MacOS Big Sur on new M1 chip will run apps faster and smoother

This story is part of Apple Event, our full coverage of the latest news from Apple headquarters.

At a virtual event on Tuesday, Apple unveiled new Macs that run on its new M1 chip for Macs, which will bring major improvements to app performance on its new operating system, MacOS Big Sur. 

With MacOS Big Sur running on Macs with the new Apple silicon-based M1 chip, launching apps is nearly instantaneous, Craig Federighi, senior vice president of software engineering at Apple, said during the event. With Safari, the OS will run JavaScript one and a half times faster, and the entire system will be almost twice as responsive — so apps that require strong performance to render 3D animations or edit raw video footage will run more smoothly. 

“We’ve optimized all of our apps for M1,” Federighi said.

The M1 chip will also bring increased security, including hardware verified secure boot, automatic high performance encryption for all of your files and MacOS run-time protections. All together, this gives you “the most advanced security of any personal computer,” Federighi said. 

MacOS Big Sur also brings universal apps, which can run on an Intel- or M1-based Mac. Adobe is releasing universal versions of its apps, starting with Lightroom next month and Photoshop early next year. 

For the first time ever, you’ll be able to run iPhone and iPad apps directly on your Mac, Federighi said.

MacOS Big Sur will roll out to all users on Thursday. For more, find out if your Mac is compatible with Big Sur, and how to download MacOS Big Sur.