Apple releases Mac OS Big Sur, a total revamp of its desktop operating system

Despite a long gestation period and a botched launch day yesterday, Apple's biggest revamp to its mac OS "Big Sur" is now available for download. Weighing in at over 12 GB, this is a hefty visual and functional upgrade to compatible mac desktops and laptops. A lot of the look and feel is reminiscent of iOS 14, and this is no surprise since Big Sur has been optimized for Apple Silicon which Apple is transitioning to by way of new hardware. 

Notable updates are the return of the startup chime, additoonal controls and the return of widgets that help push information forward without needing to open apps. The Safari browser is also faster, safer, and more privacy-oriented and now feels faster than Google Chrome, which is a resource hog on Macs. The spit and polish extends to Apple's native apps like Mail, Maps, Messages, and Notes offer new features and better integration. The big benefit of Big Sur on Apple Silicon macs is that they will be able to run iOS apps, while this sounds great in theory, mac OS still does not offer multi-touch control, so while having access to these apps is a cool feature, they will not be running in an optimized environment. 

For many Mac users, Big Sur is a huge software patch for Catalina, which introduced a number of issues on older Macs, prodding some professional users to revert to Mojave, which was more stable overall on older devices. The list of devices that can run Big Sur are as follows

 Big Sur compatible Macs:

• 2015 and later MacBook
• 2013 and later MacBook Air
• 2013 and later MacBook Pro
• 2014 and later Mac mini
• 2014 and later iMac
• 2017 and later iMac Pro
• 2013 and later Mac Pro

Anyone updating to Big Sur should create a backup of their exisiting system, specially given the issues many users experienced yesterday. Also allot a few hours for the download, installation, and optimization that follows an upgrade of this magnitude. Finally, if you rely on your Mac for work, consider delaying the upgrade until you're certain that your applications and your workflows will not be affected as is the usual case with these huge transitions.