How Apple silicon Macs changed virtualization: Native macOS hypervisor replaces third-party tools
By
@howardnoakley
1mo ago· 7 min readenInsight
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Summary
Apple has fundamentally changed how virtualization works on Apple silicon Macs by building virtualization support directly into macOS, unlike Intel Macs where third-party tools like VMware and Parallels handled everything. This architectural shift means older macOS versions and other operating systems require Apple's native hypervisor framework, changing how developers approach virtualization on the new Arm-based hardware.
Key quotes
· 2 pulledApple decided that the only practical way to support virtualisation on its new Mac hardware was to build it into macOS.
Virtualising macOS, Linux and Windows on Intel Macs has been relatively straightforward, and device support left to the developer. That won't work for Apple silicon Macs.
Virtualising macOS, Linux and Windows on Intel Macs has been relatively straightforward, and device support left to the developer. That won’t work for Apple silicon Macs. This explains what h…
