14 DAY TRIAL // Apple launched its custom-built ARM-based M1 chip last month, and now the dev community out there is working around the clock on bringing their apps to the platform.
In addition, Parallels has also started the work on its very own software supposed to bring Windows to the world of Apple Silicon, and not a long time ago, the company announced the very first preview build allowing users to try out the whole thing early.
As it turns out Parallels wasn’t alone in its struggle to run Windows on Apple Silicon, as Microsoft itself helped the company do this.
It’s not very clear how the two collaborated, but Omar Shahine, OneDrive vice president, applauded the joined effort on Twitter. Dang this is amazing! Windows 10 ARM running on MacBook Air M1. Great performance and battery life! Thanks @ParallelsMac and @Microsoft for releasing the ARM build of Windows!” he tweeted.
Microsoft committed to Apple Silicon
Funny enough, Apple executives themselves said earlier this year that bringing Windows to Apple Silicon is a decision that only Microsoft can make if they want to.
“That's really up to Microsoft,” Craig Federighi, SVP of Software Engineering, said. “We have the core technologies for them to do that, to run their ARM version of Windows, which in turn of course supports x86 user mode applications. But that's a decision Microsoft has to make, to bring to license that technology for users to run on these Macs. But the Macs are certainly very capable of it.”
In the meantime, the world of Apple Silicon is growing, and Microsoft itself is investing big on software optimizations for the new chip. Microsoft Office, Microsoft Teams, and other top Microsoft applications are getting support for the M1 processor, as Microsoft wants everything to run as smoothly as possible on the new Apple hardware.