Apple says Macs with new Apple-designed chips can natively run iOS apps, thanks to the shared architecture, available through the Mac App Store
Chaim Gartenberg / The Verge : Tweets: @siracusa , @mishaalrahman , @mpesce , @topjohnwu , @backlon , @spencerdailey , @stroughtonsmith , and @neilcybart Tweets: John Siracusa / @siracusa : So, uh, how do you do multi-touch on iOS and iPadOS apps running on Big Sur? Will it work like the Simulator does today? Mishaal Rahman / @mishaalrahman : Google tried to do this with Android apps on Chrome OS but gave developers few reasons to care about optimizing their layouts for larger screens. I have no doubt that Apple will handle this much better. https://twitter.com/... @mpesce : Macs with new Apple-built chips will natively run iPhone and iPad apps - The Verge // the biggest news from WWDC sees the final blurring between desktop and handheld UX https://www.theverge.com/... John Wu / @topjohnwu : People might not realize, but iOS and macOS is basically the same OS. The existence of Catalyst is proof. The only difference here is that it is using the same SOC as iOS devices, so the binaries don't need to be recompiled like Catalyst. https://twitter.com/... Dieter Bohn / @backlon : There's a world in which this plays out as only a very few pro-level apps and some electron developers bother making traditional Mac apps anymore. https://www.theverge.com/... Spencer Dailey / @spencerdailey : @Techmeme @cgartenberg you know what would make sense to have in the pipeline, now more than ever? Touchscreen Macs Steve Troughton-Smith / @stroughtonsmith : macOS 11 running iOS apps unmodified, directly from the App Store, is a shot across the bow of any developers thinking they could sit out Catalyst and avoid adding Mac-specific APIs until some nebulous ‘future’ where they can rewrite their entire UIs in SwiftUI. Time's now! Neil Cybart / @neilcybart : ~90% of Apple users don't use, and probably will never use, a Mac. Goes to show how the iPhone has transformed Apple's installed base and ecosystem over the past 10 years. https://twitter.com/...
Context & Ripple Effects
This announcement lands where the coverage predicted it would: analyst Ming-Chi Kuo had already pegged the first ARM-based Mac within 12 to 18 months, and last week's technical deep dive into the rumored x86-to-ARM transition flagged app compatibility as the central question. Today's news answers it — rather than forcing developers to rewrite anything, Apple says the shared chip architecture lets existing iOS apps run natively and ship through the Mac App Store.
The move also reframes Catalyst. Developers have been blunt that Catalyst handles mouse and window support well but buckles on complicated apps; native execution makes that porting framework optional for much of the catalog instead of the main bridge.
First-order effects
- iOS developers gain the entire Mac App Store audience for free — their existing apps run as-is on the new Apple-designed chips, while Intel Mac owners are excluded until/unless apps are rebuilt.
- Catalyst's role shrinks from primary porting path to fallback, since native iOS binaries now cover simpler apps that Catalyst was mainly used for.
Second-order effects
- Google's earlier attempt at the same trick — Android apps on Chrome OS — stalled because developers saw little reason to optimize for larger screens; Apple's tighter hardware-software control puts pressure on that model and raises the bar for any rival ecosystem trying app-level convergence.
- App Store economics stretch across another platform: more weekly visitors (Apple cites over 800 million) exposed to search results and listings, strengthening the storefront's position against Mac-native distribution channels like direct downloads.
Third-order effects
- If iOS apps run natively alongside macOS apps, the historical distinction between 'mobile' and 'desktop' software erodes at the silicon level — Apple converges iPadOS toward desktop-style multitasking (as later reported for iPadOS 16) from one direction and pulls Mac toward mobile apps from the other.
- The pattern points toward a single developer target: one codebase, one review process, one store spanning phone, tablet, and laptop — which concentrates both developer dependence on Apple's terms and regulatory scrutiny of those terms.
The trend: Apple is collapsing its device platforms onto shared custom silicon so that one App Store and one codebase serve iPhone, iPad, and Mac alike — the endgame of the ARM transition.