VMware Fusion Review: New Features in Fusion 13

Best Prices Today: VMware Fusion

For many years, Parallels Desktop and VMWare Fusion fought a long battle to produce the best virtualization software for Mac users who needed to run Windows software on their Macs. Every time Apple released a new version of macOS, Parallels and VMWare released their own updates, and this competition was great for Mac users because it meant both programs continued to deliver new features and performance improvements. every year. In recent years, however, VMWare has seemed to focus more on its high-end enterprise products, and since the introduction of Apple Silicon in 2020, Fusion no longer really competes with the annual Parallels Desktop updates.

Both programs work essentially the same way, allowing you to create a virtual machine (VM) that runs on your Mac like any other Mac application. This virtual machine emulates how a Windows PC works, allowing you to install a full copy of Windows on the virtual machine and then run any Windows software or game you need. And, best of all, you can run your Windows apps alongside your existing Mac apps – rather than having to switch between Mac and Windows like you have to when using Boot Camp on Intel Macs (and, of course, Boot Camp is no longer available on Macs with Apple Silicon). Both programs also allow you to create virtual machines that also run different versions of Linux, which is a useful feature for many developers and students.

Fusion 13 meets Windows 11

Fusion’s last major update was version 12 in 2021, but Fusion 12 didn’t support Apple’s new M1 or M2 processors, so it would only work on older Macs that still had Intel processors. And, in fact, it also didn’t officially support Windows 11 as a guest operating system for your Windows virtual machines. But, to try and steer people away from Parallels Desktop, VMWare has announced a free version of the program – called Fusion Player – which is available for “non-commercial” use, such as home users or students who just need use Windows applications on their Mac from time to time.

You need a MyVMware account to benefit from the free version and you must not use it for commercial purposes. Register for your free personal use license here.

This is still the case today with the new Fusion 13, which is available as a free download for non-commercial use, although business users who want to use Fusion more regularly at work must pay for a commercial license for Fusion Player, which costs $149/£127.49. There’s also a version called Fusion Pro, which provides more advanced features for larger organizations and IT managers, priced at $199/£169.16.

Foundry

New updates may have come more slowly over the past two years, but there is a small group – called “teamfusion” – at VMWare which is led by Michael Roy (blogs.vmware.com/teamfusion/) and continues to work on improving Fusion. A preview version of Fusion was released about a year ago and introduced support for Apple Silicon and Windows 11, but it wasn’t until the end of 2022 that the final version of Fusion 13 was released. been published.

When you download Fusion 13, it provides a single universal file that can run natively on Intel Macs and Macs with Apple Silicon processors. The only limitation is that Fusion now requires a Mac running macOS 12 (Monterey) or later (whereas Parallels Desktop will run on macOS since Catalina 10.15).

When run on Macs with Intel processors, Fusion continues to work as it always has. You can assign up to 32 CPU cores to your virtual machines and up to 128 GB of memory, to adjust the performance of your virtual machines according to your needs.

Fusion also has a display mode called Unity – which is similar to Coherence mode in Parallels Desktop – which hides the Windows desktop on your virtual machines and allows individual Windows applications to sit on the Mac desktop next to all your other Mac applications.

Windows on Apple Silicon

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There is a more limited range of features available when running Fusion 13 on Macs with Apple Silicon processors. These Macs need a special version of Windows 11 called Windows 11 On Arm, and Michael Roy says Fusion 13 is just “our first set of features for Windows 11 On Arm.” This means that the process of installing and running Windows 11 on Mac with Apple Silicon has some rather rough edges.

Parallels Desktop includes an option to automatically download and purchase Windows 11 On Arm when creating a new virtual machine, but VMWare simply told us that it was up to the user to purchase a license from Microsoft. Sadly, that’s not an easy task, as Windows 11 On Arm is primarily for sale to PC manufacturers, rather than individual users, so VMWare needs to make Fusion a bit friendlier for people who don’t understand the intricacies of Microsoft. licensing policies. Fusion also tends to throw a lot of complicated jargon at you – like “side channel mitigation” – which is the kind of thing that only corporate IT managers are likely to understand.

There are also some technical limitations. When run on Macs with Intel processors, Fusion provides hardware acceleration for 3D graphics in Windows games and design software that uses DirectX and OpenGL 4.3. But, when running on Apple Silicon, Fusion only supports OpenGL for virtual machines that use Linux, with Windows support still in development.

To be fair, the high performance of Apple’s M1 and M2 processors means that your Windows virtual machines should be able to handle routine tasks like browsing the web or running the Windows version of Microsoft Office without too much. problems – and even in 4K resolution too. However, players hoping to play Elden Ring or Diablo IV this summer may be disappointed.

So while Fusion 13 still lags Parallels Desktop when it comes to Apple Silicon and Windows 11 On Arm support, it’s good to see that VMWare isn’t just going to let Fusion go. And, of course, the ability to use the free Fusion Player will be a real money saver for many home users and students, especially if they’re still using Intel-based Macs that can really take full advantage of Fusion. to run Windows software. and games.