Apple Outlines Metal-Capable Cards Compatible With macOS Mojave on 2010 and 2012 Mac Pro Models

Apple's new macOS Mojave update is not compatible with mid-2010 and mid-2012 Mac Pros with stock GPUs, but it is supported on 2010 and 2012 Mac Pro models that have been upgraded with graphics cards that support Metal.

Apple today shared a new support document that provides a list of graphics cards that are Metal-capable, which will be useful for 2010 and 2012 Mac Pro owners who want to purchase a new graphics card to upgrade to macOS Mojave.

According to Apple, the following graphics cards are known to be Metal-capable and compatible with macOS Mojave on the mid-2010 and mid-2012 Mac Pro models:

MSI Gaming Radeon RX 560 128-bit 4GB GDDR5
SAPPHIRE Radeon PULSE RX 580 8GB GDDR5
SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 7950 Mac Edition
NVIDIA Quadro K5000 for Mac
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 Mac Edition

Apple also lists other AMD graphics cards that "might" be compatible with macOS Mojave:

AMD Radeon RX 560
AMD Radeon RX 570
AMD Radeon RX 580
AMD Radeon Pro WX 7100
AMD Radeon RX Vega 56
AMD Radeon RX Vega 64
AMD Radeon Pro WX 9100
AMD Radeon Frontier Edition

You can check to see if your graphics card is compatible by holding down option while selecting Apple logo to access System Information. Under Graphics/Displays, if "Supported" is listed next to the Metal entry, the graphics card will work with macOS Mojave.

According to Apple, once a Metal-capable graphics card has been installed in a 2010 or 2012 Mac Pro, macOS Mojave can be downloaded and installed after turning off FileVault.

Related Roundup: macOS Mojave

Top Rated Comments

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tdbmoss

21 weeks ago

Apple officially accepting that people upgrade the hardware inside Macs, accepting (and in fact supporting) that non Mac cards (i.e. PC cards) that don't show boot screens can be used, and officially supporting an OS version on third-party hardware upgrades (in fact requiring those upgrades) - all pretty much unprecedented in the history of the Mac.

A very clear admission from Apple themselves that the "trashcan" Mac Pro has been a dismal failure, as there is no way they would have even considered supporting a new OS on 5 to 8 year old hardware that requires a third-party upgrade designed for PCs under normal circumstances...

Rating: 17 Votes

bladerunner2000

21 weeks ago

Awesome. I can either stay on an older system, or replace my video card with a much, much less capable card. What to do...

Hackintosh.

Should be obvious.
[doublepost=1537840325][/doublepost]

Pre sure a 2080ti would stomp anything on that list, metal or no metal

Even a regular non-Ti 1080 would stomp all those cards. It's amazing how Apple is so cheap on the GPU end yet it hypes up their graphics so much. Hilarious.

Rating: 3 Votes

Darmok N Jalad

21 weeks ago

man this is confusing... I did some reasearch and some of these cards look like they are not expensive on amazon but I do not know for sure if they are the versions supported by OSX.

I’m sure it won’t be long before the industrious cMP community confirms compatibility. I had a non-flashed 7870 in my flashed 2009, and I’m pretty sure Metal support said yes. I don’t have my cMP anymore, so I can’t confirm.

Rating: 3 Votes

Morpheo

21 weeks ago

So... when Apple says the "MSI Gaming Radeon RX 560 128-bit 4GB GDDR5" and the "SAPPHIRE Radeon PULSE RX 580 8GB GDDR5" cards are Metal-capable, does that mean they are 'generic' cards, not 'flashed' or whatever is done for the other 3 "Mac Edition" cards?

Yes, these are not "mac edition" cards, so no boot screens, which may or may not be an issue (for me it's not). I got an RX 560, worked out of the box, drivers are included in 10.13.6 and Mojave. The 560 is perfect for my needs, doesn't need power, and is very cheap. :)

Rating: 2 Votes

Supermacguy

21 weeks ago

Unless the GM changed something, Mac Pro 2009's updated to 5,1 with a compatible card have been working since beta 2. Extremely long thread (22 pages at posting): https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/official-mojave-mac-pro-metal-gpu-card-list-finally.2124795/

Rating: 2 Votes

bunnspecial

21 weeks ago

Awesome. I can either stay on an older system, or replace my video card with a much, much less capable card. What to do...

Any of the cards recommended by Apple will absolutely murder the Radeon 5870, which was the best card shipped in these computers.

With that said, I'm keeping my 5770 and not upgrading to Mojave because my specific use case for my Mac Pro requires that I run Snow Leopard natively(not virtualized).

Rating: 2 Votes

bladerunner2000

21 weeks ago

Yep. So sad. It's the single reason I have been driven away from Apple Desktops.
I now run a water cooled PC with absolutely incredible performance. Every component is the best you can buy, and it probably still cost less than the Mac Pro.
Definitely less than the iMac Pro....

Each to their own.. but everyone should be able to agree.. Apple GPU offerings are terribly behind

I jumped ship on the desktop end about 4 years ago. Built myself a Hackintosh instead. Paid about 1/4 the price of an iMac and got about twice the performance and a whole slew of upgrade options. Not to mention; a GTX 980. Sure, it's a bit dated, but STILL holds it's own against whatever garbage Apple sells.

Only thing I need to do now is to sell my 2012 MacBook Pro and completely cut off Apple from getting any more money from me.

Rating: 2 Votes

Nunyabinez

21 weeks ago

Awesome. I can either stay on an older system, or replace my video card with a much, much less capable card. What to do...

Rating: 1 Votes

Eumaeus

21 weeks ago

I put a SAPPHIRE Radeon PULSE RX 580 8GB GDDR5 in my 2010 MacPro 5,1 over the weekend. This replaced the ATI Radeon that was original to it. $240, and it like having a new computer. Updated to Mojave today. Everything works great… Lightroom is much snappier, as is Final Cut.

This was out of the box, unflashed. I don't get the initial Apple logo on boot, but once the OS is loaded everything works as expected.

Rating: 1 Votes