Apple blocks M1 Mac users from side loading iPhone, iPad apps

"Apple has officially flipped the server-side switch to implement this change. This means that it is no longer possible to use an app such as iMazing to side load unsupported applications from your iPhone or iPad to your M1 Mac,"

San Francisco: Apple has blocked users of new Macs with M1 silicon chip from side loading iPhones and iPad apps. According to a report in 9to5Mac, Apple has turned off users’ ability to unofficially install iOS apps onto their M1 Macs.

“Apple has officially flipped the server-side switch to implement this change. This means that it is no longer possible to use an app such as iMazing to side load unsupported applications from your iPhone or iPad to your M1 Mac,” the report mentioned on Friday.

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While iOS apps are still available in the Mac App Store, many apps, such as Netflix, Instagram and Facebook don’t have their developer’s approval to be run on macOS.

To date, there was a workaround that allowed the use of third-party software to install the apps without having to use the Mac App Store.

Apple has now remotely disabled it.

Several people were using tools such as iMazing to side load iPhone and iPad apps.

The change applies to M1 Macs running macOS Big Sur 11.1 as well as the developer or public beta of macOS Big Sur 11.2.

The users running the macOS Big Sur 11.2 beta will see a more specific error message: “The application cannot be installed because the developer did not intend for it to run on this platform”.

The M1 Mac users running macOS 11.1, the error message would say we couldn’t install it and “try again later”.