With macOS 15 Sequoia on the horizon, Apple hasn’t forgotten about Sonoma. Ahead of its release likely later this month, Apple shipped the second beta of macOS 14.6 to developers, with the public beta to follow. Here’s everything you need to know about the upcoming update.
macOS 14.6: New features
It’s not immediately clear whether the 14.6 beta has any new features, but we’re not expecting any. Apple has released everything it announced for macOS 14 and the past several updates have been minor with mostly security updates and bug fixes.
macOS 14.6: Developer release notes
According to the developer release notes, the 14.6 beta resolves five issues; the developer notes are different from the release notes issued at the time of the official release and will note if any new features are included. Below are the developer release notes for the macOS 14.6 beta:
ARKit
Resolved Issues
• Fixed: iPhone and iPad apps on Apple Silicon Macs quit unexpectedly when initializing
ARSkeletonDefinition. (128038936)Core Spotlight
Resolved Issues
• Fixed: iPhone and iPad apps on Apple Silicon Macs quit unexpectedly when invoking
-[CSSearchableItemAttributeSet setActionIdentifiers:]. (128039095)Finder
Resolved Issues
• Fixed: Home Videos unexpectedly sync as Music Videos to iPod nano (7th generation). (94899119)
Video Subscriber Account
Resolved Issues
• Fixed: iPhone and iPad apps on Apple Silicon Macs quit unexpectedly if
VSOpenTVProviderSettingsURLStringis referenced. (113562872)Video Toolbox
Resolved Issues
• Fixed an issue and now on Apple Silicon, if width or height is greater than 4096 columns or rows and content uses 4:2:0 chroma subsampling and 8-bit depth, the hardware decoder driver will reject it and a software decoder will be automatically selected to ensure artifact-free decoding. AVC (H.264) content at level 5.2 or lower can be handled by the hardware decoder. Content that otherwise conforms to level 5.2 but is high frame rate (e.g. 4k at 100 or 120 fps) is labelled level 6, 6.1 or 6.2 and is also handled by hardware. If content is 10-bit, 4:2:2 or 4:4:4, the hardware decoder will be used. (122448862)
macOS 14.6: How to install the beta
If you are not an actual developer, you should consider waiting until the public beta is released. (While developers are usually the ones with an Apple Developer Account, anyone can sign up for an account.) If you don’t like risking the stability of your Mac, don’t run any beta macOS at all. But if you do want to run the beta, you should back up you Mac before installing the software. Here are the instructions for getting the beta:
- Open System Settings > General > Software Updates.
- You should see two options: Automatic Updates and Beta Updates. Click on the (i) beside Beta Updates.
- You can now turn on Beta Updates (if they weren’t already on).
- Choose the beta you want to download.
- If your developer account is tied to a different Apple ID to your usual one you can change that here.
- Click Done.
- Now your Mac will Check for updates and eventually show the macOS 14.6 Developer Beta as an upgrade. Click on Upgrade Now.
Learn more in our macOS Sonoma superguide.
Author: Roman Loyola, Senior Editor, Macworld
Roman is a Macworld Senior Editor with over 30 years of experience covering the tech industry, focusing on the Mac and other products in the Apple ecosystem. He is also the host of the Macworld Podcast. His career started at MacUser, where he received Apple certification as a repair technician (when Apple did that kind of thing). He's also worked for MacAddict, MacLife, and TechTV.