Here’s why Catalina does this, how you can tell whether your apps will be affected, and what you can do about it. And not just in the “some things don’t work right but they can still run” sense, but in the “it’s not possible to run the apps at all anymore” sense. But as you may have heard, Catalina-unlike most macOS releases-breaks a lot of apps, especially older productivity software and games. And like all macOS updates of the past few years, it’s available for free for all of the Macs that can run it.Īs with most macOS releases, it’s not a bad idea to wait until Apple releases Catalina’s 10.15.1 or 10.15.2 updates to fix the bugs that come with any major operating system upgrade.

It allows Macs to run modified versions of iPad apps, adds new features like the Apple Arcade gaming subscription service and the Apple TV app, and makes useful (if minor) improvements to Photos, Notes, Reminders, and many of Apple’s other apps. In early October 2019, Apple released macOS 10.15 Catalina, a major update to the Mac operating system.