VMware Fusion in beta for Windows 11 on Apple Silicon Macs

vmware offers a beta version of Fusion that adds support for Apple Silicon Macs, namely models with the M1 and M2 chips. It therefore becomes a competitor of Parallels Desktop which has been supporting Apple Silicon Macs since the beginning of 2021.

Here’s what’s new in VMware Fusion 22H2 Tech Preview:

• Windows 11 on Apple Silicon and Intel Macs, with support for 2D graphics and networking.
• Support for installing VMTools for Windows 11 guest operating system on Macs based on the M1 chip.
• Virtual TPM device with fast encryption support.
• Improved Linux support on M1 Macs.
• Hardware 3D graphics acceleration and OpenGL 4.3 in Linux virtual machines.
• Universal app for Apple Silicon and Intel Macs.

Although the new version is designed for Windows 11, VMware says the tools can be used with other virtual machines as well. At this time, Fusion on Apple Silicon devices is still a work in progress according to VMmare and there are a few limitations to be aware of:

• Fusion will not support running virtual machines on different architectures. For example, no x86_64 virtual machine on M1/M2 Macs.
• macOS virtual machines are out of scope for this release, but it’s something the group is looking into.
• Ubuntu 20.04.4 and 22.04 for arm64 currently do not launch (Ubuntu 20.04.4 from July 5). A fix is ​​planned.

The test version of VMmare is available for free at this address.