Craig Federighi: Native Windows on M1 Macs is 'Really up to Microsoft'

Following the release of the M1 Macs Apple executives have been doing interviews with a range of publications, and today, Ars Technica published another interview with software engineering chief Craig Federighi, hardware technologies lead Johny Srouji, and marketing VP Greg Joswiak.

Much of the interview focuses on topics that the three have already covered in prior discussions, but there is an interesting tidbit from Federighi on Microsoft and Windows on the M1 Macs. Right now, the M1 Macs do not support Windows and there is no Boot Camp feature as there is on Intel Macs, but Windows support is a feature that many would like to see.

Federighi says Windows on M1 Macs is "up to Microsoft." The core technologies exist and the Macs are capable of it, but Microsoft has to decide whether to license its Arm-based version of Windows to Mac users.

As for Windows running natively on the machine, "that's really up to Microsoft," he said. "We have the core technologies for them to do that, to run their ARM version of Windows, which in turn of course supports x86 user mode applications. But that's a decision Microsoft has to make, to bring to license that technology for users to run on these Macs. But the Macs are certainly very capable of it."

Federighi also suggested that Windows in the cloud could be a possible solution in the future, and he highlighted CrossOver, which is able to run x86 Windows apps on M1 Macs using Rosetta 2.

Federighi, Joswiak, and Srouji also discussed developing the Apple Silicon chips, designing the M1, the M1's performance, unified memory architecture, running iOS apps, and more. The full interview can be read over at Ars Technica.