Oct 29, 2019  In the end, programs like the ones listed above aren't the most reliable way to play Windows games on your Mac, but they do give you an option. Of course, another option is to run Windows on your Mac, via BootCamp or a virtual machine, which takes a little know-how and a lot of memory space on your Mac's hard drive.

2015 is going to be a big year for Microsoft with the forthcoming release of Windows 10 — you can read all about Microsoft's big January event right on our sister site Windows Central. Windows 10 is available as a technical preview, and if you're interested in trying it out on your Mac, you can do so safely without jeopardizing any of your Mac stuff, using virtualization software. What's more, you don't need to spend a dime doing it. Because both the Windows 10 preview and the virtualization software is free.

Step 0: Virtualization or Boot Camp?

Before you get Windows on your Mac, you have to decide how you want to run it: virtually within OS X, or on a separate hard drive partition using Boot Camp. Using software provided by Apple, you can turn your Mac into a dual-booting computer capable of running Windows or OS X natively. When your Mac is running Windows using Boot Camp, your Mac is a Windows PC. In order to do this, however, Boot Camp requires you to repartition your Mac's hard drive.

Virtualization software works differently: You're not messing with your Mac hard drive's partition map, you're just creating files and running Mac software that creates a virtual instance of a PC. If something goes really wrong — and this is preview software, remember — it's a lot easier to clean up the pieces using virtualization software than it can be if parts of your Mac's hard drive gets hosed.

Boot Camp doesn't officially support Windows 10 yet, and as such, its drivers may not play 100 percent nicely with the technical preview if you choose that route. I plan to revisit Boot Camp support for Windows 10 after Microsoft officially releases the new version, and I'll post my results. In the interim, though, I don't recommend using Boot Camp for Windows 10 Technical Preview.

Step 1: Download virtualization software

Running virtualization software seems to be the smartest option on the table at present for Microsoft's Windows 10 preview, and both Parallels Desktop or VMware Fusion are good options if you have them around.

If you don't already have virtual machine software on your Mac, you can download Oracle's VirtualBox. It's a virtualization tool just like Fusion and Parallels, but it has the virtue of being free. There are trial versions of Parallels Desktop and VMware Fusion which won't make you pay a fee for a two weeks or one month, respectively, so you're welcome to try those out if you prefer. But if you never want to pay a fee, check out VirtualBox.

My experience is that compared to VMware Fusion and Parallels Desktop, VirtualBox doesn't offer the same sort of robust performance or have quite as polished Mac integration (though there's no charge for it). You get what you pay for, et cetera.

Here are some links to virtualization software you can download for your Mac:

Step 2: Download Windows 10

After you have virtualization software, you'll need to download an ISO image of the Windows 10 technical preview. The ISO image is, for all intents and purposes, an exact copy of a physical Windows installation disc. You get this image from Microsoft itself by downloading it directly.

To get the disc image, you will need to register as part of Microsoft's Windows Insider Program. If you haven't already created a Microsoft account for OneDrive or Xbox Live or the like, you can do this during registration. You can also link the account to an existing email address to make it easier to remember and find later (much like iCloud).

Once you're set up and registered, Microsoft links you to a web page to download links; that page includes the product key you need to activate your preview version of Windows 10.

Step 3: Create a new virtual machine

1. Launch VirtualBox.
2. Click on the New button.
3. In the Name field, type 'Windows 10' or whatever you'd like.
4. Leave Type as Microsoft Windows
5. Click on the Version menu and select Windows 8.1 (64 bit).

You should be able to use the default settings for the next several screens, assuming your base goal is to just poke around Windows 10 and see how it works. Create a virtual hard drive; set the file type to VDI; and make the drive dynamically allocated. This will create a virtual machine that will be listed in VirtualBox's Manager. Select it and click the Start button.

Step 4: Install Windows 10 Technical Preview

When you finish creating your virtual machine, you'll be prompted with the following: 'Please select a virtual optical disk file or a physical optical disk to start your new virtual machine from.' Click on the folder icon to bring up a file browser which you can use to locate the Windows Technical Preview ISO file you downloaded.

Click the Start button.

Follow the instructions given by the Windows 10 Technical Preview installer. It will ask you where you want to install Windows; the only option should be a drive with unallocated space corresponding to the virtual hard drive you've just created in VirtualBox. Select it and click Next.

The rest of the process is just a step-by-step setup, and that's literally all there is to it. After a virtual machine restart, you should soon be staring at a virtualized desktop of Windows 10, running on your Mac.

Any questions?

Windows Games On Mac Free Virtual Machine Download

As I mentioned above, VirtualBox's Mac integration isn't quite as tight as its commercial virtualization alternatives; it's a bit easier with those to switch display resolutions, use accessories, and integrate your Mac's own files. But if you're on a short budget or just want to mess around with Windows 10 prior to its release, VirtualBox and the Windows technical preview can give you what you need without setting you back any cash. That counts for something.

And if you run into any problems or have any questions, let me know in the comments.

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The Mac has plenty of games, but it'll always get the short end of the stick compared to Windows. If you want to play the latest games on your Mac, you have no choice but to install Windows ... or do you?

There are a few ways you can play Windows games on your Mac without having to dedicate a partition to Boot Camp or giving away vast amounts of hard drive space to a virtual machine app like VMWare Fusion or Parallels Desktop. Here are a few other options for playing Windows games on your Mac without the hassle or expense of having to install Windows.

GeForce Now

PC gaming on Mac? Yes you can, thanks to Nvidia's GeForce Now. The service allows users to play PC games from Steam or Battle.net on macOS devices. Better still, the graphic power of these games resides on Nvidia's servers. The biggest drawback: the service remains in beta, and there's been no announcement when the first full release is coming or what a monthly subscription will cost.

For now, at least, the service is free to try and enjoy. All supported GeForce NOW titles work on Macs, and yes, there are plenty of them already available!

The Wine Project

The Mac isn't the only computer whose users have wanted to run software designed for Windows. More than 20 years ago, a project was started to enable Windows software to work on POSIX-compliant operating systems like Linux. It's called The Wine Project, and the effort continues to this day. OS X is POSIX-compliant, too (it's Unix underneath all of Apple's gleam, after all), so Wine will run on the Mac also.

Wine is a recursive acronym that stands for Wine Is Not an Emulator. It's been around the Unix world for a very long time, and because OS X is a Unix-based operating system, it works on the Mac too.

As the name suggests, Wine isn't an emulator. The easiest way to think about it is as a compatibility layer that translates Windows Application Programming Interface (API) calls into something that the Mac can understand. So when a game says 'draw a square on the screen,' the Mac does what it's told.

You can use straight-up Wine if you're technically minded. It isn't for the faint of heart, although there are instructions online, and some kind souls have set up tutorials, which you can find using Google. Wine doesn't work with all games, so your best bet is for you to start searching for which games you'd like to play and whether anyone has instructions to get it working on the Mac using Wine.

Note: At the time of this writing, The Wine Project does not support macOS 10.15 Catalina.

CrossOver Mac

CodeWeavers took some of the sting out of Wine by making a Wine-derived app called CrossOver Mac. CrossOver Mac is Wine with specialized Mac support. Like Wine, it's a Windows compatibility layer for the Mac that enables some games to run.

CodeWeavers has modified the source code to Wine, made some improvements to configuration to make it easier, and provided support for their product, so you shouldn't be out in the cold if you have trouble getting things to run.

My experience with CrossOver — like Wine — is somewhat hit or miss. Its list of actual supported games is pretty small. Many other unsupported games do, in fact work — the CrossOver community has many notes about what to do or how to get them to work, which are referenced by the installation program. Still, if you're more comfortable with an app that's supported by a company, CrossOver may be worth a try. What's more, a free trial is available for download, so you won't be on the hook to pay anything to give it a shot.

Boxer

If you're an old-school gamer and have a hankering to play DOS-based PC games on your Mac, you may have good luck with Boxer. Boxer is a straight-up emulator designed especially for the Mac, which makes it possible to run DOS games without having to do any configuring, installing extra software, or messing around in the Mac Terminal app.

With Boxer, you can drag and drop CD-ROMs (or disk images) from the DOS games you'd like to play. It also wraps them into self-contained 'game boxes' to make them easy to play in the future and gives you a clean interface to find the games you have installed.

Boxer is built using DOSBox, a DOS emulation project that gets a lot of use over at GOG.com, a commercial game download service that houses hundreds of older PC games that work with the Mac. So if you've ever downloaded a GOG.com game that works using DOSBox, you'll have a basic idea of what to expect.

Some final thoughts

In the end, programs like the ones listed above aren't the most reliable way to play Windows games on your Mac, but they do give you an option.

Of course, another option is to run Windows on your Mac, via BootCamp or a virtual machine, which takes a little know-how and a lot of memory space on your Mac's hard drive.

How do you play your Windows games on Mac?

Run Windows Games On Mac

Let us know in the comment below!

Updated October 2019: Updated with the best options.

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Mac Virtual Machine Windows 10

Apple is now redirecting (PRODUCT)RED purchases to COVID‑19 relief fund

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Now through September 30, Apple is redirecting 100% of a portion of (PRODUCT)RED purchases to the Global Fund’s COVID‑19 Response.