macOS: Releases, patches & end-of-life
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Lifecycle guide for macOS from Apple

All releases, patches, maintenance and support periods at a glance

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📅 Last update on 2026-03-09

What is macOS?

Automate product release and end-of-life managementmacOS (previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple"s Mac computers.
 

The entire lifecycle of macOS

The following figure shows you the visualised product life cycle of macOS. You can see all releases with the latest patch version, the long-term support characteristics (orange flag in the green circle, the periods for version provision, maintenance and support.
macOS (Apple) release, version and end-of-life information
XmacOS (Apple) release, version and end-of-life information
Figure: Release, patch and end-of-life cycle of product macOS (Apple)
 

What is the macOS release strategy?

The major versions of macOS are now released once a year and are usually maintained for three years. Apple usually provides security updates for the latest 3 versions, but this is not guaranteed and some security fixes are not available for the non-latest versions.

Facts and figures about macOS

Product
macOS
Vendor
Apple
Latest version
26.3.1
Number of releases
7
Number of versions
112
Number of unstable versions
10
Number of versions affected by CVE
94
Licence
Commercial
Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacOS
 
 

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Lukas Böttcher
Lukas Böttcher
Business Development Manager
P:  +49-30-221986-51
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