No, you still can’t run Linux on an Apple M1 Mac - yet
Linux on Apple M1 is coming, but still needs some work
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Despite upstream support forApple’s M1 family of chips in Linux 6.2, leading developers have said that users still won’t be able to install aLinux distroonto an Apple Silicon Mac anytime soon.
While Linux founder Linus Torvalds has been publicly passionate about getting Linux-basedoperating systemsto work on Apple hardware, theopen sourceproject presents many hurdles and stages to development, and everybody needs to be singing from the same hymn sheet before it becomes a reality.
This was emphasized in a recenttweetby Asahi Linux , which reads: “You will not be able to run Ubuntu nor any other standard distro with 6.2 on any M1 Mac. Please don’t get your hopes up.”
Linux on M1 Macs
The thread continues: “We are continuously upstreaming kernel features, and 6.2 notably adds device trees and basic boot support for M1 Pro/Max/Ultra machines.”
While the SoC processors gave recently gained support, other Apple components have not. This includes keyboard and trackpad usage.
Asupport documentdetails some of the many problems that Linux developers have encountered as they’ve been forced to reverse-engineer everything to support Apple’s M-series chips.
These are the best laptops for programming>Linus Torvalds has kind words for Apple’s M-series silicon>Linux Kernel 6.2 is here, and it now has mainline support for Apple M1 chips
Some current across-the-board blocks include USB, Thunderbolt, Video Encoder, and GPU. There are also a number of device-specific blocks, such as Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, Ethernet, microphones, the webcam, Touch ID, and the Touch Bar.
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Put simply, Asahi Linux says: “Our goal is to upstream everything, but that doesn’t mean distros instantly get Apple Silicon support.”
Despite the challenges, the project hopes to deliver official Apple Silicon support for a mainstream Linux distro “in the near future”, but the recent 6.2 announcement is not it.
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