Shortly after Apple’s announcement of their M1 Mac computers, Parallels announced that they will be working on an M1 compatible version of their software. The good news is that Parallels has since reached out to customers informing them that the latest version of the app that is compatible with the M1 chipset is now available through the Mac Technical Preview Program.
For those unfamiliar, the Technical Preview program is basically like a beta of sorts where users get to try the software ahead of its release, and also provide feedback to the developer regarding bugs. It is not necessarily meant to be used as a daily driver, but it is stable enough for a limited public release.
That being said, it should be noted that while Parallels will support the M1 chipset, its functionality will still be somewhat hampered. This is because for the most part, Mac users use Parallels to run Windows. However, the M1 version of Parallels will only support ARM-based operating systems.
As it stands, Microsoft does not have a publicly available version of their ARM-based Windows that users can purchase separately. This means that even if Parallels is installed on an M1 Mac, you won’t be able to run Windows on it until Microsoft decides to start selling a standalone version of the ARM-based Windows, or unless you’re part of Microsoft’s Windows Insider Program, which you can request to join here.
Filed in . Read more about M1, Microsoft, Parallels, Windows and Windows 10. Source: macrumors