Apple’s choice to make macOS Tahoe the final model to assist Intel Macs goes to trigger monumental issues for OpenCore and Hackintosh customers. The communities are taking the information fairly nicely.
Apple’s working system bulletins throughout WWDC 2025 included macOS 26 Tahoe among the many inbound fall updates. Nonetheless, whereas the model quantity change and the transfer to Liquid Glass for the consumer interface had been the principle speaking factors, its assist adjustments had been additionally essential.
Confirmed as a part of the WWDC Platforms State of the Union tackle, macOS Tahoe would be the last launch to incorporate assist for Intel Macs. Apple’s future macOS releases will likely be only for Apple Silicon Mac fashions, which it not so subtly hinted builders ought to lastly swap over to in the event that they hadn’t already.
“Apple Silicon allows us all to realize issues that had been beforehand unimaginable,” Apple’s video defined. “And it is time to put all of our focus and innovation there.”
The announcement of the tip of assist wasn’t totally sudden. The corporate has already moved away from promoting Intel Macs in favor of an all-Apple Silicon lineup for a while.
With all Intel Mac mini fashions classed as out of date or classic again in April, it was a case of ready for the opposite shoe to drop. It simply occurred to happen in June 2025.
For the final Intel Mac releases from 2020, there’ll nonetheless be full assist in macOS till September 2026, when the subsequent macOS model will get its full public launch.
After that, safety updates solely. And even then, not essentially all the fixes that totally supported {hardware} will get.
Supporting the unsupported
The information clearly impacts different customers of older Macs. It hits those that use OpenCore or have hacked macOS onto generic Intel {hardware} laborious too.
When Apple releases an working system, if it deems {hardware} to be too previous to run it correctly to take it off the supported units record, the set up is not going to proceed on that Mac. With out trying elsewhere for help, customers could be caught on the previous-generation working system, unable to make use of the present macOS model.
For customers who actually wish to use newer macOS variations on older {hardware} that does not formally assist it, there’s OpenCore as a workaround.
The 2018 Mac mini was the final within the vary to make use of an Intel processor
OpenCore Legacy Patcher (OCLP) makes use of the OpenCore bootloader to patch and allow compatibility with newer variations of macOS than a {hardware} usually helps. Whereas new options could not essentially work to Apple’s requirements on older {hardware}, necessitating the tip of assist, OpenCore overrides Apple’s lockouts and permits the older {hardware} to run anyway.
This expands the usable lifespan of older Mac {hardware}, by letting it run newer macOS variations.
For OpenCore, Apple’s elimination of Intel assist for the subsequent macOS model shouldn’t be one thing that may merely be patched round. Apple will not be retaining any Intel-specific parts in its code base, which means no x86_64 kernel nor binaries to fall again onto.
A patch in OpenCore would not have something to work with, and so could be pointless.
Whereas OpenCore Legacy Patcher will not be capable of assist get future macOS variations operating on Intel Macs, there’s nonetheless some life within the undertaking. It can nonetheless be capable of assist preserve older Mac fashions alive and utilizing later-than-intentioned macOS variations for the foreseeable future.
The fallout from members of the OCLP neighborhood appears to be measured, however upset. Most of the posts on Reddit about Apple’s assist pull clarify clearly that the dearth of future updates is due to a technological limitation that may’t be labored round.
There are additionally reminders that OCLP in all probability will not migrate over to Apple Silicon, due to Apple’s safety that must be overwhelmed. The T2 safety chip remains to be interfering with some performance of OCLP on Intel Macs, and Apple Silicon is a a lot harder nut to crack.
A shift over to Linux is proposed by some as a doable manner ahead as soon as assist lastly stops.
The non-Mac facet
The opposite group that will likely be hit by the change of assist will likely be Hackintosh customers. Referring to computer systems that aren’t Macs however are made to have the ability to run macOS anyway, they too will stop to have the ability to run future releases past macOS Tahoe for {hardware} causes.
Once more, the anticipated removing of Intel-related options and code from the working system will make it nigh inconceivable to get macOS to run on PC {hardware}.
The one vaguely believable workaround could be to someway emulate the Apple Silicon model to run on x86 structure. At that time, you would not be operating macOS on naked metallic, as you’d be counting on introducing a stage of abstraction that can influence efficiency.
The Mac Professional was Apple’s final Intel-based Mac that it offered in 2023
Very like OCLP, Hackintosh initiatives will not be capable of progress to future releases, and can discover macOS Tahoe because the final actual model of macOS that they’ll be capable of run with out an excessive amount of hassle.
The neighborhood response is pretty much like OCLP’s, with Hackintosh Redditors resigned to it being the final hurrah for the Intel Mac. Posts mark the finish of assist, with some expressing that they wish to take pleasure in assist whereas it nonetheless exists.
As for macOS Tahoe, customers have already labored out easy methods to get it operating on their Hackintosh setups, barely per week after the primary beta’s launch. Customers are nonetheless posting their successes in getting their Hackintosh engaged on the beta, or asking others for help, seemingly as regular.
Whereas it isn’t fairly the identical stage because the musicians taking part in because the Titanic sinks, there’s nonetheless a sense of joviality inside the area.
That feeling could change in a yr’s time when the assist iceberg turns into an actual downside. However for now, it is enterprise nearly as common.
Hackintosh and OCLP will each be missed
A number of staffers right here, together with one co-author of this piece, have performed each Hackintosh and OCLP. Within the case of Mike Wuerthele, he used his Mac Professional for his each day work, and constructed a house server round Core 2 Quad {hardware} in 2009. That lasted till about 2013.
Mike additionally stored that 3,1 Mac Professional that he was utilizing for skilled work whereas utilizing the Hackintosh for service for a lot longer than its operational life steered he ought to. Elements of his house server had been shifted to that Mac Professional when he went to MacBook Professional as a principal machine in 2011, with different facets leaping to a 2012 Mac mini in 2015.
When it fell out of vogue with Apple, he used what grew to become OCLP to maintain that Mac Professional updated for a really very long time. It served recordsdata and supplied a Minecraft server to his pals for a very long time.
Even for the Apple religious, of which which Mike actually counts, Hackintosh and OCLP had been on the very least enjoyable initiatives. It feels very very like the tip of an period, which we have spoken about earlier than.
Apple Silicon is nice. Retaining previous {hardware} operating for a very long time stays plenty of enjoyable.
The previous {hardware} will not mild on fireplace when assist ends, in fact. Intel Macs will likely be round for a while, caught in a closet right here, utilized in an exhibit there, doing industrial management over there.
What they wont be, is up to date. It will take about 10 years for the final of them to go successfully extinct, like Energy PC did about 10 years in the past.
However within the shorter time period, Hackintosh and OCLP will likely be missed.