Apple has announced that macOS 26 Tahoe will be the final macOS version to support Intel-based Macs. This means that starting next year, major new versions of macOS will only be compatible with Apple Silicon Macs.
What does this mean for future updates and versions of rhino? Are there plans to stop updating rhino for intel macs next year with the introduction of Mac OS 27? Are there any plans develop Apple Silicon only version of rhino?
We haven’t established what the minimum version of macOS is yet that Rhino 9 will require, but I’m pretty sure it isn’t going to be macOS 27. We will continue to build Rhino 9 distributions that support both architectures.
I have to take those statements back. The truth is we don’t know yet. The big issue that we are trying to figure out is what is Apple going to do with the next version of their build tools (xcode). If that only supports silicon or very poorly supports Intel, we may have to only support silicon with Rhino 9.
To add to this; we will eventually be compiling Rhino on a version of macOS that does not support Intel. In that case we would not be able to debug an Intel build even if the build tools let us create one.
We had an internal discussion about this topic today and it does look like we are leaning toward Mac Rhino 9 being Silicon only. Supporting Intel seems like it would be extremely difficult given that the life cycle for Rhino 9 would be during a period when Apple no longer supports Intel on the latest versions of their operating system and tools for building applications.
We will probably be switching to Silicon only WIPs later in July. We will also try to inform people about this switch in more than just a single discourse post.
Thank you @stevebaer. This is really helpful going forward in the future as we are defining budgets for 2026. It is really helpful to know this for our future outlook on machine purchases. Knowing this well ahead of the v9 update will allow a small shop like us to put new Apple Silicon on our roadmap. I want to have those machines in place before V9 drops and want to continue test the WIP in the meantime. Your transparency on this matter is really appreciated. I’m sure you’re not the only software developer thats going to have to make this same decision. I’m sure this will make some customers grouchy, but it is what it is and you have to do what you have to do for the betterment of your software.
Our Macs are 2018 Intel models. I find this news a bit welcoming as we needed a good reason to upgrade. No better reason than Rhino. Thank you!
Thanks for understanding. I just don’t see how we would be able to professionally support issues that may crop up on Intel Macs a few years from now. We are also figuring out how we will internally structure things so we can support late service releases of Rhino 8 after the latest macOS and xcode switch over to Silicon only (probably a year from now).
Yesterday’s RhinoWIP (for V9) may be the last that supports Intel Macs. In our current build-of-the-day, we have removed support for Intel Macs and - if all goes well - next week’s RhinoWIP will discontinue support.
Dear @stevebaer and @dan
I totally see that supporting multiple OS (Windows/Mac) with multiple Architecture (intel / AppleSilicion / OpenGL / Metal / DirectX) is challenging from a developer Point of view.
I bought my Macbook Pro “2019” in Mid of 2020. One of the decisions not to wait for a Apple Silicon Macbook Pro - that came out End of 2020 - was to be able to teach rhino (Version 7) on both Platforms with dual boot / bootcamp and vm-ware - but on one machine.
As the interface had - and still has - so many differences on both platforms.
And if i have a one-to-one teaching setup, i want to show the same system as may client / student has.
I now quite a few people that bought “the last intel” macbook pro.
If Rhino Wip and V9 will not support Intel - it will make me - and I am sure many others - very angry. Other Teachers, other customers.
Please consider that one of the main customer group of Rhino are small companies with only a few employees. And Rhino made a huge step in supporting both Platforms.
Rhino is also quite established in the educational sector - and I don t need to tell you how much time a school or university takes to update their hardware - I am sure many educational institutes will only laugh, if the CAD-Teacher tells them to buy new hardware to be able to run V9.
The same for many companies with an architectural / design focus, where apple serves the majority of hardware.
You will cut of feedback for the V9 development from quite a few users - including me - and those users will be forced to buy new hardware if they want to upgrade to V9 - for example to support their customers with the latest version.
Supporting and Pushing those replacements / hardware renewal also has a ecological aspect - you are indirectly supporting the ugly policy of planned obsolescence of apple and others. - resulting in more electronic scrap.
Please reconsider your decision, and please also do this together with some of the bigger resellers and people that teach a lot - my guess they will tell you similar arguments as I did in this post.
( @Helvetosaur what do you think ?)
kind regards - tom
This decision was not taken lightly and is about our ability to support users of Rhino 9.
During most if not all of the lifetime of Rhino 9, the up to date version of macOS will only run on Silicon chips. In order to support Rhino 9 on Intel, we would need to be able to compile and debug Rhino on Intel machines. This essentially means that we would need to lock all developers to Tahoe at max since the build tools also change with each version of macOS. If we brought in a new hire, we would have to search around for older Intel based Macs for them to work on as new Macs purchased from Apple would have the latest operating system installed. If we bought a new build machine, we would also need to find something used. Even with all of that said we recently discovered an Intel only compiler bug with the latest version of xcode that we luckily found a work around for. It will become harder to ask Apple to fix Intel specific xcode bugs once the latest xcode/macOS is silicon only.
We will continue to sell and support Rhino 8 for the Intel Mac users.
And in a strange twist of events we may be able to support Rhino 9 on Intel Macs running Parallels or VMWare if the whole Direct3D project works as well as we think it should.
I fully unterstand this is a challenging developer setup.
did you check if a virtual machine / VDI solution might solve the ugly hardware issue ?
I am not a expert in this field. with a fast search i found
?
That link does not address the problem I’m trying to describe. I am aware of cloud based development environments. I personally would hate to have to develop code that way, but that is just personal preference.
The compiler used to build Mac rhino is called xcode. When the next macOS is released; Apple typically also releases a new version of xcode. At that point in time the compiler will only work on Silicon based Macs. We may be able to build for Intel and possibly even debug using Rosetta, but I do not believe it is a good way to support a product.
I would really appreciate an “inoffical” support for older intel macs - inoffical in the same way virtual machine got not supported - but work quite well.
(system requirements will quote apple silicon only).
It would be nice to have this inoffical intel support at least until an early V9 SR - until the major Bugs / glitches are solved.
I hope you have usage data / statistics to judge how many mac users still have intel hardware - my guess: at least 15-20%
kind regards - tom
The number is currently close to 15% (and dropping) and no we will not be compiling an unofficial version for Intel Macs.
Would we expect in any performance in enhancement in the WIP V9 once the legacy code is cut out and only compiled for Apple Silicone? My hopes that once the code is doing the double duty supplying resources to support both architectures that would be beneficial to the program’s performance overall. I am not sure how much Rhino was relying on Rosetta 2.
Btw… We have updated to Apple M4 Macs since my first post. I can’t believe the boost in performance on render side of thing and the responsiveness of the display modes. Upgrading was a wise choice for us. I am seeing improvements across the board in Rhino 8. Makes me think V9 will be exciting, being that is compiled specifically for Apple processors and GPU. I’m not a programmer, so maybe this is not how it works. Just curious.
@Tom_P
Per your post, I have updated the title of the post to better reflect what the tread is about.
No, I would not expect any performance increases on Apple Silicon due to removing the Intel slices. I would expect the app bundle size to decrease by up to ~350 MB (not a big deal, I know). This shrinkage will happen over time as we root out the libraries that still contain the Intel bits.
There will not be a performance improvement.
Hi @stevebaer, is this the percentage of Intel-based Mac in the RhinoWIP users, or in the Rhino 8 users ? In Dan’s notice, it looks like RhinoWIP, which sounds like a poor way to evaluate the potential users of Rhino 9…
It’s the percentage of RhinoWIP users*. However, it’s about the same breakdown (percentage wise) in Rhino 8 for Mac. The percentage of Rhino for Mac users in both groups is shrinking at the same rate.
*Actually, the percentage you’re referring to is from a different topic (macOS Sequoia vs earlier macOS), but coincidentally, they are about the same. Today, the percentage of Intel Mac users - in both the WIP and V8 - is ~13% (and falling).
Just cross-posting a bit of text from a different topic here:
Today is Monday, 21 July, 2025. We plan to ship the first RhinoWIP that drops Intel support tomorrow, Tuesday, 22 July. That means that the current RhinoWIP (shipped on 15 July) - 9.0.25196.12306 - still supports Intel. You can download 9.0.25196.12306 if you don’t already have it. That RhinoWIP expires around the end of August. As of right now, you have 39 days to use that RhinoWIP. After we ship the next RhinoWIP, refrain from updating. If you accidentally do update, just download it again…it will continue working until it expires at the end of August.
so that it does not get lost in the shuffle.