To find out whether your Mac uses this method, see “Learn more” in the Apple Support article How to install Windows on your Mac with Boot Camp. If your Mac is.
Sometimes, you just need Windows. It’s not something that Apple would like to admit, and for the most part MacOS has done an admirable job of keeping up with its less stylish and more utilitarian cousin, but sometimes you just need access to a computer that runs Windows 10. Thankfully, as Apple used to say, “there’s an app for that.”
Apple’s custom-tailored solution is called Boot Camp, and it’s the easiest way to get Windows on your Mac without resorting to dark rituals and eldritch sorcery. So here’s how to install Windows 10 on a Mac with minimal fuss and danger!
Step 1: Confirm your Mac’s requirements
Before getting started, make sure your Mac has the available disk space and hardware necessary to handle the Windows install via Boot Camp. Make sure all the latest updates are completed before you begin!
First, the install requires an Intel-based Mac computer and an empty external USB drive capable of holding up to 16GB of data (these are our favorites). You can connect the hard drive when preparing if it is not already connected.
Second, the Mac you intend to use for the install needs to have at least 55GB of free disk space on the startup drive. Most Mac devices from 2012 and later will work, but MacBooks from before 2015 are unlikely to have enough space. Apple provides a handy system requirements list for various Mac models which details the version of Boot Camp your system requires to complete a Windows install.
Step 2: Buy a copy of Windows
Luckily, acquiring Windows 10 has never been easier. Just head over to the Windows Store. You can choose to purchase a digital copy, which you’ll need to download (and then download this tool to create a Windows 10 disk image), or you can purchase a Windows 10 flash drive which Microsoft will ship to you.
If given an option, always choose the ISO file, which should be available for download even if you bought a physical version of Windows 10: The flash drive option tends to be time-consuming and unnecessary, and should only be used if you have compatibility issues with a download.
Step 3: Open Boot Camp
Now that you’ve got an install drive of your desired Windows operating system (you can even download the October 2018 update version), it’s time to open the MacOS Boot Camp Assistant. To do this, simply select the Utilities folder from your Mac’s application list and open Boot Camp Assistant.
Once the program opens, an introductory screen offers information on the application and also suggests creating a backup of your data before continuing with the Windows install — we highly recommend doing this. Click Continue to advance to the next screen.
Make sure both installation options are checked as seen above. At this point, Boot Camp Assistant copies your desired Windows operating system installation files from either an. ISO file, or a physical disc, onto the plugged in USB drive. Here, depending on your setup you will probably need that connected external hard drive we mentioned. Simply choose the location of the. ISO file and its intended destination (the USB drive) and click Continue. The next screen should say Copying Windows files… and may take a while to complete; be patient even if it looks like the progress bar freezes.
Once the next window opens, Boot Camp Assistant gives you the option to choose where to save the Windows drivers and installs support software files. Follow the on-screen instructions and make sure you have an Internet connection, selecting Continue when prompted. You may need to connect empty external USB storage, depending on how the downloads progress and where you choose to download the Windows files. The process of downloading the drivers could take quite a while to complete, so stay patient!
Step 4: Create a partition for Windows
After the drivers complete installing, the next step is to create a partition for the new Windows installation. By default, Boot Camp Assistant assigns just 55GB of space for the Windows partition, which is enough to complete the installation but hardly anything else.
To increase the GB limit for the Windows partition, simply slide the bar between the MacOS partition and the Windows partition until it assigns the desired amount of space. Once you finish this, click Install to complete the partition process.
Step 5: Install Windows
With the partition completed, Boot Camp Assistant now asks you to begin installing the Windows operating system. After following a few on-screen prompts the installer asks which partition you wish to install the Windows operating system on. Simply select the partition labeled BOOTCAMP and choose Format. Continue to follow the install wizard’s commands and Windows should complete installing in around 30 minutes.
When ready, head over to Startup Disk preferences (you can search for it using Spotlight or find it in System Preferences). Choose the startup disk housing Windows 10 so that from now on your Mac will start in Windows. Restart your computer entirely, and it should open onto the Windows screen.
Touch Bar Support on Windows
If you’re installing Windows on a brand-new MacBook Pro with Touch Bar, worry not, you’ll still be able to get some functionality out of your OLED touch pad when running Windows. Once you boot into Windows your Touch Bar will retain some functionality, but not exactly the full range available in MacOS. The Touch Bar will still have support for all of your MacBook’s basic controls – brightness, volume, play and pause – and at the touch of a button it can switch over to a standard row of F keys.
It’s also worth noting many features may not work correctly while using the Windows partition. Apple supports Windows 10 but you’ll still notice a difference in performance. MacBook hardware is made for MacOS, so it doesn’t always get along with Windows 10, in particular your trackpad might be a little less responsive, and some Apple-specific hardware will cease to function entirely — like the TouchID sensor on the power button.
Editors' Recommendations
Is it possible to install Windows 7 (64-bit) on a Mac Pro without Boot Camp?
I don't need Mac OS at all and just want to install Windows 7.
EDIT:Yes, it seems possible (see answer), but I would strongly recommend to follow deddebme's advice on this matter.
![How To Get Windows On Mac Without Bootcamp How To Get Windows On Mac Without Bootcamp](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/TgLllxE-wFQ/maxresdefault.jpg)
8 Answers
This is for Vista, but the same rules should apply to 7.
If I were you, I won't bother installing windows without boot camp, since it is painfully unnecessary if you do so.
You'll be losing something like one hour and 10GB of harddisk space if you install (restore) OSX and install bootcamp, but you'll save lots of time since bootcamp will do the EFI booting configurating, partitions creating and shrinking, providing mac hardware drivers etc.
I did it following the Vista instructions that Joseph posted above. It will work, but here are a few things I wish someone would have told me:
the big gotcha: no xp mode
- if you want to use 'xp mode' with windows 7, you have to enable your hardware virtualization in the bios. But macs don't have 'bioses' so you'll have no way to do this after you install. Forum rumor has it that if you boot first to osx and then reboot into windows 7 that osx will start it for you and then you can use xp mode. of course, you need bootcamp to be able to boot both of these (maybe you could install osx to another hd or something).
You can use VMLight instead, but I installed itunes on that and it just crashed without running. Had similar experiences with Adobe on parrallels in OSx.
there's some general issues with booting macs that most users probably know already, but I did not:
do the disk util thing the way the vista instructions describe.
when you reboot with your windows 7 cd, it will do some initial instally-things and then reboot your computer. You have to hold down the 'alt' key when it's rebooting and then select the hard drive to boot from, otherwise you will be stuck with a white/grey screen.
when you are done with the install, reboot and hold down 'alt' and then control-click the windows-7 drive to make it the default boot volume and you don't have to hold 'alt' down anymore on restart.
As others have said, it's probably best to just use bootcamp and set windows as the default. Unless you're putting everything on one big raid volume and booting straight from that, osx isn't really hurting anything except a few megs off your boot volume, but that's not typically a problem.
(I didn't install any drivers from the disk and didn't have any problems)
Not sure if you can simply install Windows 7 from scratch (i.e., pop the disc in and boot from it, as opposed to using the Boot Camp Assistant from Mac OS X), but you'll certainly want to use the Mac OS X disc afterwards to install the Boot Camp hardware drivers.
Windows 7 Pro, x64 disc boots fine on Mac Pro. Just delete all existing Mac partition, and create new Windows partitions, and reformat the new partitions. Windows 7 installs and boots as is. Then insert Snow Leopard disc and install Boot Camp drivers.
Install Windows 7, put the OSX disk in, and rather than letting it autorun, open the disk manually and select setup. The compatibility checks Boot Camp seems to run appear to be bypassed this way.
It worked for me on my mad science rig 'Abby', but she was dual booting Ubuntu 10.x 64 and Windows 7 64 with grub-efi-amd64, so that may have made a difference. Macbook Pro 2,1.
well once i installed xp x64 to a single free drive. first i removed the os x drive and and a new empty harddrive. it was as easy as installing on a pc. Standart install worked fine and i used 64 bit drives from intel, ati and others (not bootcamp drivers). had no problem.it was a dual socket, 2 core xeons, mac pro, total 4 cores...
environment: any MBP/MBA having GPT (yes GPT, not MBR, because 10.11/10.12/Sierra/etc will not allow you to have MBP partitioned drive and installed on it, especially on wireless recovery mode). however if you don't have MBR drive partitioned - windows 7 will refuse installation - the only cure is a 'hybrid' GPT/MBR configuration explained below.
prerequirements: you need 2 USB sticks = 1 formatted NTFS (because you might have no DVD drive anymore around) and created as Windows7 installation using unetBootIn, 1 formatted FAT32 for win32/64 MBP drivers to be stored onto with the help of boot-camp
step 0: all you need from the boot-camp these days is to get WindowsSupport folder downloaded into your USB stick FAT32 formatted one. trying to install windows 7 using boot-camp will complain about single only partition you must have on your HDD and will complain about installing ONLY from DVD disk (imaging the hassle as modern MBP/MBA has NO DVD drive embedded at all)
step 1: you have to migrate windows 7 installation from DVD drive/image into USB stick. the best way to do so is to use unetbootin. make sure you have NTFS formatted stick otherwise it will not boot installation after.
step 2: repartition your hdd drive using regular macosx disk utility (let it stay in GPT mode, it won't matter for you anymore).
step 3: download and install refind boot loader replacing original useless MBP/MBA pseudo-bootloader (you can always comeback to the original one by holding 'alt' key during boot process). refind will let you choose what media to boot from including: USB stick with windows 7 installation image and HDD partition with already installed windows 7 (later)
step 4: download and install gdisk. it will require to append hybrid MBR partition emulation (without boot flag enabled!). you sudo gdisk with your drive device name. print list of partitions (command 'p') and remember the one you've created for future windows 7 installation. then switch into 'recovery and transformation mode' (command 'r'). make hybrid MBR (command 'h'): specify windows 7 dedicated partition number (single digit), answer 'y' on place EFI GPT partition first, answer 'default' on MBR hex code (just hit Enter), answer 'n' on set the bootable flag. answer 'n' on 'use one to protect other'. write table to the disk (command 'w'). if you specify bootable flag 'y' - you'll have a windows 7 usb stick bootloader failure (it will discover bootable win7 partition on your hdd and will try to boot from it instead).
step 5: plug windows 7 usb stick and reboot. you'll see 3 choices to boot produced by refind bootloader menu: 'your macosx partition name', 'boot windows (legacy) from Basic data partition' - this is your future windows 7 partition to boot from, 'boot windows (legacy) from NTFS volume' - this is your NTFS formatted USB stick with windows 7 installation - run installation from it now. inside windows install select 'advanced' installation and choose preselected partition by yourself. don't delete the partition but I'd suggest to format it within the menu. the rest of installation process will be relatively simple and standard. remove the stick once the windows will enter reboot state.
step 6: plug in fat32 formatted usb stick with WindowsSupport folder you've downloaded with the help of boot-camp application. execute setup from inside the folder and wait for all the drivers to be installed. reboot system and you are done with the 2 systems booting in parallel from the refind bootloader.
protected by Community♦Jun 18 '11 at 12:55
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