macOS Catalina
The power of Mac.
Taken further.
Featuring all-new, dedicated apps for music and podcasts. Smart new features in the apps you use every day. And Sidecar, which lets you use iPad as a second Mac display.
macOS Catalina gives you more of everything you love about Mac. Experience music and podcasts in two all-new Mac apps. Enjoy your favorite iPad apps now on your Mac. Extend your workspace and expand your creativity with iPad and Apple Pencil. And discover smart new features in the apps you use every day. Now you can take everything you do above and beyond.
iTunes forever changed the way people experienced music and podcasts. It all changes again with new, dedicated apps — Apple Music and Apple Podcasts — each designed from the ground up to be the best way to enjoy entertainment on your Mac. And rest assured; everything you had in your iTunes library is still accessible in each app. iCloud seamlessly syncs everything across your devices — or you can back up, restore, and sync by connecting the device directly to your Mac.
The new Apple Music app is the ultimate music streaming experience on Mac. Enjoy all the music you’ve collected over the years and find it all in your music library on all your devices.
The best entertainment, comedy, news, and sports shows are now available on your Mac with Apple Podcasts. Search for podcasts by title, topic, guest, host, content, and more. Subscribe and be notified as soon as new episodes become available. And in the Listen Now tab, you can easily pick up where you left off across all your devices.
Experience your favorite iPad apps now on your Mac. With Mac Catalyst, developers can easily create Mac apps from the iPad apps you already know and love. They run natively alongside your existing Mac apps so you can drag and drop content between them. They take full advantage of the larger screen and powerful architecture of your Mac. And because they are built from their iOS versions, they provide a seamless experience across your devices. Enjoy a broad range of Mac apps — from travel, entertainment, and gaming to banking, education, and project management.
Developers are continuing to build for Catalyst as many more of your favorite iPad apps will be coming to Mac.
With macOS Catalina, the apps you love are now more beautiful and intelligent than ever. So your everyday tasks are easier than ever.
Focus on your best shots.
Photos has a new immersive, dynamic look that showcases your photos and memories. See only the best shots in your library, without the duplicates and clutter. Browse your favorite photos by days, months, and years and get larger previews of all your photos. And Photos is even smarter, so it can highlight important moments like birthdays, anniversaries, and trips.
Sidecar lets you extend your workspace by using your iPad as a second Mac display.1 Work in one app while you reference another or view your artwork on your Mac while you use tools and palettes on your iPad. You can also mirror the screens so they both display the same content, making it perfect for sharing exactly what you see with others.
View the Sidecar white paper (PDF)Bring the ease and precision of Apple Pencil to your favorite creative Mac apps with Sidecar.2 Just drag your app window from your Mac to your iPad as you would with any second display. Then use Apple Pencil to design in Illustrator, edit photos in Affinity Photo, or create 3D models in ZBrush. The handy sidebar puts essential Command, Control, and Shift keys right at your fingertips.
Use Apple Pencil for everyday tasks like drawing and sketching or marking up screenshots and PDFs. You can easily insert a sketch from your iPad into any document on your Mac.
Discover all the amazing apps that are compatible with Sidecar, including illustration, photography, and 3D apps.
Adobe Illustrator
Affinity Photo
Cinema 4D
Maya
ZBrush
macOS Catalina brings all your favorite Screen Time features to Mac, giving you greater insight into how you’re spending your time. Monitor usage, schedule downtime, and set limits for both apps and websites across all your devices. And with Family Sharing, you can set app and communication limits for your kids to help them focus on the right things.
With macOS Catalina, there are enhanced security features to better protect macOS against tampering, help ensure that the apps you use are safe, and give you greater control over access to your data. And it’s even easier to find your Mac if it’s lost or stolen.
The Apple T2 Security Chip keeps your Mac secure by ensuring that you’re running trusted software and automatically encrypting your stored data. It also provides secure authentication for Touch ID. And now macOS Catalina features Activation Lock, so only you can erase and reactivate your Mac.
macOS Catalina runs in its own read-only volume, so it’s separate from all other data on your Mac, and nothing can accidentally overwrite your system files. And Gatekeeper ensures that new apps you install have been checked for known security issues before you run them, so you’re always using good software.
Apps must now get your permission before directly accessing files in your Documents and Desktop folders, iCloud Drive, and external volumes, so you’re always in control of your data. And you’ll be prompted before any app can capture keyboard activity or a photo or video of your screen.
The new Find My app combines Find My iPhone and Find My Friends into a single, easy-to-use app on Mac, iPad, and iPhone. Find My can help you locate a missing Mac — even if it’s offline and sleeping — by sending out Bluetooth signals that can be detected by Apple devices in use nearby. They can then relay the detected location of your Mac to iCloud so you can locate it in the Find My app.
It’s all anonymous and encrypted end-to-end so no one, including Apple, knows the identity of any reporting device. And because the reporting happens silently using tiny bits of data that piggyback on existing network traffic, there’s no need to worry about your battery life, your data usage, or your privacy.
macOS Catalina includes new features to help everyone get the most out of Mac. Tools for users with low vision allow you to zoom in on a paragraph of text or the entire screen.
2017 and later
(all models)
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