Apple Seeds Fourth Beta of macOS 14 Sonoma to Developers

Apple today seeded the fourth beta of the upcoming macOS 14 Sonoma update to developers for testing purposes. The beta comes two weeks after the launch of the third beta.

macos sonoma 4
Registered developers can download the beta through the Apple Developer Center and after the appropriate profile is installed, with the betas available through the Software Update mechanism in System Settings.

macOS Sonoma introduces new Apple TV-like screen savers that also serve as wallpapers after you log in, plus it moves widgets to the desktop. You can use the new widget gallery to choose from a range of widgets, and then drag them to your Mac's desktop.

Widgets can be arranged in any way that's useful, and when you're using an app, they are designed to fade into the background so they're less distracting. ‌Widgets‌ are more interactive than before, so you can use them to do things like play music, turn off the lights in your home, and more. Through Continuity, your iPhone's widgets can also show up on your Mac's desktop.

Video conferencing has improved with a new Presenter Overlay view that shows your desktop or project in new ways, plus Safari now supports web apps for the Dock and the option to create Profiles so you can separate personal browsing from work browsing.

Other new features include improved search that's faster and more responsive, password and passkey sharing, a revamped stickers interface for the Messages app, PDF integration in notes that makes it easier than ever to manage PDFs, and more.

macOS Sonoma will be in beta testing for several months, with a public release coming this fall.

Related Forum: macOS Sonoma

Popular Stories

Apple Logo Black

Apple Just Made Its Second-Biggest Acquisition Ever After Beats

Thursday January 29, 2026 10:07 am PST by
Apple today confirmed to Reuters that it has acquired Q.ai, an Israeli startup that is working on artificial intelligence technology for audio. Apple paid close to $2 billion for Q.ai, according to sources cited by the Financial Times. That would make this Apple's second-biggest acquisition ever, after it paid $3 billion for the popular headphone and audio brand Beats in 2014. Q.ai has...
14 inch MacBook Pro Keyboard

Apple Changes How You Order a Mac

Saturday January 31, 2026 10:51 am PST by
Apple recently updated its online store with a new ordering process for Macs, including the MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, iMac, Mac mini, Mac Studio, and Mac Pro. There used to be a handful of standard configurations available for each Mac, but now you must configure a Mac entirely from scratch on a feature-by-feature basis. In other words, ordering a new Mac now works much like ordering an...
Aston Martin CarPlay Ultra Screen

Apple's CarPlay Ultra to Expand to These Vehicle Brands Later This Year

Sunday February 1, 2026 10:08 am PST by
Last year, Apple launched CarPlay Ultra, the long-awaited next-generation version of its CarPlay software system for vehicles. Nearly nine months later, CarPlay Ultra is still limited to Aston Martin's latest luxury vehicles, but that should change fairly soon. In May 2025, Apple said many other vehicle brands planned to offer CarPlay Ultra, including Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis. At the time,...
imac video apple feature

Apple Unveils First New Products of 2026

Monday January 26, 2026 1:55 pm PST by
Apple today introduced its first two physical products of 2026: a second-generation AirTag and the Black Unity Connection Braided Solo Loop for the Apple Watch. Read our coverage of each announcement to learn more:Apple Unveils New AirTag With Longer Range, Louder Speaker, and More Apple Introduces New Black Unity Apple Watch BandBoth the new AirTag and the Black Unity Connection Braided...
apple unsold web store

Retail Accessories Apple Won't Sell You Now Available via New Site

Friday January 30, 2026 8:46 am PST by
A newly surfaced resale operation is seemingly offering Apple Store–exclusive display accessories to the public for the first time, potentially giving consumers access to Apple-designed hardware that the company has historically kept confined to its retail environments. Apple designs a range of premium MagSafe charging stands, display trays, and hardware systems exclusively for displays in ...

Top Rated Comments

Realityck Avatar
33 months ago
After 3 weeks get to discover if things like Safari 17.0 are working better loading certain URLs like this MacRumors for example. (page loading animation that doesn't stop) ;)
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
sdf Avatar
33 months ago
The Sonoma beta has been pretty dull so far. I like dull betas.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Realityck Avatar
33 months ago
Comparison of DB3 and DB4 release

macOS 14 beta 4 (23A5301g)

* Safari Version 17.0 (19616.1.24.11.3)
* System Firmware Version: 10151.0.255.0.4 (M1 based Macs)
* Darwin Kernel Version 23.0.0: Tue Jul 18 20:35:19 PDT 2023; root:xnu-10002.0.199.505.1~3/RELEASE_ARM64_T8103 arm64

macOS 14 beta 3 (23A5286i)

* Safari Version 17.0 (19616.1.20.11.3)
* System Firmware Version: 10151.0.172.0.3 (M1 based Macs)
* Darwin Kernel Version 23.0.0: Fri Jun 30 17:48:23 PDT 2023; root:xnu-10002.0.168.505.3~1/RELEASE_ARM64_T8103 arm64
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
TheYayAreaLiving ?️ Avatar
33 months ago
Apple needs to bring this back!

[MEDIA=twitter]1684741967933005824[/MEDIA]
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)
patearrings Avatar
33 months ago

So how will you be able to install beta 5 when it comes out?

Might be better to downgrade to beta 3 and skip beta 4.
Networking was broken on boot up. No internet connection at all. Reboot fixes everything.

You gave up reading just ONE sentence too soon......
Score: 4 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Intelmaster Avatar
33 months ago
This one seems to be new!

Attachment Image
Score: 4 Votes (Like | Disagree)