MacVisor

Overview

Virtual machines for Apple Silicon Macs. macOS, Windows 11, Linux and FreeBSD guests, with AI sandboxes as a Tech Preview.

MacVisor runs virtual machines on Apple Silicon Macs, using Apple's Virtualization framework. You manage them in the MacVisor app, or in Terminal with the mvz command, which can do nearly everything the app does and gives JSON output for scripts.

The MacVisor library window with an Ubuntu Desktop VM's Overview, and the VM running in its own window.

What it runs

GuestMade fromGood to know
macOSApple's installers, or your own IPSWmacOS 27 guests skip Setup Assistant and install the MacVisor Agent themselves. Apple's accelerated graphics. See macOS guests.
Windows 11 on ARMMicrosoft's ISO, installed unattendedMacVisor's own display device: any size, sharp on Retina, with sound and a microphone. See Windows 11 guests.
LinuxCloud images: Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, Rocky Linux, AlmaLinux, Oracle Linux, CentOS Stream, openSUSE Leap, Alpine. Or any ARM64 installer ISO.cloud-init sets up your account and SSH keys, and can add a container runtime, a read-only share of your home folder and, on Ubuntu, a desktop. See Linux guests.
FreeBSDFreeBSD 15.1 or a 16.0-CURRENT snapshot, from MacVisor's image catalogueNo display after the loader: you use it over SSH and its console. See FreeBSD guests.

What you can do

  • Work in VMs from Terminal. mvz shell into any VM, reach it by name as dev.mvz, use its Docker or k3s from the Mac, and open a Linux or FreeBSD VM's serial console.
  • Share with the Mac. The MacVisor Agent, which runs in each VM, adds shared folders, clipboard, file transfer, port forwarding and mvz shell. MacVisor installs it in the VMs it sets up (cloud-image Linux and FreeBSD, Windows, macOS 27); in others you install it by hand. USB devices plugged into the Mac can be passed through to a VM.
  • Snapshot, clone and back up. Take live or disk-only snapshots, make linked clones in seconds, and run daily, weekly or on-demand backups to another drive or a share, restorable on any Mac.
  • Network VMs. NAT, bridging, VLANs, and named networks with DHCP, DNS, port forwards and a firewall the Mac enforces.
  • Bring your VMs. Import VirtualBuddy, UTM, tart and Parallels Desktop VMs, or start from a raw, ASIF or qcow2 disk image.
  • Run an always-on host. Headless VMs that start at login, run from the menu bar or over SSH, are restarted after a crash or a failed health check (high availability), and can run hooks when they start or stop.
  • Give AI agents a VM (Tech Preview: works, with known limits). AI sandboxes run a coding agent such as Claude Code, Codex or Goose in a disposable VM, and you review its changes before they reach your project. Over MCP, agents on your Mac can use the VMs you open to them, as far as you allow.

Requirements

  • An Apple Silicon Mac with macOS 27. Windows guests need macOS 27.2.
  • ARM64 guests. MacVisor doesn't emulate x86, so x86 images don't boot. x86-64 programs still run inside Linux guests through Rosetta 2, and in Windows through its own emulation.
  • Nested virtualization (KVM in a Linux guest) needs an M3 or later.
  • macOS guests: the MacVisor Agent needs macOS 14 or later, and automatic setup needs a macOS 27 guest.

Memory, disk space and network for each kind of guest are in System requirements.

How it works

A background service owns your VM library and runs each VM in its own process. The app and mvz both talk to that service. So closing the app or a VM's window doesn't stop a VM, and one VM failing doesn't affect the others. See Architecture.

Each VM is a .mvz package holding its configuration, disks and snapshots, and you can keep VMs in several storage locations. A template is a VM kept as a base for new ones. VMs made from a cloud image are linked clones of its template: they share its disk, so they're made in seconds and take little space.

Next steps

  1. Install and activate MacVisor.
  2. Make your first VM with the Quickstart.
  3. Find your way around the MacVisor interface.