I recently updated to Ventura on a laptop that was running Monterey this morning. I hat Ventura. I want to go back to Monterey however the appstore says that I cannot download Monterey on a newer laptop. Before any such recommendations appear, I do NOT have an external hard drive or a time machine. All I have is a 32 gb thumb drive. How can I forcefully download the files to downgrade, or have I just ruined my laptop?
you may try the command-lines shown here to obtain Monterey, ( at this point, Jan-2023, i suggest to use 12.6.1 ),
so change the "10.15.7" in that linked page, into "12.6.1"
if earlier macOS has important data, then you must/need to backup ...
use the 32GB USB drive, if that can hold all, thats great ...
otherwise ...
obtain "iCould" data backup service ,it is a remote-hosting server (aka: cloud based hosting) , you can use that to backup your files/data.
get low-cost hdd-enclosure based usb hard drive ... sufficient for TimeMachine backup.
No Time Machine backup ?
To Downgrade back to Monterey and Not Loose all your Personal Data etc will required Reformatting the Entire Drive to Zero Data on the computer
Then reinstalling the Entire Operating System from Scratch
Stop Immediately and get a Drive that is alert 2 1/2 to 3 X larger than your internal Drive
Then take the time to do a TM Backup before moving forwards
In this article below there are two methods, depending on if this is an Intel Computer or Apple Silicon M1/M2 Computer
https://www.howtoisolve.com/downgrade-macos-ventura-to-macos-monterey/
Follow on - Exactly what is the Computer year and exactly what version of maCO was installed when it came out of the box as New
About this Mac without the Serial number
Cannot download Monterey on a Ventura laptop
