Apple Seeds Fifth Beta of macOS Catalina to Developers

Apple today seeded the fifth beta of macOS 10.15 Catalina for testing purposes, a little over two weeks after seeding the fourth macOS Catalina beta and more than a month after the new Mac operating system update was first unveiled at the Worldwide Developers Conference.

The new macOS Catalina beta can be downloaded using the Software Update mechanism in System Preferences. As with all new betas, macOS Catalina should not be installed on a primary machine because it is early release software and has bugs.

test macOS 10
macOS Catalina eliminates the iTunes app, splitting it into Music, Podcasts, and TV apps. The Apple Music and Apple Podcasts apps are available now, while the Apple TV app is coming later this year.

The three new apps offer similar functionality to iTunes, but are split up by feature. iOS device management is still available on the Mac, but it's now done through the Finder rather than iTunes.

With a new Sidecar feature, you can turn your iPad into a second display for your Mac with just the click of a button. The Apple Pencil works with ‌Sidecar‌, so you can turn your ‌iPad‌ into a drawing tablet in apps like Photoshop and Illustrator.

Your Apple Watch can be used to approve security prompts for passwords and other info in macOS Catalina, and Macs with a T2 chip now support Activation Lock, making them more secure. There's a new Find My that brings the ‌Find My‌ Mac app to the Mac for the first time and even lets you track your devices when they're offline, or, in the case of notebooks, closed.

Screen Time is available on the Mac as well as iOS devices, and Project Catalyst, a new Apple initiative, will let developers easily port their ‌iPad‌ apps over to the Mac to increase the number of Mac apps available.

There's a new Photos interface that surfaces your best photos organized by day, month, or year, there's a new start page in Safari, Mail has new tools for muting email threads and blocking senders, and the Reminders app has been overhauled. 32-bit apps no longer work in macOS Catalina, which is something to be aware of before installing the beta.

For more details on macOS Catalina, make sure to check out our macOS Catalina roundup.

Related Forum: macOS Catalina

Top Rated Comments

DrJohnnyN Avatar
61 months ago
Great salad dressing.
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Aeternum Avatar
61 months ago
In the 10 year’s or so that I’ve been testing betas, Catalina’s are the worst.

With this latest Beta, the installation got stuck with the Apple logo and the progress bar around 2/3 of the way. It’s been like that for 4 hours.

After forcefully powering off the Mac and powering on again I was prompted with the log in screen with Mojave’s background. Typed in the password, press entered... the progress bar took like 10 min to reach the end and now stuck there for the last 30 or so minutes.

I won’t be updating any other machines from Beta 4, that one gave me a lot of problems but Beta 5 isn’t even loading up.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
tethead Avatar
61 months ago
You waited 2 days? That's ridiculous.

If your install is stuck after 1hr RESTART THE COMPUTER. If you're afraid to restart its because you haven't done a proper backup or have no computer skills. Some people shouldn't be installing beta software.
first of all, chill, or quit smoking crack. you'll live longer.

second of all, I restarted a few times after it was taking more than an hour - reset PRAM, reset SMC, booted into recovery and verified HD, tried recovery install (failed), so went back to it. you can check my post history if you still think i'm a moron who just sat for 40 hours staring at a screen.

anyway, the moral of the story is that NOTHING seems to alleviate this. i sent a ton of logs thru Feedback but haven't heard anything about it, and it's clearly not fixed, so not sure what else to do at this point but wait.
[doublepost=1564677629][/doublepost]
Just one of his posts


Seems like he's a long time Mac user, he knows his stuff.
Again, you're throwing insults at someone without knowledge of how much he (Or she) knows.
thank you.

now get off my damn lawn.
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)
tethead Avatar
61 months ago
I'm hopeful the extra days before releasing this means they will have fixed the extremely long update times some of us had on b4. As mine took around 40 hours last time (!!), I will hold off until some of you who had issues last time around verify that it's all fine now.
Score: 4 Votes (Like | Disagree)
justperry Avatar
61 months ago
You waited 2 days? That's ridiculous.

If your install is stuck after 1hr RESTART THE COMPUTER. If you're afraid to restart its because you haven't done a proper backup or have no computer skills. Some people shouldn't be installing beta software.
Restarting got him back into the installer, a loop.
You make a lot of assumptions, you don't know his skills, throwing insults on top of it.

Maybe you should do research before you write such a post, like looking at his posts history.
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
retrospek Avatar
61 months ago
Just hope Music now works - as all I had previously was 'Loading Music Library' all the time.
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Popular Stories

reset password request iphone

Warning: Apple Users Targeted in Phishing Attack Involving Rapid Password Reset Requests

Tuesday March 26, 2024 4:34 pm PDT by
Phishing attacks taking advantage of Apple's password reset feature have become increasingly common, according to a report from KrebsOnSecurity. Multiple Apple users have been targeted in an attack that bombards them with an endless stream of notifications or multi-factor authentication (MFA) messages in an attempt to cause panic so they'll respond favorably to social engineering. An...
maxresdefault

Apple to Launch New iPad Pro and iPad Air Models in May

Thursday March 28, 2024 11:07 am PDT by
Apple will introduce new iPad Pro and iPad Air models in early May, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. Gurman previously suggested the new iPads would come out in March, and then April, but the timeline has been pushed back once again. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. Apple is working on updates to both the iPad Pro and iPad Air models. The iPad Pro models will...
Generic iOS 18 Feature Purple

iOS 18: What to Expect From 'Biggest' Update in iPhone's History

Wednesday March 27, 2024 11:10 am PDT by
At least some Apple software engineers continue to believe that iOS 18 will be the "biggest" update in the iPhone's history, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. Below, we recap rumored features and changes for the iPhone. "The iOS 18 update is expected to be the most ambitious overhaul of the iPhone's software in its history, according to people working on the upgrade," wrote Gurman, in a r...
maxresdefault

Apple Announces WWDC 2024 Event for June 10 to 14

Tuesday March 26, 2024 10:02 am PDT by
Apple today announced that its 35th annual Worldwide Developers Conference is set to take place from Monday, June 10 to Friday, June 14. As with WWDC events since 2020, WWDC 2024 will be an online event that is open to all developers at no cost. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. WWDC 2024 will include online sessions and labs so that developers can learn about new...
apple maps 3d feature

Apple Maps May Gain Custom Routes With iOS 18

Tuesday March 26, 2024 3:10 pm PDT by
Apple may be planning to add support for "custom routes" in Apple Maps in iOS 18, according to code reviewed by MacRumors. Apple Maps does not currently offer a way to input self-selected routes, with Maps users limited to Apple's pre-selected options, but that may change in iOS 18. Apple has pushed an iOS 18 file to its maps backend labeled "CustomRouteCreation." While not much is revealed...
General iOS 17 Feature Orange Purple

Apple Releases Revised Versions of iOS 17.4.1 and iPadOS 17.4.1 With Updated Build Number

Wednesday March 27, 2024 5:59 am PDT by
Apple on late Tuesday released revised versions of iOS 17.4.1 and iPadOS 17.4.1 with an updated build number of 21E237, according to MacRumors contributor Aaron Perris. The updates previously had a build number of 21E236. The revised updates are available for all iPhone and iPad models that are compatible with iOS 17 and iPadOS 17, but they can only be installed via the Finder app on macOS...
applephilschiller

Apple's Phil Schiller Works 80 Hours a Week Overseeing App Store

Wednesday March 27, 2024 2:03 pm PDT by
With the App Store and app ecosystem undergoing major changes in the European Union, The Wall Street Journal today shared a profile on App Store chief Phil Schiller, who is responsible for the App Store. Though Schiller transitioned from marketing chief to "Apple Fellow" in 2020 to take a step back from Apple and spend more time on personal projects and friends, he is reportedly working...