We Live in a Beta World

For Wired's 20th anniversary, we revisit beta testing. It used to come before an official public launch, inside stuff for insiders. Now? We live in a beta world.
Image may contain Human and Person

Beta testing used to be like a prerelease screening of a movie: A limited number of users see an all-but-final product for one last round of feedback. Beta came before an official public launch, inside stuff for insiders. Now? We live in a beta world.

Many of the big-name products and features you use all the time, stuff like Google Maps' bicycle directions and Apple's virtual assistant, Siri, are technically still in beta. For a lot of new mobile apps, beta isn't a final testing phase; it's an indication that work will continue indefinitely—and a handy excuse if the product is flawed. Why is Siri still in beta? Will some future Siri do more? Faster? Better? Apple isn't saying. In the case of SugarSync, whose new Android app has been in beta since February, the cross-device synchronization software is "really great, close, but not quite final," chief marketing officer Paul Sebastien says. This way, he adds, users have influence over the finished product. Which is due ... any day now.

When Gmail launched in 2004, it was a traditional beta: limited users, narrow functionality. But Google released it worldwide in 2007—and it stayed in beta for two more years, picking up millions of users. That's a lot of beta.

The beta designation used to mean that a product wasn't finished. Now we know they never will be. Companies like Microsoft and Apple have trained us to expect updates and new versions forever. What's in beta? Everything.