Windows 11 now officially supported on Macs with Apple Silicon using Parallels…but it’ll cost you

For many, Parallels Desktop has been the go-to route if they wanted to run Windows on a Mac, and now that Apple has discontinued native Boot Camp support with its own chips, it’s the only viable option. This situation had been complicated by the fact that Microsoft officially only licences ARM versions of Windows directly to OEMs, making it much more difficult for users of M1 and M2 Macs to use the OS.

That changes now, with Microsoft authorising the use of Windows 11 on Parallels Desktop 18, allowing users to download, install and configure the OS with a single click. The virtualisation software emulates the Trusted Protocol Module (TPM) required by the latest version of Windows, paired with the security features built into Apple Silicon and Secure Boot to “provide a high level of security for customers.”

There are a few caveats, however, not least being the specific variants of Windows 11 you’ll be “allowed” to run on your Apple Silicon Mac.

For one, Microsoft has only authorised Windows 11 Pro and Enterprise for Parallels Desktop, which means if you want to go the “kosher” route, you’ll have to cough up a least RM1,299 for a Pro licence, which is RM380 more than the Home version. Sure, this method is angled towards business users, but it still seems like an unreasonable jacking up of costs—especially when a Parallels Desktop 18 licence retails at USD99.99 (about RM443) all on its own.

There are a few other limitations with using Windows 11 via virtualisation. Firstly, you won’t be able to run 32-bit apps, as support for these are being deprecated on all ARM versions of Windows. You also won’t be able to use apps that require DirectX 12 or OpenGL3.3 or later for 3D acceleration, meaning that many of the latest games won’t run. Lastly, nested virtualisation applications like Windows Subsystem for Android and Linux, Windows Sandbox and Virtualisation-based Security (VBS) aren’t supported.

If all those restrictions seem a bit too, um, restrictive, you can simply run Windows 11 via a Windows 365 Cloud PC, which enables all these features. However, this is specifically targeted at business and enterprise customers and subscriptions are priced starting at RM130.20 per month for only 4GB of RAM and 128GB of storage.