Silicon based Apple Macs brings support to run iOS apps on Mac and it is one of the best features of the new M1 Macs. If you also want to run your iPhone or iPad apps on the Mac. Then, here’s the simplest way by which you can download and install iPhone apps on your Apple M1 Macbook Air, Macbook Pro, or Mac Mini.
Originally published on November 20th, updates (official method) are added at the end.
You can sideload iPhone and iPad apps on the newly launched Macs running on macOS Big Sur. Though, sideloading the IPA from third-party source to the Mac won’t work, but a third-party software, iMazing, allows you to use the iOS apps on your M1 Macs, all thanks to a reddit user for sharing the information. Not only this, but you also need the Apple ID associated with the app.
As for now, the apps like Spotify, Dark Sky, Netflix, Instagram, Facebook, and a few more works fine on the macOS Big Sur running on M1 Macs. All these apps are fit in the different sizes on the Mac, for example, the Instagram app size on Mac is as same as the iPhone Simulator. The developers of these apps have not yet uploaded the optimized version of these apps on the Mac App Store. But you can access the iOS apps on your silicon powered Mac.
Let’s dive right in.
How to Run iOS Apps on M1 Macs
To sideload the iOS apps on your Silicon Mac, you need to sideload a third-party software, named iMazing, on your Apple M1 Mac running on macOS Big Sur. The app allows you to download and install IPA files of the apps you want to install from your iPhone or iPad. Let’s take a look at the steps.
- At first, you need to download iMazing on your Mac.
- Now, plug-in your iPhone or iPad to Mac with iMazing running.
- Then, head over to Manage Apps section.
- Select Library to download the apps from Manage Apps section.
- Now download the app you want to use on your M1 Mac.
- Then, right click on the app and click Export IPA.
- That’s it.
Now head over to the downloads folder, then double click on the IPA file to install the app on your Apple Silicon Mac. Once installed, it will automatically go to the applications folder like other apps on the Mac. You can open these apps directly from the Finder or Launchpad, or even you can add it to the dock. That’s it.
This is one of the easiest ways by which you can install iOS apps on your silicon powered Mac. Although, it’s a temporary method, but you can use it until developers officially upload the apps on the Mac App Store.
After publishing this article, marketing person, from iMazing tool, emailed me and providing a statement from the company’s CEO Gregorio Zanon. The marketing person points out that iMazing is primarily made for backup, data transfer, and enterprise device management. Here you can check the full statement.
“App management has been available in iMazing since November 2017. We did not do any particular adjustments to ensure that iOS apps exported from iMazing’s library would run on Apple Silicon Macs. It turns out that when developers choose whether or not to include their mobile app on the Mac App Store, no change is made to the app itself – the setting is purely a distribution toggle.
Hundreds of thousands of iMazing users depend on our app management feature to save bandwidth. Downloading an IPA just once and installing it multiple times saves time and energy, and is ecologically sound. We understand that developers wish to control which platforms their apps run on. We’re also hopeful that Apple can find a way to limit which OS can run a specific IPA without altogether removing our ability to download apps.”
Gregorio Zanon
CEO, DigiDNA
How to Install iPhone and iPad Apps on Mac M1 (Official Method)
You can now download and install iPhone and iPad Apps directly from the App Store on your Mac M1 running MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, or Mac Mini. Here are the steps.
- At first, Open the App Store from the dock or from finder.
- Now Click on the profile icon, available at the bottom left corner on the Mac App Store home.
- Click on iPhone & iPad Apps option available on the Accounts page on App Store.
- Now you can download the iPhone or iPad app on your Mac.
- Click on download icon.
- That’s it.
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