Following limited testing of native support, Dropbox's Mac app built for Apple silicon is now available to all beta testers.
Earlier this month, Dropbox began testing native Apple silicon support with a handful of beta testers, promising to expand testing to all beta users before the end of the month. Now, all Dropbox users who have enabled "Early releases" in their account preferences will have access to the native Apple silicon app.
On a support page, Dropbox says that users on Apple silicon Macs can expect to receive the newer version within 24 hours after joining the early releases program for their account. Here's how to join the program:
- Go to dropbox.com and log into your account.
- In the top right-hand corner, click your profile picture and go into Settings.
- Under General, locate Preferences and toggle on "Early releases."
Dropbox faced criticism late last year following confused messaging from the company about whether its client would adopt native Apple silicon support, forcing customers on Apple's latest Macs to use a version of the app built for Intel-based computers. Amongst Mac users, Dropbox has been criticized for being poorly optimized, leading to excessive memory and battery usage.
Top Rated Comments
So, for an Apple Silicon user, this is good news.
For us, OneDrive nor Google Drive nor Apple iCloud are as convenient as Dropbox, nor as powerful. iCloud is a no go because of the Apple-first/Apple-only approach, and no Business plan with lots of storage; Google Drive is a nightmare and a mess (and we don't want to share more information with Google), and only lately its beginning to work nice; and OneDrive is playing catch with Dropbox, but still its a Windows-first / Microsoft-first approach.
I am trying to use iCloud Drive with Obsidian. But I am finding that even though Obsidian only uses simple text files, switching from one device to the next I am never sure if files have synced. This is true with devices that are *always on* and *always connected to the Internet*! And when I am able to see that a file is not the latest version, I haven't found a reliable way to force an update. I try to rename the file, move it to a different folder, and then undo these changes. Sometimes that forces the update. Sometimes not.
Bottom line: I cannot use iCloud Drive.
For Google Drive and OneDrive, they seem to have improved over time. But the few times I've tried to use them, I've found them both clunky compared to Dropbox.