Adobe has announced the availability of Photoshop native M1 Mac support in a day-one beta. It lacks a lot of the features in the release version, but the company says there are more on the way.

We are excited to announce the first Beta release of Photoshop running natively on Apple Silicon hardware!

This early version of Photoshop for Apple Silicon offers many of the core Photoshop features that you’ve come to rely on for your day to day editing needs, and we’ll be adding more features in the weeks to come …

Adobe made the announcement this morning, with a number of cautionary notes.

The list of excluded features is currently extensive, and includes some major ones, like Camera RAW, Healing Brushes, and all Content Aware functionality (fill, scale and move). Below is the full list.

Note that Beta software is not officially supported yet by Adobe, but we want to hear from you, and this is the place to let us know how it’s going.

Before posting questions, read the notes to familiarize yourself with the known limitations in the build. As we release new builds, we’ll update the notes.

his Adobe Photoshop for ARM BETA will only install and work on ARM hardware that meets the minimum system requirements. If you have qualifying ARM hardware and you do not see the installer, check manually for an update (Help > Check for Updates). If it still does not appear, try logging out/back into the Creative Cloud Desktop application.

This is not a fully functioning version of Photoshop; it contains several limitations compared to the more widely available version of Photoshop for Macintosh. Over time, more features will be made available. See the ‘Known Issues’ section below for more details.

Many features are still not available in this version of Photoshop, and some features may experience slow performance. Please refer to the known issues before submitting feedback.

  • Features NOT PRESENT IN THIS VERSION:
  • Camera RAW
  • Select Sky/Sky Replacement
  • Refine Hair (in Select and Mask)
  • Liquify Filter: Face Aware features
  • OilPaint filter
  • Video timeline and file format support
  • All CEP-based Panels (CC Libraries panel, 3rd party extensions)
  • Adaptive Wide Angle
  • Shake Reduction
  • Face Detection underlying Color Range skin tones and Content Aware Move functions
  • Match Font/Font Similarity
  • Rich Tooltips, Coach marks for Discovery Panel tutorials
  • Microsoft Dial support
  • File Info Panel
  • Layer > Smart Objects > Stack Mode menu item disabled
  • Content Aware Fill
  • Content Aware Scale
  • Content Aware Move
  • Focus Area
  • Auto-Blend Layers
  • Photomerge
  • Spot Healing Brush
  • Patch Tool
  • Healing brush
  • Some File formats not supported:
  • Features present, but with limitations or bugs:
  • Import from Lightroom Photos via the home screen does not work
  • Filter Gallery functions may seem to hang but will eventually succeed
  • All 3D-related functions are limited; either very slow or not fully rendering 3D content; includes 3D printing, 360 panorama editing, normal and bump map filters, Lighting Effects
  • Scrubby Zoom behavior is erratic
  • Changing stroke pixel size not working as expected
  • Opening hundreds of files could cause a crash
  • Several features are running slower on M1 native devices; these will be optimized over time:
  • Select Subject (may have bugs due to misclassification)
  • Object Aware Matting (in Select and Mask)
  • Object Selection
  • Preserve Details 2.0 Upscale (Image Size dialog box

All the same, many new M1 Mac owners will be keen to at least take the beta for a spin, and it’ll be interesting to hear how performance compares.

  • Camera RAW

  • Select Sky/Sky Replacement

  • Refine Hair (in Select and Mask)

  • Liquify Filter: Face Aware features

  • OilPaint filter

  • Video timeline and file format support

  • All CEP-based Panels (CC Libraries panel, 3rd party extensions)

  • Adaptive Wide Angle

  • Shake Reduction

  • Face Detection underlying Color Range skin tones and Content Aware Move functions

  • Match Font/Font Similarity

  • Rich Tooltips, Coach marks for Discovery Panel tutorials

  • Microsoft Dial support

  • File Info Panel

  • Layer > Smart Objects > Stack Mode menu item disabled

  • Content Aware Fill

  • Content Aware Scale

  • Content Aware Move

  • Focus Area

  • Auto-Blend Layers

  • Photomerge

  • Spot Healing Brush

  • Patch Tool

  • Healing brush

  • Some File formats not supported:

  • Import from Lightroom Photos via the home screen does not work

  • Filter Gallery functions may seem to hang but will eventually succeed

  • All 3D-related functions are limited; either very slow or not fully rendering 3D content; includes 3D printing, 360 panorama editing, normal and bump map filters, Lighting Effects

  • Scrubby Zoom behavior is erratic

  • Changing stroke pixel size not working as expected

  • Opening hundreds of files could cause a crash

  • Several features are running slower on M1 native devices; these will be optimized over time:

  • Select Subject (may have bugs due to misclassification)

  • Object Aware Matting (in Select and Mask)

  • Object Selection

  • Preserve Details 2.0 Upscale (Image Size dialog box

  • Select Subject (may have bugs due to misclassification)

  • Object Aware Matting (in Select and Mask)

  • Object Selection

  • Preserve Details 2.0 Upscale (Image Size dialog box

To install the beta, you’ll need to be using an Apple Silicon Mac (obviously), and have Creative Cloud desktop version 5.3.1.470 or later. Open the Creative Cloud desktop app, click on Beta apps in the left-hand panel and then click Install.

It’s not yet known how long it will be before we see Photoshop native M1 Mac support on the release version.