Skip to Content

Apple Pledges Support for 3D Graphics Tool Blender

Blender today announced that Apple has joined the Blender Development Fund to support continued development of the free open source 3D graphics tool.

blender banner
Alongside a contribution to the Development Fund, Apple will provide engineering expertise and additional resources to Blender and its broader development community to help support Blender artists and developers, according to the announcement.

Blender CEO Ton Roosendaal said the announcement means that "macOS will be back as a complete supported Blender platform."

Blender said its Development Fund accepts donations "to support activities to provide free and open accessible services for all Blender contributors," including bug fixing, code reviews, technical documentation, and onboarding.

The fund will also provide grants and subsidies to developers on generic and widely agreed development projects, according to Blender.

Popular Stories

AirPods Max 2 Feature

Apple Announces AirPods Max 2 With H2 Chip and More

Monday March 16, 2026 6:12 am PDT by
Apple today unveiled AirPods Max 2, with key upgrades including the H2 chip, increased active noise cancellation, improved sound quality, and features such as Adaptive Audio, Conversation Awareness, Voice Isolation, and Live Translation. The new AirPods Max have the same overall design as the previous generation, with most of the new features coming from the upgrade to the H2 chip:- Adaptive ...
Apple Logo Sketch Feature

Apple Unveiled a Surprise New Product Today

Monday March 16, 2026 10:50 am PDT by
Surprise! Apple today unveiled the AirPods Max 2, despite no rumors suggesting that a new version of Apple's over-ear headphones were imminent. Key upgrades compared to the previous AirPods Max include Apple's H2 chip, increased active noise cancellation, improved sound quality, and features such as Adaptive Audio, Conversation Awareness, Voice Isolation, and Live Translation. AirPods Max ...
apple design award 2025

Apple Announces 2025 Design Award Winners Ahead of WWDC 2025

Tuesday June 3, 2025 10:14 am PDT by
As we wait for WWDC to kick off next Monday, Apple today announced the winners of its annual Apple Design Awards, recognizing apps and games for their innovation, ingenuity, and technical achievement. The 2025 Apple Design Award winners are listed below, with one app and one game selected per category: Delight and Fun - CapWords (App) and Balatro (Game) Innovation - Play (App) and PBJ -...

Top Rated Comments

58 months ago
This is huge for Mac blender users. The lack of GPU rendering is an enormous problem!
Score: 25 Votes (Like | Disagree)
58 months ago
This is pretty big news actually and could open even more doors for GPU rendering on Apple silicon allowing Apple computers to compete in a space normally ruled by Nvidia (with CUDA). The timing is very interesting too... announcing this just a few days before the big M1X event. I wonder if Blender will have an appearance during the show to help show off the GPU capabilities of the new chips. Also makes me wonder if we could see some raytracing abilities on the larger M1X (Jade C Die).
Score: 25 Votes (Like | Disagree)
chrono1081 Avatar
58 months ago

Apple didn’t want to lose their last 3D creation tool still used on their platform haha 😂 Seriously all the serious 3D tools aren’t used on Mac
Yes they are. Maya, Houdini, Zbrush, Mari, Substance, and more all have Mac versions.
Score: 17 Votes (Like | Disagree)
58 months ago
Gotta get blender and cycles Metal and arm ready before the M1X benchmarks drop
Score: 15 Votes (Like | Disagree)
58 months ago
This is fantastic news. Blender is a great tool. I wonder if this has anything to do with Apple's AR ambitions?
Score: 13 Votes (Like | Disagree)
ryanmillercg Avatar
58 months ago

So apple plans to pivot MacBook as GPU rendering machine now? Not to say it’s a bad thing but I guess gaming on Mac will never catch up with Windows PC.

Wonder how much it would do in 3D modelling world and how it competes against windows and Linux.
Local GPU renders for development (yes, even with cycles) is part of an artist workflow that doesn't require extended rendering times. Even 3D Artists working on beefy RTX Windows machines will use cloud render farms for long batch renders. Mac is perfectly competitive in the 3D modelling space; Blender, Maya, Zbrush, etc all run great on Mac. I think it's unlikely that Mac will be looking to challenge high-end GeForce GPUs, but I'd love to be wrong about that.
Score: 12 Votes (Like | Disagree)