Apple has officially launched macOS Tahoe 26, bringing one of the most significant visual and functional updates to the Mac in years. The software is available starting today, arriving alongside iOS 26, iPadOS 26, watchOS 26, tvOS 26, and visionOS 26. With a mix of design refinements, new continuity tools, and Apple Intelligence-powered features, macOS Tahoe 26 delivers a fresh yet familiar Mac experience.
At the center of the update is the new Liquid Glass design language. The transparent menubar creates the sense of a larger display, while app sidebars and toolbars now reflect and refract the content you are viewing, drawing more attention to your work. Personalization also plays a bigger role in this release. Users can now style their icons and widgets with light, dark, tinted, or even fully clear options, and folders can be customized with colors, emoji, or symbols to make them instantly recognizable.
Control Center has been rethought, offering the ability to add controls from both Mac and iPhone apps, including third-party software. You can rearrange them into pages, place them in the menu bar, and build a layout that fits your workflow.
Apple Intelligence makes its way to the Mac in practical ways. Live Translation can handle text in Messages, captions in FaceTime, or audio transcriptions in the Phone app, all on-device for privacy. Shortcuts have been enhanced with intelligent actions, such as summarizing text or generating images, and can now run automatically based on triggers like connecting to an external display or changes in files and folders. Genmoji creation has been expanded with hairstyle customization and more descriptive controls, while Image Playground now supports new creative styles, including watercolor and oil painting, along with Any Style for more flexible prompts.
Continuity has also taken a leap forward. Live Activities from iPhone can now be viewed on Mac, showing progress for deliveries, rides, or sports scores directly in the menu bar. The all-new Phone app brings cellular calling to Mac with features like Call Screening, Hold Assist, and Live Translation, in addition to familiar tools like Recents and Voicemail. Messages gains better spam detection, filtering for unknown senders, backgrounds for conversations, and the ability to run live polls.
Spotlight has been rebuilt with new browsing categories for apps, files, actions, and clipboard history. It can also now handle hundreds of direct actions, from sending a message to creating an event, and assigns quick keys so you can complete tasks with just a few characters.
Gaming is also getting its own space. The new Apple Games app serves as a hub for updates, challenges, and events across your game library, while making it easier to connect with friends.
macOS Tahoe 26 is available today as a free update for supported Macs. It runs on MacBook Air and MacBook Pro models from 2018 or later, iMac and Mac mini models from 2018 or later, iMac Pro from 2017, Mac Studio, and Mac Pro from 2019 or later.
