Open Source Package Management Software Homebrew Gains Native Apple Silicon Support

Popular macOS package management system Homebrew today received a major update, with the 3.0.0 version introducing official support for Apple silicon chips.

homebrew logo

Apple Silicon is now officially supported for installations in /opt/homebrew. formulae.brew.sh formula pages indicate for which platforms bottles (binary packages) are provided and therefore whether they are supported by Homebrew. Homebrew doesn't (yet) provide bottles for all packages on Apple Silicon that we do on Intel x86_64 but we welcome your help in doing so. Rosetta 2 on Apple Silicon still provides support for Intel x86_64 in /usr/local.

Homebrew, for those unfamiliar with the software, is a package manager like the Mac App Store. It's designed to let users quickly and easily install, uninstall, and update apps using Terminal.

Prior to now, Homebrew was able to run on M1 Macs through Rosetta 2, but now it works on the new MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, and Mac mini natively. Homebrew doesn't yet support bottles for all packages on Apple silicon that are available on x86_64, but improvements will be made in the future.

According to Homebrew developer Mike McQuaid, the 3.0.0 development was helped along by MacStadium and Apple, with Apple providing hardware and migration help.

Popular Stories

iPhone Top Left Hole Punch Face ID Feature Purple

iPhone 18 Pro Launching Later This Year With These 12 New Features

Thursday January 15, 2026 10:56 am PST by
While the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max are not expected to launch for another eight months, there are already plenty of rumors about the devices. Below, we have recapped 12 features rumored for the iPhone 18 Pro models, as of January 2026: The same overall design is expected, with 6.3-inch and 6.9-inch display sizes, and a "plateau" housing three rear cameras Under-screen Face ID...
iPhone Top Left Hole Punch Face ID Feature Purple

New Leak Reveals iPhone 18 Pro Display Sizes, Under-Screen Face ID, and More

Wednesday January 14, 2026 7:09 am PST by
While the iPhone 18 Pro models are still around eight months away, a leaker has shared some alleged details about the devices. In a post on Chinese social media platform Weibo this week, the account Digital Chat Station said the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max will have the same 6.3-inch and 6.9-inch display sizes as the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max. Consistent with previous...
2024 iPhone Boxes Feature

Apple Adjusts Trade-In Values for iPhones, Macs, and More

Thursday January 15, 2026 11:19 am PST by
Apple today updated its trade-in values for select iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Watch models. Trade-ins can be completed on Apple's website, or at an Apple Store. The charts below provide an overview of Apple's current and previous trade-in values in the United States, according to the company's website. Most of the values declined slightly, but some of the Mac values increased. iPhone ...
Apple MacBook Pro M4 hero

These 5 Apple Products Will Reportedly Be Upgraded With OLED Displays

Friday January 16, 2026 7:07 pm PST by
Apple plans to upgrade the iPad mini, MacBook Pro, iPad Air, iMac, and MacBook Air with OLED displays between 2026 and 2028, according to DigiTimes. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman previously reported that the iPad mini and MacBook Pro will receive an OLED display as early as this year, but he does not expect the MacBook Air to adopt the technology until 2028 at the earliest. A new iPad Air is...
Verizon New

Verizon Offering $20 Credit After Major Outage, Here's How to Get It

Thursday January 15, 2026 7:37 am PST by
Verizon today announced it will be offering customers a $20 account credit after a major outage on Wednesday, and action is required to receive it. The carrier said affected customers can accept the credit by logging into the My Verizon app, but it might take some time before this option shows up in the app. Affected customers will receive a text message when the credit is available. On...

Top Rated Comments

aesc80 Avatar
65 months ago
Holy crap, yes!!! Now we're getting the good stuff!!! I realize how hard it can be to get tools working on a new platform, so this is definitely appreciated!
Score: 26 Votes (Like | Disagree)
FishyFish Avatar
65 months ago

I dont know why but I cant seem to find anything useful in Homebrew, yes I could use youtube-dl but even short videos are like almost a gig.

Do you guys recommend trying out something? I just dont think Homebrew is useful in any way.
Just off the top of my head of things I use every day:

awscli, tldr, htop, ncdu, speedtest-cli, pyenv, pyenv-virtualenv, tmux, nvm, node, redis, yarn, git, tree, unrar, wget, docker, httpie, nginx... I'm sure others as well
Score: 18 Votes (Like | Disagree)
LeeW Avatar
65 months ago

I just dont think Homebrew is useful in any way.
It is great for developers like me. But yes, not much use for general users.
Score: 17 Votes (Like | Disagree)
aesc80 Avatar
65 months ago

I dont know why but I cant seem to find anything useful in Homebrew, yes I could use youtube-dl but even short videos are like almost a gig.

Do you guys recommend trying out something? I just dont think Homebrew is useful in any way.
It's definitely a developer thing. There's a bunch of tools that can be installed freely with Homebrew without having to manage all the different invocations. The general user can stick to the App Store, or whatever other site that offers their apps.
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
EugenesSoggySalami Avatar
65 months ago
I dont know why but I cant seem to find anything useful in Homebrew, yes I could use youtube-dl but even short videos are like almost a gig.

Do you guys recommend trying out something? I just dont think Homebrew is useful in any way.
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
name99 Avatar
65 months ago

I dont know why but I cant seem to find anything useful in Homebrew, yes I could use youtube-dl but even short videos are like almost a gig.

Do you guys recommend trying out something? I just dont think Homebrew is useful in any way.
Gotta say MacPorts has always been way more useful for my needs.
(As for what I use from MacPorts, the primary functionality is a set of tools like sox and ffmpeg that I use in a script that speeds up audio and video files by some arbitrary factor (while preserving pitch).

The audio speedup is less essential these days in that Apple gives us some degree of flexibility in audio speedup, though still not that many choices. And while I do the audio speedup I fix it up in other useful ways like companding and silence removal.
Apple has never embraced video speedup (after the days of QuickTime as QuickTime; back when I was on the team we definitely supported it even doing backward playback smoothly. My smooth backward MPEG playback remains the only such implementation I have ever seen.) But if you're watching, eg, video lectures, you want speedup for the same reason you want audio speedup!
Score: 4 Votes (Like | Disagree)