With the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) just around the corner, many developers are waiting for Apple to release OS X 10.9 Beta so they can get their hands on the new operating system. However, a new report indicates that the Cupertino company is not going to give these developers much time to run their applications on the next Mac OS X.

A report from Apple Insider reveals that Apple has already worked on over 400 builds of the new OS X 10.9 that is expected to be announced during the WWDC 2013.

The report cited a piece of data it obtained from a Webkit bug report that showed that the OS X 10.9 is going through an extensive pre-release testing and the OS X 10.9 Build has already reached 451 builds.

Though the OS X 10.9 is yet to achieve the Golden Master status or the final build, rumors are rife about Apple going ahead with the Beta release of the OS X 10.9 at the WWDC.

Apple released the last two OS X versions - OS X 10.7 Lion and OS X 10.5 Mountain Lion - in July 2011 and July 2012 respectively. If the company is planning to follow the same release cycle, the developers, who will get to work on the OS X 10.9 Beta, will get less than two months to test the new OS.

The OS X 10.5 Leopard and OS X 10.7 Lion had seen over 500 builds before their Golden Master versions were released for public distribution. So far, OS X 10.5 Leopard has seen the most number of builds before public release with 581 builds under its belt.

The large number of pre-release builds is directly associated with the number of changes an OS is going to bring with it. The OS X 10.5 Leopard that went through 581 builds was termed by Apple as the largest update of Mac OS X.

The OS X 10.5 Leopard had arrived for Macs with more than 300 new features and was even seen as the most impressive Mac OS X.

The OS X 10.7 Lion saw the second largest number of builds - 511 - but it did not come with so many features like the Leopard. However, the Lion was the first OS X to incorporate features of Apple's mobile operating system, iOS, into an OS X. The Lion also changed the navigation display of installed applications with improved user interface.

Apple has, so far, not said anything about the name of the OS X 10.9. Even analysts are clueless about the name of the new OS X as Apple has used almost all the names available in Panthera genus of Felidae family.

Some developers are also of the view that Apple might release the OS X 10.9 final build at the WWDC as they don't expect the new OS X to come with major changes. They believe that the big number of builds is an indication that Apple is nearing the final release of the new Mac OS.