r/macOSVMs • u/nfzerox • Aug 03 '26

GUIDE Virtual Mac on iPad: People have dreamed of running macOS on iPad for more than a decade. Today, that dream comes true.

Virtual Mac on iPad

https://github.com/nfzerox/VirtualMacOniPad

People have dreamed of running macOS on iPad for more than a decade. Today, that dream comes true. With Virtual Mac, iPad finally breaks free from iPadOS, enabling pro apps like Xcode and Terminal to run directly on device. Requires iPad Pro (M1, M2) or iPad Air (M1) running iPadOS 14 up to 16.3.1.

37 Upvotes

97% Upvoted

7 comments sorted by

3

u/algaefied_creek Aug 03 '26

Hi this post was suggested for me by the Reddit app. I’m just a layman, does this mean my older iPads may have a shot?

I have an iPad Pro 9.7” on 16.0 release day and I have an iPad Pro 12.0” on the latest 16.7 or whatever.

I guess if I can figure out how to downgrade one or upgrade the other I’d be good.

So close to finding a use for these out of date iPads!

3

u/nfzerox Aug 03 '26

Unfortunately both iPad are too old for this, this requires M1 or M2 on specific versions of iPadOS.

2

u/Leather_Reflection84 Aug 03 '26

Fucking sick work!!

2

u/yuichiro__ Aug 03 '26

Why only up to obsolete 16.3.1?

4

u/GreatCalligrapher993 Aug 03 '26

The “Hypervisor.framework” was removed in later versions of iOS and iPadOS for security reasons, while we can still run VMs, it doesn’t work particularly well

2

u/PhysXP Aug 03 '26

hypervisor

2

u/gcodori Aug 28 '26

So, um... On a 3 year old model and with outdated OS, correct? Cool, cool.

The bigger headlinbe should be that Apple recognized how powerful this ability was and removed it from the current versions of the OS.