⚠️ macOS 27 Beta 1 details

[insidegui]

Update: Workaround 🎉

VirtualBuddy 2.2 beta 2 includes a new restore mechanism that works around the bug that was preventing macOS 27 restores from working on macOS 26 hosts. Installing the latest device support files is still required, but those who have installed Xcode 27 don't have to install device support files separately.

Original Message

Installation of macOS 27 in VirtualBuddy and other virtualization apps that use Apple's Virtualization framework currently requires the host to also be running macOS 27. Attempting to install on a macOS 26.x host fails, even if Xcode 27 is installed on the host.

To prevent folks from wasting their time downloading macOS 27 in a macOS <27 host, I've marked macOS 27.0 Developer Beta 1 as requiring macOS 27 in the VirtualBuddy catalog.

Hopefully Apple will address this in upcoming betas. If anyone happens to know of a workaround, please let us know in the discussion.

If this is important to you, send a feedback report to Apple in Feedback Assistant.

[Bo98]

Weirdly enough, it works on macOS 15.x when you manually grab MobileDevice.pkg from Xcode 27 (since Xcode 27 itself doesn't run on macOS 15 and the separate Device Support installer isn't available yet).

Whatever the problem is, it seems to be a macOS 26-specific bug. macOS 26.6 beta might be worth a test.

[ProductBR]

Tried on macOS 25.5.1 but got the same error

[Bo98]

15.7.7 for me. Other thread also seems to report it working better on macOS 15, though with one user claiming it works on macOS 26 so will see if there's something else we're missing.

[DrDonk]

Same problem 26.5.1 with Xcode beta installed and also re-ran MobileDevice.pkg but always the same error.

[DrDonk]

Acknowledged by Apple as broken on Tahoe including 26.6 on the Apple Developer Forums.

[aonez]

Try this:
#591 (reply in thread)

[insidegui]

Looks like that's working for most folks, I'll note it as a workaround 🥳

[aronvandenherik]

Apple has added a download for Mobile Device Support (2050A3n) for macOS 27 beta to their developer downloads page.
I've tried this with 27.0 beta 1 and VirtualBuddy 2.1 (325) on macOS 26.5.1, but didn’t get the installation to work.

[DrDonk]

It will not work, an Apple Engineer has said there is an issue with the API in 26 which stops the 27 beta installing. They are looking for workaround.

https://developer.apple.com/forums/thread/830118

[aronvandenherik]

Thanks @DrDonk, that worked for me! I created a new macOS 27 VM on a macOS 27 host machine and then moved the .vbvm file to my macOS 26 machine.

macOS 27 VM runs fine on macOS 26.5.1, just need to create the VM on a macOS 27 host machine first.

[MatthieuLamp]

In fact. It is impossible to create a new virtual machine on 26.5.1

[insidegui]

Update

VirtualBuddy 2.2 beta 2 includes a new restore mechanism that works around the bug that was preventing macOS 27 restores from working on macOS 26 hosts. Installing the latest device support files is still required, but those who have installed Xcode 27 don't have to install device support files separately.