Hands-On With macOS Catalina

Apple this week unveiled macOS Catalina, the newest version of the macOS software designed to run on Macs. macOS Catalina is launching this fall, but it is available now in a beta capacity for developers.

In our latest video, we went hands-on with macOS Catalina to explore all of the new features that are coming to the Mac later this year.


One of the most notable changes in Catalina is the elimination of the iTunes app, which has been a key Mac feature since 2001. In Catalina, iTunes has been replaced by three apps: Music, Podcasts, and TV (coming later in the year).

The new apps can do everything that iTunes can do, so Mac users aren't going to be losing any functionality. As for device management, that's now done using the Finder app. When you plug in an iPhone or an iPad, it'll show right up in Finder, with all of the same management and syncing features available.

The TV, Podcasts, and Music apps look similar to iTunes and have similar features, which should make the transition easy for most Mac users. On Macs with a 4K display, such as the iMac, the new TV app will support 4K HDR playback for the first time, along with Dolby Atmos sound.

macOS Catalina has a useful new Sidecar feature, designed to turn the ‌iPad‌ into a secondary display for the Mac. It can work as a traditional second display or with a mirroring feature. Apple Pencil support works with ‌Sidecar‌, so you can turn your ‌iPad‌ into a drawing tablet using apps like Photoshop.

For those with an Apple Watch set up to unlock the Mac, there's now an option to approve security prompts in Catalina by tapping on the side button of the watch. Macs with a T2 chip in them also support Activation Lock, making them useless to thieves much as it does on the ‌iPhone‌.

There's a new Find My app that lets you track your lost devices, and previously, this functionality was only available via iCloud on the Mac. There's even a new option to find your devices even when they're offline by leveraging Bluetooth connections to other nearby devices, something that's particularly handy on the Mac because it doesn't have a cellular connection.

Apple is expanding Screen Time to the Mac in Catalina, letting Apple users track their device usage across Mac, iOS, and ‌iPad‌ for a better overall picture of time spent using electronics.

For developers, a "Project Catalyst" feature lets apps designed for the ‌iPad‌ be ported over to the Mac with just a few clicks in Xcode and some minor tweaks. Apple's ultimate goal with Project Catalyst is to bring more apps to the Mac.

Photos has an updated interface that better highlights your best pictures, Safari includes a new start page with Siri Suggestions, Mail has a new feature for blocking emails and another new option for muting threads, and the Reminders app has been overhauled and is now more useful.

Notably, macOS Catalina does away with 32-bit app support, so some of your older apps are going to stop working. The operating system will let you know which apps are now defunct once you upgrade.

macOS Catalina is available to developers, but it shouldn't be installed on a main machine and this time because it's not particularly stable and has quite a few bugs. Apple plans to make a Catalina beta available for public beta testers in July, and following a few months of testing to iron out bugs and refine features, macOS Catalina will launch in the fall.

Related Forum: macOS Catalina

Popular Stories

M5 MacBook Pro

Apple Announces New 14-Inch MacBook Pro With M5 Chip

Wednesday October 15, 2025 6:07 am PDT by
Apple today updated the 14-inch MacBook Pro base model with its new M5 chip, which is also available in updated iPad Pro and Vision Pro models. In addition, the base 14-inch MacBook Pro can now be configured with up to 4TB of storage on Apple's online store, whereas the previous model maxed out at 2TB. However, the maximum amount of unified RAM available for this model remains 32GB. Like...
Apple iPad Pro hero M5

Apple Debuts New iPad Pro With M5 Chip, Faster Charging, and More

Wednesday October 15, 2025 6:16 am PDT by
Apple today announced the next-generation iPad Pro, featuring the custom-designed M5, C1X, and N1 chips. The M5 chip has up to a 10-core CPU, with four performance cores and six efficiency cores. It features a next-generation GPU with Neural Accelerator in each core, allowing the new iPad Pro to deliver up to 3.5x the AI performance than the previous model, and a third-generation ray-tracing ...
iphone air thickness

Apple Said to Cut iPhone Air Production Amid Underwhelming Sales

Friday October 17, 2025 8:29 am PDT by
Apple plans to cut production of the iPhone Air amid underwhelming sales performance, Japan's Mizuho Securities believes (via The Elec). The Japanese investment banking and securities firm claims that the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max are seeing higher sales than their predecessors during the same period last year, while the standard iPhone 17 is a major success, performing...
maxresdefault

Here's Everything Apple Announced Today

Wednesday October 15, 2025 3:54 pm PDT by
We didn't get a second fall event this year, but Apple did unveil updated products with a series of press releases that went out today. The M5 chip made an appearance in new MacBook Pro, Vision Pro, and iPad Pro models. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. We've rounded up our coverage and highlighted the main feature changes for each device below. MacBook Pro M5...
HomePod mini and Apple TV

Apple's Next Rumored Products: New HomePod Mini, Apple TV, and More

Thursday October 16, 2025 9:13 am PDT by
Apple on Wednesday updated the 14-inch MacBook Pro, iPad Pro, and Vision Pro with its next-generation M5 chip, but previous rumors have indicated that the company still plans to announce at least a few additional products before the end of the year. The following Apple products have at one point been rumored to be updated in 2025, although it is unclear if the timeframe for any of them has...
Vision Pro M5 Announcement

Apple Updates Vision Pro With M5 Chip, Dual Knit Band, and 120Hz Support

Wednesday October 15, 2025 6:14 am PDT by
Apple today updated the Vision Pro headset with its next-generation M5 chip for faster performance, and a more comfortable Dual Knit Band. The M5 chip has a 10-core CPU, a 10-core GPU with Neural Accelerators, and a 16-core Neural Engine, and we have confirmed the Vision Pro still has 16GB of RAM. With the M5 chip, the Vision Pro offers faster performance and longer battery life compared...
14 inch MacBook Pro Keyboard

New 14-Inch MacBook Pro Has Two Key Upgrades Beyond the M5 Chip

Thursday October 16, 2025 8:31 am PDT by
Apple on Wednesday updated the 14-inch MacBook Pro base model with an M5 chip, and there are two key storage-related upgrades beyond that chip bump. First, Apple says the new 14-inch MacBook Pro offers up to 2× faster SSD performance than the equivalent previous-generation model, so read and write speeds should get a significant boost. Apple says it is using "the latest storage technology," ...
MacBook Pro M5 Screen

New MacBook Pro Does Not Include a Charger in the Box in Europe

Wednesday October 15, 2025 6:59 am PDT by
The new 14-inch MacBook Pro with an M5 chip does not include a charger in the box in European countries, including the U.K., Ireland, Germany, Italy, France, Spain, the Netherlands, Norway, and others, according to Apple's online store. In the U.S. and all other countries outside of Europe, the new MacBook Pro comes with Apple's 70W USB-C Power Adapter, but European customers miss out....
airpods max 2024 colors

AirPods Max 2: Everything We Know So Far

Tuesday October 14, 2025 8:43 am PDT by
Apple's AirPods Max have now been available for almost five years, so what do we know about the second-generation version? According to Apple supply chain analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, the new AirPods Max will be lighter than the current ones, but exactly how much is as yet known. The current AirPods Max weigh 0.85 pounds (386.2 grams), excluding the charging case, making it one of the heavier...
iOS 26

iOS 26.0.2 Update for iPhones Coming Soon

Friday October 17, 2025 7:35 am PDT by
Apple's software engineers continue to internally test iOS 26.0.2, according to MacRumors logs, which have been a reliable indicator of upcoming iOS versions. iOS 26.0.2 will be a minor update that addresses bugs and/or security vulnerabilities, but we do not know any specific details yet. The update will likely be released by the end of next week. Last month, Apple released iOS 26.0.1,...

Top Rated Comments

techfreak23 Avatar
83 months ago
“Notably, macOS Catalina does away with 32-bit app support, so some of your older apps are going to stop working. The operating system will let you know which apps are now defunct once you upgrade.”
Why can’t they tell you BEFORE you do the upgrade...? Time Machine does the same thing with backups it deletes. It tells you AFTER it deletes them...
Score: 15 Votes (Like | Disagree)
autrefois Avatar
83 months ago
The operating system will let you know which apps are now defunct once you upgrade.
What would be helpful, for non-techies who don’t know the difference between 32- and 64-bit, is if the installer warned you *before* you install Catalina which apps will no longer work, so that you could decide if you want to go through with the upgrade or not (or if there is some app you can’t/don’t want to do without).
Score: 14 Votes (Like | Disagree)
now i see it Avatar
83 months ago
The most notable feature is 32 bit apps will not run at all.
Score: 13 Votes (Like | Disagree)
saba01 Avatar
83 months ago
What would be helpful, for non-techies who don’t know the difference between 32- and 64-bit, is if the installer warned you *before* you install Catalina which apps will no longer work, so that you could decide if you want to go through with the upgrade or not (or if there is some app you can’t/don’t want to do without).
You do not need this. Just click on the Apple symbol in the upper left of the screen then About This Mac / System Report / Software / Applications
There all Apps are listed and you can sort for 64-Bit all others are 32-Bit and will not work after update...
Score: 10 Votes (Like | Disagree)
rols Avatar
83 months ago

The real question is this – WHY END 32-BIT SUPPORT??
Because continuing to support mixed 32 and 64 bit apps in an OS which is natively 64 bit adds complexity throughout the OS which makes the whole thing slower, bloatier and use more memory and resources. Services, libraries, frameworks all have to support being usable by 32 and 64 bit apps. Apple started the 64 bit transition over 10 years ago, they've warned about compatibility for the last few years, now it's time to reap the benefits of being 64 bit .. before of course someone introduces a 128bit processor and we all do it all over again.
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
BaltimoreMediaBlog Avatar
83 months ago
Under Tim Cook, all the latest MacOS updates have been bean counter updates, which machines to not support to encourage new Mac sales while offering less and less new features while deleting old ones willy nilly. so now I have to get rid of all my 32 bit apps for nor particular reason? I think not. It's about time that people stand up to this computer authoritarianism.

I mean, I don't think any of my Mac games are 64 bit. I'm not throwing away stuff I paid for just because Timmy thinks it's a great new feature. I didn't like it when Steve Jobs did it either, but he always had something cool enough to weigh in favor or it. Not so with bean counter Timmy. :(
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)