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OS X Yosemite

Released to the public on october 16, 2014.

Subscribe for regular MacRumors news and future OS X Yosemite info.

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New photos for os x app in 10.10.3, editing tools, availability, yosemite redesign details and features, notification center, handoff and airdrop, phone calls and sms messages on macs, icloud drive, known issues, yosemite how tos and guides, compatible macs, os x yosemite timeline.

Apple released OS X Yosemite to the public on October 16, 2014, following a media event that saw the unveiling of new iPads, a new Retina iMac, and a new Mac mini. It was succeeded by OS X El Capitan on September 30, 2015.

OS X Yosemite was made available through the Mac App Store at no cost. Prospective users needed 2GB of RAM and 8GB of storage space, along with Snow Leopard at a minimum as Mac App Store access was required.

Originally unveiled during Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference on June 2, 2014, Yosemite went through several months of beta testing before it saw its public release. Apple also launched a public beta for OS X Yosemite for the first time, allowing more than a million users to test the software before its release.

OS X Yosemite introduced a number of visual changes , including a flatter, more modern look that emphasizes translucency , streamlined toolbars, and smarter controls.

Yosemite also included a number of feature improvements, such as a "Today" view in Notification Center , that offers a wider variety of information including integration with third-party apps and Spotlight search , which was been improved with new data sources, behaving more like a search engine by pulling in data from Wikipedia, Maps, movies, news, and more.

Apple also brought improvements to a number of core OS X apps in Yosemite, including Safari , which featured a streamlined toolbar, a new "Favorites" view for bookmarks, and frequently visited sites. A new Tab View also made it easier to manage multiple open tabs across various sites, while the more robust Spotlight functionality brought more power to the Safari search bar.

Mail also saw a number of improvements, including a new Mail Drop feature that allows users to seamlessly send and receive attachments up to 5 GB in size via iCloud, bypassing the typical much smaller attachment size limits of many email providers. A new Markup feature also allowed users to easily make Skitch-style annotations to images and other documents right from within Mail.

Messages on Mac gained the ability to handle SMS messages , allowing users to keep all of their conversations synced across iOS and Mac devices. Messages could also be used to send audio and video clips, and it became possible to see the physical location of friends (as in the Find My Friends iPhone app).

A major theme of OS X Yosemite was " Continuity " , ensuring that users could move seamlessly between devices. With Yosemite and iOS 8, users were able to use a new Handoff feature to switch devices and pick up right where they left off. Users could make and receive phone calls right from their Macs with iPhone integration, while Mac users out of range of Wi-Fi networks could initiate Instant Hotspots on their iPhones with a single click on the Mac.

The final version of OS X Yosemite was OS X 10.10.5 , an under-the-hood update that introduced bug fixes, security enhancements, and performance improvements. Most notably, 10.10.5 fixed the DYLD_PRINT_TO_FILE privilege escalation vulnerability that could allow malware to gain root access to a Mac.

OS X 10.10.4 came before OS X 10.10.5, seeded to the public on June 30 . OS X 10.10.4 was also an under-the-hood update that brought bug fixes and performance improvements, including the removal of the problematic "Discoveryd" process , which caused multiple networking issues for sme users in OS X Yosemite. OS X 10.10.4 also introduced TRIM support for third-party solid state drives.

Prior to OS X 10.10.4, Apple released OS X 10.10.3, released in April . The update brought the new Photos for OS X app, which includes a Yosemite-style design, iCloud Photo Library integration, and more. It replaces iPhoto and Aperture.

OS X 10.10.3 also introduced an updated emoji menu plus new emoji options and emoji skin tone modifiers . It added direct support for Google 2-factor authentication when setting up Google services in the Internet Accounts section of System Preferences, included new Force Touch APIs for developers, and new data sources for the "Look Up" feature. When right clicking as one would to get a dictionary definition, there's now more information available from sources like iTunes, the App Store, and there are movie showtimes, nearby locations, and more.

Prior to releasing OS X 10.10.3, Apple launched 10.10.2 in January. The update was a minor one, focusing on fixing lingering issues in Yosemite, like problems with Wi-Fi, issues with Safari web pages loading slowly, and problems with audio and video syncing when using Bluetooth headphones.

OS X 10.10.2 also fixed several notable security flaws, including an issue that caused Spotlight to load remote email content even when the Mail preference was disabled, vulnerabilities detected by Google's Project Zero, and the "Thunderstrike" hardware exploit affecting Thunderbolt-equipped Macs.

OS X 10.10.2 was the operating system's second update. The first, OS X 10.10.1, was released to the public on Monday, November 17. Also a minor update, 10.10.1 included several reliability improvements for Wi-Fi, connecting to Microsoft Exchange Servers, sending Mail messages, and connecting to remote computers using Back to My Mac.

Alongside OS X 10.10.3, Apple released the much-anticipated Photos app for Yosemite. Designed to integrate with the Photos for iOS app, the Photos for OS X app takes on Yosemite-style design elements with an emphasis on flatness and translucency. Photos for OS X is designed to replace both Aperture and iPhoto, Apple's previous photo editing software.

Photos in the Mac app are organized into Moments, Collections, and Years, with a options for Shared, Albums, and Projects, all of which will be immediately recognizable to anyone who has used the iOS app. Albums offers deep levels of organization, sorting photos into sections like Last Import, Favorites, Panoramas, Videos, Slo-Mo, Time-Lapse, Bursts, and more. There's also an option to display all photos and an option to display photos organized by face, a feature that comes from iPhoto.

The app integrates with iCloud Photo Library, so a user's entire collection of photos can be synced to both iOS devices and the Mac. iCloud Photo Library is not required, however, and Photos for OS X can be used as a standalone app for managing large photo libraries if a user does not want to purchase iCloud storage space.

When first opening up Photos for OS X, users will be prompted to import existing iPhoto and Aperture libraries. For iPhoto, projects like albums, folders, books, cards, calendars, and slideshows will be integrated into Photos for OS X, while metadata like star ratings and flags will be transformed into searchable keywords. iPhoto Events are transformed into albums.

For Aperture, metadata including star ratings, color labels, and flags will be transformed into keywords when importing an Aperture library to the new app. All projects will become Albums, and metadata like copyright, contact, and content is retained but not visible.

If iCloud Photo Library is turned on, migrating libraries from iPhoto and Aperture will prompt users to purchase iCloud storage space if necessary. With iCloud Photo Library, photos are accessible on any device that has it turned on.

Photos for OS X has a wide selection of editing tools. There's an "Enhance" button to improve photos with a single click, and there are "Smart Sliders" for more customized adjustments. A list of tool categories and options is below:

- Light: Adjustments for exposure, highlights, shadows, brightness, contrast and black point.

- Color: Adjustments for saturation, contrast, and cast.

- Black and White: Turn photos black and white and adjust intensity, neutrals, tone, and grain.

- Levels: Correct photo aspects like tonal range, color, and contrast via histogram by adjusting mid-tones, highlights, and shadows.

- White Balance: Adjust the white balance to make photos warmer or cooler with Neutral Gray, Skin Tone, and Temperature/Tint options.

- Definition: Increase image clarity.

- Vignette: Darkens the edges of an image, with adjustments for strength, radius, and softness.

- Revert: Lets users compare edits to the original version by pressing the "M" key and gives an option to revert changes.

Along with the above mentioned adjustment tools, Photos for OS X also includes eight built-in filters to make quick adjustments to photos. Options include Mono, Tonal, Noir, Fade, Chrome, Process, Transfer, and Instant. There's also a new cropping tool, which offers a "rule-of-thirds" automatic cropping feature and options for rotating images.

Photos can be shared through the Share menu to sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Flickr, and there are also options to send photos via iCloud Photo Sharing, Mail, Messages, and AirDrop. The Share menu can be customized with sharing tools for sites that offer sharing extensions. There's a built-in printing feature for creating photo books, cards, prints, and more directly within the app, like there was in iPhoto.

OS X Photos can be acquired by updating to OS X 10.10.3, which was released to the public on Wednesday, April 8.

OS X Yosemite has been updated with a redesigned interface that refines the look of Mavericks with design cues taken from iOS 7. Much like iOS 7, Yosemite features a "flatter" style that does away with gloss heavily emphasizes translucency.

Menu bars, side bars, and other window elements have taken on translucent designs, allowing more of a user's chosen background to shine through. The dock is now 2D, and many of the buttons, icons, and apps throughout the operating system have been updated with a simpler, "more harmonious" design.

Translucent toolbars let you know there's more to see than what's visible in the window as you scroll. And a translucent sidebar lets you see what's hidden behind the active window. So the interface takes on the look of your desktop image and your content -- making your Mac experience different from anyone else's.

Apple has updated the fonts in OS X Yosemite, refining them to make them more legible and consistent "across the Mac experience." There's a new typeface in app windows, menu bars, and throughout the system, which Apple promises looks "incredible" on the Retina display.

Toolbars, such as those in Safari, have been slimmed down. For example, Safari no longer displays favorites in the menu bar, as Yosemite makes them accessible when clicking in a "smart search" box instead. Streamlining, simplifying and minimizing interface elements seems to be Apple's goal with Yosemite.

Yosemite's Notification Center has gained a refined design along with a new "Today" feature that mirrors the functionality of the Notification Center in iOS. Today is designed to present a summary of the day's upcoming events, reminders, and birthdays.

Notification Center incorporates stock Apple widgets like Calendar, Weather, Stocks, World Clock, Calculator, and Reminders, but it can also be customized with third-party widgets from the Mac App Store. During a demo, a Sports Center widget was dragged into the Notification Center, displaying sports scores directly in the Today view.

As it is fully customizable, Notification Center can be adjusted for each person's specific needs, and a list of apps that take advantage of Notification Center can be found here .

Not only has Spotlight received the same translucency treatment as many of Yosemite's apps, it has also been updated to incorporate additional sources of information. Spotlight searches will now provide information from Wikipedia, Bing, news, Maps, movies, and more.

Type in a term like "national park," for example, and Spotlight will provide a snippet of a Wikipedia article as a result. Look up a movie, and it will provide both showtimes and reviews from Rotten Tomatoes. The new Spotlight even has currency and unit conversion tools, allowing users to make instant conversions like dollars to euros, feet to meters, and more.

Many of the default apps that come pre-installed with Yosemite have received new abilities and new looks. Safari, for example, has a slimmed down toolbar that's accompanied by a "smart search" feature that provides access to favorite sites, much like Safari in iOS 7. Search also provides Spotlight suggestions from sources like Wikipedia, Bing, Maps, news, and iTunes, along with standard search results.

A revamped Tab View displays all open tabs in a tiled arrangement, with tabs from the same sites arranged together. According to Apple, Safari in Yosemite includes an improved Nitro JavaScript engine, making it faster than ever. It's also more energy efficient, providing functions like two extra hours of battery life when watching Netflix.

With Yosemite, it is possible to open a single tab or window in Private Browsing mode, a feature that previously required all tabs to switch to private, and DuckDuckGo, which does not track users, is now a search option.

Apple has been encouraging FireFox and Chrome users to give the newly updated Safari a try, with a pop up Notification that reads "Try the new Safari. Fast, energy efficient, and with a beautiful new design."

Mail in Yosemite has gained some impressive new features along with its redesign. Now featuring a cleaner design, Mail now supports Markup, a feature that allows users to annotate attachments right in the app. For example, a user might sign a document or write a funny caption on a picture before sending it out.

Large mail attachments are now managed by Mail Drop, a feature that allows users to send attachments that are up to 5GB in size by leveraging iCloud. Attachments are automatically uploaded to iCloud, with recipients receiving the files as a standard attachment in Mail or as a file to download in other clients.

Improving the integration between iOS and Mac devices was one of Apple's major goals with iOS 8 and Yosemite. Better communication between devices was largely achieved with "Continuity," a set of features available for both Yosemite and iOS 8.

One of the major new features of Continuity is Handoff. As described by Apple, Handoff can be used for several different activities, including email and web browsing. Users can begin writing an email on an iPhone, for example, and then switch to a Mac to finish.

Websites work similarly, allowing users to browse the web on one device, and then continue looking at the same website on another device. While this is already possible via iCloud Tabs, Handoff makes the entire process easier and extends the functionality to other apps.

As demoed during the keynote, iOS devices and Macs are "aware" of each other, and can pick up a task when nearby. When composing an email on a Mac, for example, users will see an icon on the screen of their iPad or iPhone that can be tapped to allow them to continue writing on the iOS device. Similarly, an iPhone near a Mac will cause the activity to automatically pop up on the Mac's dock, allowing for a seamless transition between devices .

Handoff works with functions like email and web browsing, but it also works in apps. Apple has built Handoff functionality into its apps like Pages , Numbers , Keynote , and more, which will allow a document started in an iOS version of that app to be seamlessly picked up within the Mac app, and vice versa. Apple has also opened up this functionality to third-party developers, allowing them to build Handoff into their apps. While apps using Handoff will open their Mac and iOS counterparts on relevant devices, when there is no Mac app available for an iOS app, developers will be able to redirect users to a website or a web-based version of an app and vice versa. Having two apps for the feature is not a necessity, as it also supports browser-to-app or app-to browser functionality.

It appears that Handoff is limited to Macs that include Bluetooth LE(4.0), which means that many Macs produced before 2011 will not have access to the feature. At this point in time, it does not appear that a Bluetooth LE adapter enables the feature.

AirDrop, Apple's peer-to-peer file sharing service, also now works between Macs and iOS devices. Previously, AirDrop on an iOS device only worked with other iOS devices, while AirDrop on a Mac only worked with AirDrop on other Macs.

The enhanced Continuity between OS X and iOS also allows Mac devices in close proximity to an iPhone to both place and receive calls, leveraging Bluetooth and WiFi with the iPhone serving as a relay. Users can answer a call made to their iPhone on their Mac, a useful feature when an iPhone is across the room charging or otherwise inaccessible.

Similarly, iPads and Macs are now able to receive SMS messages from non-Apple devices, a function previously limited to the iPhone. iPads and Macs are also able to utilize an "Instant Hotspot" feature that allows them to connect to an iPhone hotspot with just a click, and AirDrop is also cross-platform. For users wondering how to set up Instant Hotspot, MacRumors has published a detailed how-to article.

iCloud Drive is a new facet of iCloud that puts an iCloud folder directly in the Finder. All files that have been uploaded to iCloud from various iOS and Mac apps can be found in iCloud Drive, but more importantly, it also allows users to store their own files, much like Dropbox.

The iCloud Drive folder within Finder on Yosemite works like any other folder, allowing users to drag and drop files to it. Additional folders within iCloud Drive can also be created, letting users organize all of their cloud files.

iPhones and iPads also have access to iCloud Drive, and thus access to all of a user's personal cloud files. Content can also be managed on Apple's iCloud.com website and Apple is planning an app for Windows as well.

iCloud Photo Library on iOS 8 will take advantage of iCloud Drive, storing all of a user's photos in the cloud. Apple is working on a similar solution for Macs called Photos, which will be released in the spring of 2015.

Apple introduced new iCloud pricing during its iCloud Drive announcement. The company now offers 5GB of iCloud storage for free, with 20GB available for $0.99/month and 200GB available for $3.99/month, which puts its prices on par with competing services like Dropbox.

Many people who have installed OS X Yosemite have been experiencing problems with slow Wi-Fi speeds or continual disconnections. Though a variety of fixes have been proposed , it does not appear that there's a single solution that works for all users.

The OS X Yosemite 10.10.1 update that Apple released in November included improvements for Wi-Fi reliability, but according to reports on Apple's support forums, the update did not fix the bulk of the Wi-Fi problems that people are seeing. OS X 10.10.2 , released on January 27, also fixed some remaining problems with Wi-Fi.

• How to Get 'Handoff' Working in OS X Yosemite and iOS 8
• How to Use iOS 8's 'Instant Hotspot' On a Mac with OS X Yosemite
• How to Use AirDrop to Share Files Between Macs and iOS Devices
• How to Enable Text Message Forwarding and Answer Phone Calls on Your Mac
• How to Enable Family Sharing in iOS 8 and OS X Yosemite
• iCloud Photo Library: What You Need to Know

OS X Yosemite will run on all Macs that can run OS X Mountain Lion and OS X Mavericks. It requires 2GB of RAM and 8GB of storage space. Mac App Store access (introduced with Snow Leopard) is also required.

OS X Yosemite can be installed on the following Macs: iMac (Mid 2007 or newer), MacBook (Late 2008 Aluminum, or Early 2009 or newer), MacBook Pro (Mid 2007 or newer), MacBook Air (Late 2008 or newer), Mac Mini (Early 2009 or newer), Mac Pro (Early 2008 or newer), Xserve (Early 2009).

OS X El Capitan is now the current version of OS X and it too is available free of charge through the Mac App Store and runs on all Macs that support OS X Yosemite.

Apple Announces OS X Yosemite

Introduces Refined New Design, Powerful Apps & Amazing New Continuity Features

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OS X Yosemite Overview

Apple today unveiled OS X Yosemite , the next major version of their Mac operating system. Introduced by Apple’s Senior Vice President of Software Engineering, Craig Federighi, Yosemite brings a big new redesign to the Mac that is reminiscent of last year’s iOS 7 redesign. Continuity between OS X and iOS is also a huge aspect to the Yosemite release, including a so-called ‘Handoff’ feature, instant hotspots, and support for making phone calls and sending text messages from a Mac. Beyond that, Notification Center now includes the ‘Today’ view from iOS (with support for widgets), a brand new ‘Spotlight’ and big improvements to Mail, Safari and the new iCloud Drive.

 “Yosemite is the future of OS X with its incredible new design and amazing new apps, all engineered to work beautifully with iOS,” said Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of Software Engineering. “We engineer our platforms, services and devices together, so we are able to create a seamless experience for our users across all our products that is unparalleled in the industry. It’s something only Apple can deliver.”

Taking strong cues from last year’s iOS 7 redesign, Yosemite removes a lot of unnecessary window chrome and pumps up the translucency. The dock is no longer a 3D platform, but a semi-transparent rectangular square that blurs the wallpaper. Apple’s Mac app icons are now a little flatter, and a bit simpler - but there is still a mix of round-rectangles, circles and other shapes. Apple has even brought a dark mode to Yosemite, allowing you to switch from a translucent white theme to a translucent black theme (similar to the Private mode in iOS 7’s Safari). But you really have to see the design to understand it, so here are a few screenshots.

With Yosemite, OS X has been redesigned and refined with a fresh modern look where controls are clearer, smarter and easier to understand, and streamlined toolbars put the focus on your content without compromising functionality. Translucent elements reveal additional content in your app window, provide a hint at what’s hidden behind and take on the look of your desktop. App icons have a clean, consistent design and an updated system font improves readability.

Notification Center

In addition to being redesigned to fit within Yosemite’s new look (translucent black, blurring the desktop wallpaper), there is now a new ‘Today’ view. Just like the Today view in iOS, you will now be able to get a rundown of everything happening today for you. You get a glance of your calendar, reminders, stocks, weather and more. Importantly, it also includes the support for widgets such as a calculator, and you’ll be able to get more widgets as developers create them for their Mac App Store apps.

The new Today view in Notification Center gives you a quick look at everything you need to know with widgets for Calendar, Weather, Stocks, Reminders, World Clock and social networks. You can even download additional widgets from the Mac App Store to customize your Today view.

Spotlight has now been moved to the center of your screen, in a design similar to Alfred and Quicksilver. But the changes are more than face deep, with support for large inline previews and external data sources. Those external data sources include support for Apple Maps, iTunes Store, Wikipedia, movie showings, and a number of news sources amongst others - all of which also support for the inline preview. For example, you can search for a restaurant right from Spotlight, view it in the inline preview even including any Yelp reviews.

Spotlight® now appears front and center on your desktop and adds new categories of results, so you can view rich suggestions from Wikipedia, Maps, Bing, App Store, iTunes Store, iBooks Store, top websites, news and movie showtimes.

Continuity Features

A big aspect of the presentation was highlighting new features that provide greater continuity support between the Mac and iOS. There were a few key aspects to this including ‘Handoff’, instant hotspots, and the ability to send SMS text messages and make phone calls from your Mac. In Federighi’s words, they wanted to promote the ability to use “the right device for the right moment”.

Continuity features in Yosemite make your Mac and iOS device perfect companions. When your iPhone or iPad is near your Mac, Handoff lets you start an activity on one device and pass it to the other. Instant Hotspot makes using your iPhone’s hotspot as easy as connecting to a Wi-Fi network.³ Now the SMS and MMS messages that previously only appeared on your iPhone appear in Messages on all your devices. You can even send SMS or MMS messages directly from your Mac and make or receive iPhone calls using your Mac as a speakerphone.⁴

The idea behind the Handoff features is to improve the continuity when transitioning from using an iOS device to a Mac, or vice versa. So for example, if you are composing an email in Mail on an iPhone and you approach your Mac, OS X Yosemite will add an icon to the dock that allows you to finish composing the email on your Mac. This new feature works both iOS to Mac and Mac to iOS. On iOS, the Handoff icon will appear on the bottom left of the Lock screen.

Instant Hotspot

This isn’t specifically a new feature, but a greatly improved one. Now, OS X Yosemite will be able to automatically hotspot off an iPhone or iPad cellular connection with one-click. All it requires is the iOS device to be nearby - no passwords, no setup (presumably just working from iCloud accounts and Bluetooth).

SMS and Phone Calls

Messages on your Mac can now receive and send SMS messages via your iPhone. The iPhone acts as a relay between your mobile service provider and your Mac, allowing you to seamlessly send messages to others who don’t have iMessage. Perhaps even more impressively, you can now even make and accept phone calls on your Mac. Don’t worry about your phone being charged in another room whilst you are working on your Mac, simply accept the call and your Mac will work as a speakerphone. Similarly, you can even start a phone call on your Mac, right from Safari, Contacts and other Mac apps.

Mail in OS X Yosemite has supposedly seen improvements to the basics of reliable syncing, fast account switching and quick fetches of new mail. But beyond that, and the expected UI refresh, it has a new Mail Drop, and Markup features.

Within Mail, it allows you to circumvent the common email problem of sending large attachments. Mail will allow you to upload documents, such as large videos (up to 5GB), to iCloud and recipients will be able to view the attachments like normal (if they are using Apple’s Mail app) or as a link (if using 3rd party apps).

Markup Feature

Also included OS X Yosemite’s Mail app is a new markup feature. This brings some Preview-esque features right into the Mail app, allowing you to annotate, draw and sign images and PDF documents from within the compose window. It’ll even recognise when you are drawing an arrow or callout bubble with your trackpad and automatically convert that scribble into a clean vector annotation.

Safari in OS X Yosemite brings a refreshed user interface and four key features: powerful smart search options, improved sharing options, new tab views and improved standards support. Running through each of those briefly, perhaps the most exciting is the new smart search bar, which incorporates many of the new features that Spotlight does - allowing you to preview popular search items. That search bar also contains your favourites: simply tap on it and a dropdown box will display all your favourites. Moving to the sharing options and you can now subscribe to RSS feeds into your Shared Links sidebar. When you want to share a link to something, Safari will remember the recent people you have sent links to, and display them so you can quickly do so again.

As for tabs, there is a new birds-eye grid view that allows you to view all your tabs at a glance, and if you have multiple tabs open from the same website, they’ll be stacked on top of each other. But they haven’t removed the normal tabs, and in fact Apple has improved them. Now, if you have many tabs open (such that you can’t even read what all their titles are), you can scroll along them to expand the tab to fit the title. Last but certainly not least, Apple has stepped up Safari’s compliance with standards and even introduced some new features such as HTML5 Premium Video which will supposedly let you watch Netflix and other video services without a plugin - allowing big savings on battery (Apple claims two hours).

Safari has a new streamlined design that puts the most important controls at your fingertips. A new Favorites view gives you quick access to your favorite websites, and a powerful new Tabs view displays thumbnails of all your open web pages in one window. Safari also gives you more control over your privacy, with separate Private Browsing windows and built-in support for DuckDuckGo, a search engine that doesn’t track users. When you search for popular or common terms, new Spotlight Suggestions appear along with the suggestions from your search provider. Safari supports the latest web standards, including WebGL and SPDY, and with support for HTML5 Premium Video Extensions, you can watch Netflix HD videos for up to two hours longer. Powered by the Nitro JavaScript engine, Safari is over six times faster than Firefox and over five times faster than Chrome when executing JavaScript found in typical websites.

iCloud Drive

iCloud Drive is a new feature that is included within Finder in OS X Yosemite. It allows you to not only view what is being synced with your iCloud account (think of Pages documents or Keynote documents) but also sync all your Mac documents with iCloud, making those documents accessible to any apps the support iCloud Drive.

Built right into the Finder, iCloud Drive stores files of any type in iCloud®. iCloud Drive works like any other folder on your Mac, so you can drag documents into it, organize them with folders and Tags and search for them using Spotlight. With iCloud Drive, you can access all your files in iCloud from your Mac, iPhone, iPad® or even a Windows PC.

AirDrop now works between iOS and Macs. Enough said, right? Now you can send documents, images and a lot more, easily between nearby colleagues, even if they’re using a Mac and you’re using an iPhone.

Availability

A developer preview of OS X Yosemite will be available to developers today. Apple will also be running a public beta program of OS X Yosemite, where anyone can sign up to be a part of the program and help Apple improve the update. OS X Yosemite will be available to everyone later this Fall, for free.

You can  follow our WWDC 2014 hub for updates , or subscribe through RSS to  our dedicated WWDC 2014 feed .

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Apple OS X Yosemite Review

Laptop mag verdict.

Not only does OS X Yosemite have a flatter, cleaner look, but it also lets you transition almost seamlessly between Macs and iOS devices.

Continuity features dramatically improve cross-device workflow

Much-improved iCloud file-syncing service

More-capable Spotlight feature

Clean, modern appearance

Some of best features require relatively recent hardware

Pervasive translucency can make some UI elements confusing

Finder's file-management features still feel limited

Why you can trust Laptop Mag Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing products and services so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about how we test .

With last year's release of iOS 7, Apple made its mobile OS "flatter" -- the  fancy, 3D textures of iOS 6 were replaced by brighter colors, simpler interfaces and less depth. With this week's release of OS X 10.10 Yosemite -- available for free from Apple's Mac App Store starting tomorrow (Oct. 16) -- the company has taken a similar visual approach with its desktop operating system. You'll find brighter colors, fewer textures and simpler-looking interfaces.

But Yosemite doesn't just adopt iOS's look. It also allows devices running either platform to integrate, share and collaborate. And while Apple has made innumerable other tweaks to OS X in Yosemite, and added some great new features , this Mac/ iPhone /iPad integration will surely be the biggest appeal for many people invested in Apple's ecosystem.

Editor's Note : This review is based on the final beta of OS X Yosemite. Upon the operating system's official release, we will revisit any issues we encountered and amend this review accordingly.

Who Can Run It?

As with Mavericks, any Mac that can run OS X 10.7 Lion or later can run Yosemite. Even most OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard-compatible Macs are eligible, though specific features require newer hardware components. (More on those restrictions below.) The list of specific computers is:

• iMac (Mid-2007 or newer)
• MacBook (Late 2008 Aluminum, Early 2009 or newer)
• MacBook Pro (Mid/Late 2007 or newer)
• MacBook Air (Late 2008 or newer)
• Mac mini (Early 2009 or newer)
• Mac Pro (Early 2008 or newer)
• Xserve (Early 2009)

To install Yosemite, your Mac must already be running 10.6.8 Snow Leopard or later to download the new OS from the Mac App Store. Apple's other official requirements are 2GB of RAM and 8GB of available storage; I recommend at least 4GB of RAM and 10GB or more of free drive space; you'll simply have a better experience with those resources.

Interface: A New Look

More than with any previous update to OS X, Yosemite offers a significant visual overhaul. The system font is now the thinner Helvetica Neue; interface elements that formerly had texture or weight are now flatter and more colorful; gradients are subtler or have been eliminated completely.

Translucency is everywhere in Yosemite, in toolbars, sidebars and more. The translucent effect can be a bit distracting in some apps, for example, in Preview's sidebar. But in others, it helps you focus on the main content area, and it adds a feeling of depth to the otherwise flat design. (You can disable most transparent effects by going to System Preferences > Accessibility > Display, and checking the Reduce Transparency option; an Increase Contrast option makes many buttons and similar interface elements more defined.).

Apple simplified and compacted many window toolbars. For example, Safari's toolbar is now inline with the "Stoplight" buttons, and Contacts has lost its traditional title bar in order to conserve vertical screen space. Apple also revamped the icons for included apps, starting with a new, happier Finder, and you'll find that some elements, such as the Share button, are direct copies of their iOS counterparts.

Overall, Yosemite's look is quite different than that of Mavericks, but it makes Apple's desktop and mobile operating systems feel more like variations of each other. And after the initial shock wears off, Yosemite's look is actually quite nice, though the new system font works much better on Macs with a Retina display than on lower-resolution screens.

A minor, but nice option is the new Dark Mode (found in the General screen of System Preferences), which changes the background of the menu bar, Dock and Spotlight from translucent white to translucent black. It's a slick effect (and the nifty utility Lights Out can automatically enable and disable dark mode based on daylight hours). However, in the latest pre-release versions of Yosemite, I couldn't disable dark mode once I turned it on. (I presume this bug will get fixed in the final version.)

I also love Yosemite's new Dock, which dispenses with the odd, 3D version of recent years, replacing it with a flat, translucent background. The new appearance makes app icons much easier to see and differentiate, and the running-app indicator is more obvious. And if you like working with full-screen apps, the green-stoplight button on any window now toggles full-screen mode, further integrating this feature into the standard interface. (Option-clicking that button gives you the old-school "zoom" behavior.)

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Overall, the look and feel of Yosemite is cleaner and feels more efficient. It will make for an easier adjustment for new Mac users coming from iOS, and I suspect that many OS X veterans will grow to like the new interface.

Continuity: Easier Multi-Device Workflows

Though Yosemite offers a slew of new features, a group of these features collectively dubbed Continuity is likely to be the biggest draw. This will be especially true for Mac owners who also use iOS devices, but even for those who just have more than one Mac. 

One of the biggest challenges to using multiple computing devices is moving your work from one to another, whether it's shifting the editing of a spreadsheet from an iMac to an iPad or starting an email message on your iPhone and finishing it on your MacBook. Yosemite's new Handoff feature lets you perform some of these shifts with much less hassle.

When using supported apps, you can save a document, pause editing of an outgoing message or stop reading a webpage on one device, and then pick that task up right where you left off on another. For example, when viewing a Web page in Safari on your Mac, you can turn on your iPad, swipe up on a small Safari icon that appears on the lock screen, and immediately view that same Web page in iOS Safari. You can also do the reverse, with a special Handoff icon appearing at the end of your OS X Dock to let you receive the Web page.

Apple says Handoff works with Calendar, Contacts, Keynote, Mail, Maps, Messages, Notes, Numbers, Pages, Reminders and Safari; third-party apps must be updated to support the feature. (Third-party developers will also be able to enable Handoff between iOS apps and Web apps on the desktop.) In my testing, handoffs in these apps -- except for the iWork apps, which require an update that will be released in concert with Yosemite -- usually worked as advertised. When it works, Handoff feels almost magical.

In the weeks leading up to Yosemite's release, Handoff's success rate was occasionally spotty. For example, on several occasions, I was able to stop writing an email or pause viewing a Web page on my iMac and immediately resume on my iPhone or iPad. But I couldn't reliably get it to work the other way around. (Apple says these glitches should be resolved in the final version of Yosemite.) 

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Handoff is also a bit finicky in terms of how you get it to work. For example, when moving from a Mac or iOS device to another iOS device, the receiving iOS device must be at the lock screen in order to receive the handoff; you end up having to lock your device's screen and then wake it up to complete the handoff.

People have also long been frustrated when transferring files between OS X and iOS devices. Apple's AirDrop feature, which makes it relatively easy to transfer files between devices, has been around for a while, but until now, it's been platform specific: OS X to OS X or iOS to iOS. With Yosemite and iOS 8, you can now use AirDrop to send files directly between compatible Macs and iOS devices.

On an iPhone or iPad, you use the familiar share sheet; on OS X, you use the Finder's AirDrop view. And unlike with older versions of OS X AirDrop, you don't need to first open the AirDrop view in the Finder to receive files. If someone sends you data using AirDrop, you'll see a standard notification, allowing you to accept or decline the transfer. Even better, if you're sending data to yourself -- from and to devices with the same Apple ID -- the transfer happens automatically, and you see a notification that lets you quickly view the new file(s).

As with Handoff, when AirDrop works, it's fantastic. However, I did experience occasions when, even with recent hardware (a Late-2013 iMac and an iPhone 6 Plus), devices weren't able to "see" each other. (As with Handoff, this bug should be fixed in the final version of Yosemite.)

Phone and SMS

Yosemite and iOS 8 also work together to let you use the cellular capabilities of your iPhone or iPad on your Mac. My favorite feature is that if your iPhone is on the same Wi-Fi network as your Mac, you'll see a notification on your computer whenever you receive a call on your phone; you can answer the call right on your Mac, using its speaker and microphone for the conversation, or quickly send an iMessage reply. (This also works between iOS devices, so you can answer phone calls on your iPad.)

It gets better. If you're looking at a restaurant's Web page in Safari, or a friend's card in Contacts, you can click a phone number to call right from your Mac, using your iPhone for the cellular connection. As long as your iPhone is configured with the same iCloud account, it just works.

A related feature -- and one I'm really looking forward to, but that won't be available until the release of iOS 8.1 -- is SMS relaying. As with phone calls, if your iPhone is within range of your Mac, incoming SMS and MMS messages will automatically be forwarded to Messages on your computer, and you'll be able to send those types of messages from your Mac.

Instant Hotspot

You've long been able to set up a personal Wi-Fi hotspot with OS X, which lets you use the cellular-data connection of your iPhone or iPad for Internet access on your Mac. But doing so has required first configuring the feature on your iOS device, and then manually connecting your Mac to the phone or tablet via Wi-Fi. With Yosemite's new Instant Hotspot feature, you configure the setup once, and from then on you can initiate and stop the hotspot right from your Mac's system-wide Wi-Fi menu, without having to touch your iPhone or iPad.

According to Apple, Yosemite manages data more efficiently when using Instant Hotspot, and it automatically disconnects and reconnects as necessary to preserve your iOS device's battery life. I wasn't able to test this feature, as Instant Hotspot requires iOS 8.1, which should be released shortly after Yosemite.

Limited Compatibility

The downside to these Continuity features is that they require hardware that older Yosemite-compatible Macs won't have. Handoff, Instant Hotspot and Mac-to-iOS AirDrop each require a 2012 or newer Mac laptop, a 2012 or newer iMac or Mac mini , or a Late 2013 Mac Pro ; each device must have Bluetooth LE enabled. 

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On the iOS side, Handoff requires a Lightning-connector device running iOS 8 or later, and Instant Hotspot requires an iPhone or iPad running iOS 8.1 or later with cellular service that supports personal hotspots. (Mac-to-iOS AirDrop requires only iOS 7.) Similarly, making phone calls on your Mac requires an iPhone running iOS 8 or later with a cellular plan, and SMS forwarding requires iOS 8.1.

iCloud Drive: More Like a Drive

Yosemite brings a complete revamp of iCloud document storage. Under Mavericks and iOS 7 (and previous OS versions), the file-storage and -sync space you get with a free iCloud account was sandboxed -- securely separated, on a per-app basis. Each app could see only its own documents, and you could share files across devices only if a particular app had versions for each device. Now, in many respects, iCloud Drive is a lot like a simplified version of Dropbox.

Once you enable iCloud Drive in Yosemite and iOS 8, which is initially an option, iCloud storage is much more open. For example, the Finder offers a special iCloud Drive view that looks just like any other folder, except that any files you store here are synced to your iCloud Drive space and, thus, to your other devices. Open that same view on another Mac, and you see the same files and folders; open an iOS 8 document-picker view on your iCloud Drive, and you'll see the same files and organization there, too. You can also access your iCloud Drive documents, and save to this area, using the standard Open/Save navigation dialogs.

Because the iCloud Drive view acts like a standard Finder folder, you can organize files however you want, including using tags; that organization is reflected across devices. Any changes you make while offline are automatically synced to iCloud once you're back online.

Developers can still choose to store an app's files in an app-specific folder, but it's no longer a requirement. And Apple is even updating its iCloud software for Windows to allow access to iCloud Drive from Windows.

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Unfortunately, the new iCloud Drive features require Yosemite and iOS 8, and they're not backwards compatible with older versions of either platform. Once you enable iCloud Drive, you can no longer access iCloud Drive-hosted data on older devices. And data you save to iCloud on older computers and devices isn't accessible from Yosemite and iOS 8. For my testing, this meant that I wasn't able to rigorously test iCloud Drive's features across more than a few devices, but it seemed to work well in my limited use.

Spotlight: Front and Center

Apple says that Yosemite brings the biggest changes to Spotlight, OS X's system-wide search feature, since Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger. And that's a fair claim. For starters, Spotlight's main interface is no longer relegated to a corner of the screen, though its menu-bar icon remains there. Click that icon, or press a keyboard shortcut, and Spotlight's revamped search bar appears right in the middle of your display. Begin typing a search query, and you see both instant results and autosuggested search terms.

You can still use Spotlight to launch apps and locate documents; it actually feels a bit faster at these tasks than it did under Mavericks. But the new, larger interface provides room for detailed information, including maps, document previews and even Yelp reviews for businesses. When searching for a contact, you can see the person's entire contact card, and click on any bit of information to act on it: call a number, send an email, view a map and so on.

Spotlight also incorporates a number of additional data sources in Yosemite, including Wikipedia, Bing, Fandango, Maps, the Mac App Store, the iTunes Store and trending news from a number of websites, encouraging you to use Spotlight, rather than Safari, as your first option for searches.

Spotlight can use your current location when performing those sources: Search for "pizza," and Spotlight will show you nearby restaurants and ratings. Apple has also added unit and currency conversion: Type "3 tablespoons in teaspoons," and Spotlight shows you the answer, along with the same volume in several other units.

If you've rarely (or never) used Spotlight in previous versions of OS X, you'll want to give it a try in Yosemite. It's a much different, and much more useful, feature.

Notification Center: Mirroring iOS

In my experience, far fewer people use Notification Center on OS X than on iOS. But that could change under Yosemite, as the desktop version takes liberal cues from its mobile counterpart, making Notification Center just as much a replacement for OS X's legacy Dashboard feature as it is a center for notifications.

On the visual side , Notification Center now slides over your windows and desktop, rather than clumsily pushing the entire desktop aside. It's a much nicer effect, and one that's less disruptive. On the functional side, you get a Today view that mirrors the one found on the iPad and iPhone: a summary of today's weather and upcoming events at the top, with an editable list of widgets below, and a summary of tomorrow's day at the bottom.

Apple provides widgets for Calculator, Calendar, Reminders, Social (for quickly posting to Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn, or for sending a text message), Stocks, Weather and World Clock. The Weather and Stocks widgets can even sync with their iOS counterparts. Once Yosemite is released, you'll be able to further customize the Today view using third-party widgets, such as a scoreboard widget from ESPN or Yahoo Sports, or a better calculator.

The other view, Notifications, works much as it did under Mavericks, as a sort of ticker-tape reference to past notifications. Alas, despite new visuals, not much has changed here. For example, there's still no way to quickly clear all notifications, and clearing each app's notifications still requires tapping a minuscule "x" button, one app at a time.

Safari: Streamlined Design

Like Notification Center, and perhaps more than any other standalone app, Safari in Yosemite has inherited much of the look and feel of its iOS 8 counterpart, or, more specifically, iOS 8 Safari on the iPad.

If you click in the URL/search field, you'll see  a drop-down grid of icons for your Favorites. Open a new tab or window, and by default a similar grid of icons for your Favorites appears on the right, with your Bookmarks/Reading List/Shared Links list on the left. Clicking the tabs button in the upper right (or use a two-finger pinch gesture on your trackpad) shows a bird's-eye view of open tabs, grouped by website.

This new tab view even includes iCloud-synced open tabs from other devices. And Safari now has a shorter, streamlined toolbar, as well as a horizontally scrollable tab bar, just like on the iPad. The result is a browser that better fits smaller screens, leaves more room for Web content and makes it easier to quickly open your favorite sites.

On the other hand, this new minimalism has a few drawbacks. The new toolbar leaves no room for Web page titles, so if you want to see the name of the current page, you must have the tab bar visible. And, as with iOS, Safari by default shows only the root of the current webpage's URL ( www.laptopmag.com , for example). To see the full URL, you must click the URL (or, to always see full URLs, enable the "Show full website address" option in Safari's Preferences). I'm not a fan of the new Favorites bar, either, which centers your favorites So, if you resize your Safari window, the location of each site's shortcut changes, eliminating the benefits of muscle memory.

Apple has extended much of Spotlight's Web-focused functionality into Safari's search bar. For example, type a search term, and the first result is often a preview of Wikipedia's article on the topic; enter a restaurant's name, and you see a Maps preview of the business; type "Movies," and a small preview of movies playing nearby appears.

Other minor changes include integration of third-party sharing extensions. For example, you can add a Tumblr option to Safari's Share menu. Also, you can now have separate private and nonprivate browsing windows (previously it was all or nothing), and Apple has restored RSS functionality to Safari. However, in Yosemite, subscribing to a site's RSS feed includes new articles in the Shared Links list, rather than in a traditional RSS-reader view.

A new feature called Quick Website Search lets you search specific sites by typing, for example, "youtube funny movie." Finally, your browsing history is now synced across all your devices, so it's easy to go back to a particular site, even if you last viewed it on your iPhone.

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Chrome has become quite popular on OS X, but the Yosemite version of Safari offers enough interesting features, including many features Chrome has long had, that it will be easier than ever to stick with OS X's stock browser.

Mail: Better Attachments, Fewer Bugs

System-wide aesthetic changes aside, Mail in Yosemite looks and feels much like it has in the past couple versions of OS X. However, it gains two big new features that are sure to please those who frequently work with attachments.

The first, Mail Drop, makes it easier to send large files via email. Many email providers, including Apple's own iCloud mail service, impose size limits on message attachments. The common workaround has been to sign up for an online-storage service (such as Dropbox or Droplr), upload your large file(s) to the service and then get a download URL you can send to your recipient.

In Yosemite, you simply drag large attachments into an outgoing message as you normally would. OS X automatically encrypts and uploads the attachments, up to 5GB per email message, to your iCloud storage on Apple's servers. (Mail Drop uploads don't count against your iCloud storage capacity.) If your message is received by another Yosemite user, the attachment(s) are automatically downloaded and appear in the message as would any other file. Users of other operating systems (including earlier versions of OS X) and webmail will instead see a link to download the file(s); these links are valid for 30 days.

As long as you have an iCloud account configured on your Mac, Mail Drop works with any email account set up in Mail -- not just iCloud mail. It's essentially seamless, and is an elegant solution to an issue that's become more and more common as file sizes for videos, photos and other sharable content have grown.

The other new feature, Markup, makes it easier to annotate PDFs and images. When replying to an email with a PDF or image attachment, a small Markup menu appears on the image; click it, and you get tools for editing that document. You can draw free-form and straight lines, arrows and other shapes; magnify parts of the image; add text; add a signature; and more. You essentially get all the annotation tools built into OS X's Preview app right from within Mail. It's the most convenient solution I've seen for signing PDFs and quickly adding notations to images.

If you were scarred by Mavericks' early Mail problems, you're probably wondering if Mail in Yosemite is better. I couldn't test Yosemite Mail with an Exchange server -- one of Mavericks Mail's buggiest areas -- over several weeks using release candidates of Yosemite. But Mail seems to be solid when used with iCloud, general IMAP and even Gmail accounts. Unlike with early versions of Mavericks, I didn't have problems with mail not appearing (or messages disappearing), or issues connecting to my various email servers.

Messages: Learning from Mobile

The promise of Apple's Messages app and iMessage service has long been "all your instant and text messages, on every device." The reality has often been frustratingly far from that, but if you're running Yosemite and iOS 8, it's getting a lot closer, and the Messages app on OS X is becoming more and more like its iOS 8 counterpart.

Click to Enlarge For starters, each conversation -- individual or group -- gets a new detail view that lets you share your location, see the locations of other participants (assuming they're on Yosemite or iOS 8 and have chosen to share where they are), and quickly view all media and documents included in the conversation. You can also rename group conversations for easier reference, easily add a new person or remove an existing participant, and even remove yourself from the conversation if you're done. If a particular conversation is getting a bit chatty, you can disable notifications for it.

Like iOS 8 Messages, the Yosemite version also lets you quickly record and send audio messages using a feature called Soundbites: Just click the microphone button next to the new-message field and start talking. Click stop, and you have the option to Send or Cancel.

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Unfortunately, there's no way to preview the message, and audio quality isn't great, but it's still useful for times when you'd rather talk than type. Assuming the new SMS-relay feature described above works well once iOS 8.1 is released, Messages could finally be your one-stop messaging app on the desktop.

Family Sharing and More...

These are just the marquee new features and capabilities in Yosemite. Minor changes and adoptions of new iOS features abound. For example, Yosemite now supports Family Sharing, Apple's new option for sharing media, apps and other digital media across multiple Apple IDs. The Finder gains the capability to batch-rename groups of files. And the Calendar app makes it easier to quickly create new events; it also learns from past events to help auto-complete new ones. As with most new versions of OS X, you'll find little changes everywhere.

Bottom Line

Each year, Apple announces a new version of OS X, usually proclaiming the release to be the largest update yet. But OS X 10.10 Yosemite really does feel, and look, like it's worthy of the hype, especially if you own multiple Apple devices. It's the first version of OS X that truly embraces Apple's ever-widening ecosystem by letting you use your Macs, iPhones and iPads as part of a coherent computing system, rather than as disparate devices fighting for your attention. And for iOS users who are new to the Mac, Yosemite makes the transition from mobile to desktop (and back again) as seamless as I've seen to date.

I'd still like to see the Finder, and OS X's file-management features as a whole, get the overhaul they deserve, so that both basic and power users can work more efficiently. (Open and save dialogs, for example, haven't changed much in years.) It's also a shame, if technologically understandable, that so many of the best features of Yosemite require newer hardware, on both the Mac and iOS side. And like any new OS, Yosemite's initial release has a few glitches. But Yosemite will likely  change -- for the better -- how many users work every day.

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Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite review

Putting the computer back in apple inc.

By David Pierce , editor-at-large and Vergecast co-host with over a decade of experience covering consumer tech. Previously, at Protocol, The Wall Street Journal, and Wired.

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For nearly two decades, the release of a new PC operating system was an event. Upgrading cost money; you had to go to the store to get the necessary floppy disk or a CD; the new OS was expected to be different and better in basically every way. I’ll never forget the first time I booted Windows XP, or the day I finally got to jump again to Windows 7.

The last few years, Apple’s taken a decidedly simpler approach. It still rents event space and touts the new features, but your new operating system arrives more like an tune-up than a new car. You open the app store, click a button, and poof: a few things change but everything stays mostly the same.

This year’s model, OS X 10.10 Yosemite, is a little different. It comes with a stylistic overhaul, a new and cleaner coat of paint for your Mac. And it improves most of Apple’s built-in apps, from Mail to Maps and everything in between. But the reason Yosemite feels bigger, more important, is that it feels like the beginning of something new for Apple. OS X still looks like OS X, but Yosemite turns your Mac into more than just a PC. It turns it into both hub and spoke of a constantly connected, conversing ecosystem of Apple products, in which you’re able to do anything you want on any device you want.

Yosemite doesn’t promise to make my Mac look like my iPhone; it promises to make them work together constantly. Perfectly.

That would be a big event.

Our original preview of Yosemite, from July.

It took about six hours for me to mostly forget that I was using Yosemite. That’s not to say it doesn’t look different — it does. It’s just that the new look feels familiar, only slightly more refined, like the finished version of what came before. After downloading and installing the update (which took about 25 minutes and a little over 5GB of disk space), I had a new wallpaper, the mountain face against pink and purple sky. All the fonts were suddenly a little smaller and a lot more Helvetica Neue (and also pretty pixelated unless I was on a Retina screen). All the icons were a little flatter. I’d love to say I have feelings about the translucency in the sidebars and menu bars of Apple’s apps, which shows a bit of the app behind whatever you’re looking at, but I don’t. I stopped noticing it almost immediately. (Of course, that’s partly because a lot of apps haven’t even updated to support translucency yet. You can also turn it off really easily.)

It’s a cleaner, calmer, more balanced look that I like a lot, even if I did change my background immediately. But there’s still a dock at the bottom of my screen, still a menu bar at the top, still the same settings and options and gestures and keyboard shortcuts. Yosemite is a new look — but it’s not a new idea.

Yosemite only changed a few things about the way I use my Mac. Some are small: there’s no "full-screen" button in the top right corner of the window, you just press the green button in the stoplight menu. Spotlight doesn’t pop up in the corner of your screen, but in the center, in a gray window like Alfred. I have a fraught relationship with the new Spotlight, by the way: it’s much more powerful, showing movie times and map results and topical Wikipedia pages, but it can’t do a simple Google search, and it would rather show me emails that reference Taylor Swift than actually help me play "Out Of The Woods." Spotlight is so close to right, but I still use Alfred every time.

The biggest change was that I started using Safari again. A lot. Safari is so incredibly fast to load pages that I almost think it’s cheating. The list of frequently visited sites that appears every time you click on the address bar is incredibly handy, as is the visual tab switcher. I’m a habitual opener of hundreds of tabs, and I’ve never found an easier way to wade through the morass and find what I’m looking for. If you’re not forever married to another browser, Safari is very much worth a shot.

For all the talk of convergence and of the ever-shrinking gap between PC and smartphone and tablet, Yosemite almost makes a statement in its lack of fundamental change. It’s not Windows 10, with big ideas about how our devices are just different sizes of the same thing, how the interface and settings and apps should be consistent everywhere. Microsoft believes in a single experience for all devices; Apple believes every device ought to have its own. This is still a PC operating system, made for devices with mice and keyboards and trackpads. It feels outdated in places – the whole idea of the "desktop" just feels pointless, and saving and organizing files is still more complex than it should be in the age of limitless searchable cloud storage — but it’s true to what Apple believes in.

Plus, there’s a lot more to Yosemite than the desktop. The best features, the most important and innovative features, do affect every device you own — as long as you own Apple devices. They don’t all look or work the same, but they work together better than ever.

If you’re using an iPhone or iPad running iOS 8.1 and a Mac running Yosemite, have Bluetooth on, and are logged into the same iCloud account and Wi-Fi network on both devices, your devices will suddenly begin to constantly talk to each other. After a surprisingly convoluted setup process (you need to change settings in three different apps on two different platforms, and enter a passcode), when your phone rings, so does your Mac.

You can actually even make and receive calls from your computer, which has more than once saved me from missing calls while digging for my phone in my bag. AirDrop finally works between Mac and iOS, meaning you can easily send photos and files between phone and computer. (FINALLY.) You can remotely activate the personal hotspot feature on the iPhone and use it to connect your Mac to the internet, which I’ve already needed a few times because Time Warner Cable is a nightmare.

My favorite feature of the Continuity group, and probably the thing about Yosemite that most changed how I go about my day, is that Messages now lets you send SMS text messages from your computer. That means I can finally text my Moto X-toting girlfriend without having to constantly pick up and put down my phone. It’s already made me more likely to quickly (or ever) respond to someone’s texts. Messages do still occasionally sit in the iMessage hell of existing on one device but not others, but I can’t overstate how much I like texting from my laptop.

Sharing data between devices is automatic, once you get the setup right, and surprisingly pervasive. Whenever you open a new tab on your Mac, or start composing an email or text, an icon appears in the bottom left corner of the iPhone’s lock screen; swipe it up and you’ll go right to where you were on your PC. It works the opposite way, too, the icon showing up to the left of your dock on the Mac. It doesn’t always work the way I expected, though; there’s no rhyme or reason to when in the message-composition process the icon will appear on my phone, and sometimes the icon on my Mac opens Chrome but not a new page. Everything works most of the time, but it’s not quite seamless yet.

When Continuity works, it’s amazing

As long as they work, all these features together make the case for buying a Mac, an iPhone, and an iPad better than Apple ever has before. iTunes wasn’t compelling enough; neither were any previous iterations of iCloud. Now, the three devices feel synced and aligned in a totally automatic, uncomplicated way. I can do anything from anywhere, each device suited best to certain things. (This is the idea Windows had long ago, and I hope Microsoft is taking a few notes on execution.) Next, I hope more apps start to take advantage, letting me move image edits and my spot in videos and the like between devices. This is a killer feature with huge possibilities, and I hope Apple and its developers all make real use of it.

There’s more to Yosemite, including lots of behind-the-scenes changes and graphics improvements and more access to built-in apps, Finder, the sharing menu, and Notification Center. There are also a number of features borrowed from iOS and sort of hidden around your Mac. The Today view in the Notification Center is handy, and I like having my calendar and a few widgets just a two-finger swipe away, but I keep forgetting it’s even there — and the Mac’s handling of notifications is as messy as ever. (Which is to say, as messy as iOS still is.) Developers will hopefully quickly start to take advantage of Extensions, to let you essentially use an app within another app.

If your hardware supports it, you should upgrade to OS X Yosemite. There’s really no reason not to, unless translucency makes you want to pull your hair out. In the time I’ve been using it I’ve found zero crippling bugs, few bugs whatsoever, and plenty of improvements both aesthetic and functional. It’s more secure, faster, and better all around.

The best and worst thing I can say about Yosemite is that I mostly forgot about it. It’s stable and fast and utterly familiar. Everything works as it should, including a lot of things that didn’t work before. But Yosemite isn’t really a brand-new vision of the future the way Windows 8 was. The ways it talks to and interact with your other devices is tacked on to an existing paradigm, not part of an entirely new one. Yosemite is an excellent desktop operating system, but in a world where "desktop operating system" is starting to feel as antiquated a phrase as "cordless telephone," I don’t see Apple moving boldly into the brave unknown. I see Apple watching its PC share grow while others fall, and sticking with what still works. For now.

Yosemite is the continuation of a decade-long legacy, the result of endless tweaking and improving. OS X 10.10 is a perfectly appropriate name: it’s the best OS X ever, but it’s still OS X. When it downloads and installs onto your machine, you’ll hardly even notice.

The walls of Apple’s garden are tumbling down

The apple vision pro’s ebay prices are making me sad, in the first autonomous racing league race, the struggle was real, i traded in my macbook and now i’m a desktop convert, they turned cattle ranches into tropical forest — then climate change hit.

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OS X Yosemite

OS 10.10 Yosemite for Mac

OS X 10.10, codenamed Syrah and officially named Yosemite, is the 2014 version of the Mac operating system from Apple, released on October 16, 2014. OS X 10.10 was shown off at WWDC 2014 on June 2. In addition to new features, OS X brings interface and experience refinements to Apple's desktop operating system, similar in spirit if not exact execution to the iOS 7 makeover of 2013 — interface depth and translucency effects, textual clarity and other elements to improve the overall user experience.

But that's just scratching the surface. There are a ton of new features under the hood.

OS X 10.10 Yosemite design language

Last year Jony Ive and Apple's design team spent so much time working on iOS 7's new look, OS X mostly got the linen and the leather — if not the felt — stripped out but not much else. The intent was always to go back and give OS X the design attention it deserved as well.

Yosemite employs clearer, smarter and easier-to-understand controls, with streamline toolbars, translucent elements and clean, consistent icon design. An updated system font also improves readability. Depth, deference and clarity are the design guidelines Apple first employed in iOS 7, and now we're seeing that work continue over to Yosemite.

Apple doesn't seem compelled to blur the lines between iOS 8 and OS X 10.10 as much as obliterate them, at least where it makes sense to. Continuity is what Apple's calling that — design that enables one device to complement the other. Handoff, for example, lets you start an activity on your iPad or iPhone and continue it on your Mac. And Instant Hotspot lets your Mac use your phone more easily. SMS and MMS messages sent to your phone will automatically appear in Messages on all your devices; you can even make and receive phone calls on your Mac when your iPhone is on the same network.

OS X 10.10 and AirDrop

AirDrop debuted on the Mac but after several initial attempts to bring it to iOS were shot down as overly complex, the version that finally shipped in iOS 7 wasn't even compatible with the Mac.

That changes with OS X 10.10 as the teams at Apple get their protocols back in sync and their cross-platform beaming fully in order.

OS X 10.10 Notification Center

Notification Center gets a rework with the new Today view — a quick look at everything you need to know. Apple's also introducing Notification Center Widgets to help you view your calendar, weather, stocks, reminders and a World Clock, and the API is open for developers to use to create custom Widgets that can be downloaded from the Mac App Store.

OS X 10.10 Spotlight

Spotlight's now in the Spotlight. Apple's search feature in OS X has been taken out of the realm of just file search; now it can find applications (making it a potential replacement for Apple's Launchpad app) and content on the Internet (putting it toe to toe with the popular third-party tool Alfred). It will view search results from Wikipedia, the App Store, iTunes Store, iBooks Store and more.

iCloud Drive

Apple's integration with cloud-based storage and services continues with 10.10 and iOS 8 thanks to iCloud, which lets you store any kind of file online. It also works with a Windows PC.

OS X 10.10 bottom line

The Mac's operating system is beyond mature, but there's huge room for improvement. Apple's moving iOS 8 and OS X 10.10 together, forward, for a new era of interdevice and intersystem communication. Stay with us as we provide you with more details.

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Four tips for Safari on OS X 10.10 Yosemite

Safari is seeing its fair share of new features in the latest Mac OS.

Safari 8.0 brings a new flat look, speed and performance improvements under the hood for Yosemite, as well as a new feature I found myself using nonstop during the public beta .

Better tab management

To help you better manage open tabs in Safari, you can now view thumbnails for all open tabs by clicking on the new tab view button, located to the right of the address bar.

Each page currently open will have its own smaller version displayed within the browser window. If you have multiple pages from the same site open, they'll be grouped together. You can quickly change between tabs by clicking on its preview icon, or close a tab by clicking on the X in the upper-left corner.

Just below the tab thumbnails you'll find a list of open tabs on your other iCloud connected devices. The list makes it convenient to open or close a tab from another device on your Mac.

Sidebar shared links

The sidebar view remains in Safari, with the new ability to act as an RSS reader on your behalf. At any time when viewing a webpage, you can click on the Share button -- also located to the right of the address bar -- and select Add Website to Shared Links to subscribe to the site's respective RSS feed. Keep in mind, the option to add the site to shared links will only be present when a valid RSS feed is found.

You can manage your subscriptions by clicking on the Subscriptions button at the bottom of the shared links column.

Better searching

When you begin typing a search term or URL in the address bar, you can press Enter to still perform a normal web search using your preferred search engine. Or you can click on one of a list of suggested sites, suggested Wikipedia pages, or an iTunes Store result directly below the address bar.

You may notice your favorites are no longer displayed just below the address bar. To select a site from your favorites, simply click in the address bar.

Below the address bar, before you start typing anything, you'll find thumbnails for your favorites. Click on the thumbnail to visit the site.

Never fear, however, you can bring them back by going to View > Show Favorites Bar.

Do you have a favorite feature in Safari on OS X Yosemite we didn't include here? Be sure to share it in the comments below.

For more Yosemite tips, please see CNET How To's guide to Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite .

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Perform a Clean Install of OS X Yosemite on Your Mac

Follow these basic steps to get Yosemite on your Mac

Tom Nelson is an engineer, programmer, network manager, and computer network and systems designer who has written for Other World Computing,and others. Tom is also president of Coyote Moon, Inc., a Macintosh and Windows consulting firm.

In This Article

Jump to a Section

• Benefits of a Clean Install
• Backing Up Your Data
• What You Need
• Downloading Yosemite
• Creating a Bootable Installer
• Booting From a USB Flash Drive
• Completing the Installation

When you're ready to install OS X Yosemite (10.10), download it from the Mac App Store . This version supports two primary installation methods: a clean install, which is covered in this guide, and the more common upgrade install, which is covered in detail in a separate step-by-step guide .

Apple no longer offers Yosemite (10.10) for download. The information in this article is maintained for archival purposes.

The clean method of installing OS X Yosemite wipes all the data from the destination drive and replaces it with the fresh, never-before-used data from the OS X Yosemite installer. All your user data and any applications that you installed will be gone.

While the clean install option may not sound like a friendly way to update a Mac to OS X Yosemite, it offers advantages that make it the preferred update path for some Mac users.

The Benefits of Performing a Clean Install of OS X Yosemite

If your Mac suffers from  annoying problems that you've been unable to fix , such as occasional freezes, unexpected shutdowns,  applications that hang  or seem exceptionally slow, or poor overall performance not attributed to hardware issues , a clean install may be a good choice.

Many of these problems can occur over the years of using your Mac. As you upgrade systems and applications, debris is left behind and files become large. This causes slowdowns and may corrupt some system files. Finding these bits of file debris is almost impossible. If you encounter these kinds of problems with your Mac, a good clean sweep may be the remedy your Mac needs.

Sometimes, the cure may be worse than the problems. Performing a clean install deletes all the data on the destination drive. If the destination is your startup drive, which for most users it will be, there goes personal data, settings, preferences, and apps. However, if a clean install cures the problems, the tradeoff may be worth it.

Back Up Your Data

No matter which installation method you choose, back up your data before proceeding. A recent  Time Machine backup  is the bare minimum you should have on hand.

Also, consider  creating a clone of your startup drive . That way, if anything terrible happens, you can recover by booting from the clone and be back where you started, without taking the time to restore the data from a backup.

A clone is also an advantage when it's time to migrate your information to your new installation of OS X Yosemite. The Yosemite  Migration Assistant  works with cloned drives and lets you easily move data you may need.

What You Need for a Clean Install of OS X Yosemite

Here's what you'll need to perform a clean install:

• The Yosemite installer on a disc or as a downloaded image file. If you can't find Yosemite in the store, check the Purchase page. If you ever downloaded Yosemite in the past, it will be listed there.
• A Mac that meets the  minimum requirements for OS X Yosemite .
• A recent backup of your current Mac startup drive.
• A startup drive that contains  OS X Snow Leopard  (10.6) or later and which you're willing to erase.

Clean Install of OS X Yosemite: Boot From USB Flash Drive to Start the Process

With the preliminary steps out of the way, you're ready to start the process.

If you use a version of OS X that's older than Snow Leopard (10.6) and want to upgrade to Yosemite, you must purchase and  install OS X Snow Leopard  before upgrading to OS X Yosemite.

Launch the Mac App Store by clicking its icon in the Dock or double-click the App Store application located under / Applications in Finder.

Navigate to the OS X Yosemite download page by searching the App Store for Yosemite.

Once you locate OS X Yosemite, select the Download button. You may be asked to sign in if you haven't done so.

When the download is complete, the OS X Yosemite Install app launches on its own. Do not proceed with the installation. Instead, quit the installer by selecting Quit Install OS X from the Install OS X menu.

Create a Bootable Version of the Yosemite Installer

Now that you have the OS X Yosemite installer downloaded to your Mac, the next step is to make a bootable copy of the installer on a USB flash drive. You need a bootable version of the installer because you'll erase your startup drive as part of the clean install process.

To erase and reformat the startup drive, start your Mac from another device. Since all OS X installers include Disk Utility and an assortment of other apps, booting from the Yosemite installer allows you to erase the startup drive and perform the installation, all from the same USB flash drive.

Once you finish creating a bootable version of the OS X Yosemite installer , come back here to continue the clean install of OS X Yosemite.

Boot From the USB Flash Drive

Follow these steps to boot the installer from a USB flash drive.

Make sure the USB flash drive you created in the step above is still plugged into the Mac. Don't use a USB hub or plug the flash drive into the keyboard or display's extra USB ports. Instead, plug the flash drive into one of the USB ports on the Mac.

Restart the Mac while holding down the Option key.

The OS X Startup Manager appears on the display, showing the devices you can boot the Mac from. Use the arrow keys to highlight the USB Flash Drive option, then press the Enter key to start the Mac from the USB flash drive and the OS X Yosemite installer. After a short time, you'll see the Yosemite installer's Welcome screen.

Select the language you want to use for the installation and then select Continue . The OS X Utilities window displays with options for restoring a Time Machine Backup, Installing OS X, Getting Help Online, and using Disk Utility.

Select Disk Utility and then select Continue . Disk Utility opens, with the Mac's drives listed in the left pane.

Select the Mac's startup drive, usually named Macintosh HD , and select the Erase tab in the right pane.

You are about to erase your Mac's startup drive and all of its contents. Make sure you have a current backup of this data before proceeding.

Use the Format drop-down menu to ensure that Mac OS Extended (Journaled) is selected and then select Erase .

You're asked if you want to erase the Macintosh HD partition. Select Erase .

The startup drive is completely erased. Once the process is complete, select Quit Disk Utility from the Disk Utility menu. You're returned to the OS X Utilities window.

You're now ready to start the OS X Yosemite installation process.

Clean Install of OS X Yosemite: Complete the Installation Process

In the previous steps, you erased the Mac's startup drive and returned to the OS X Utilities window. You're now ready to complete the installation process by letting the installer copy the OS X Yosemite system files to your selected startup drive.

Once everything is copied, your Mac reboots into Yosemite and walks you through setting up your admin account, migrating data from a previous version of OS X, and other general housekeeping tasks.

In the OS X Utilities window, select Install OS X and then select Continue .

The OS X Utilities window is dismissed, and the Install OS X app launches. Select Continue .

The Yosemite software licensing terms display. Read through the licensing terms and select Agree .

A panel displays, asking you to affirm that you read and agree to the terms. Select Agree once again.

The installer displays the drives you can install OS X Yosemite on. Highlight the drive you want to be the OS X Yosemite startup drive and then select Install .

The installer prepares the Mac for the installation of OS X Yosemite by copying files to the startup drive. Once the copying process is complete, the Mac restarts. An ongoing estimate of the time remaining until the restart displays during the file copy process. The first phase of the installation process, including the restart, continues without any input required from you. It's not until after the restart that you are asked to help set up the Mac's basic configuration.

Once the restart occurs, the Mac displays a new status message indicating the time it will take to complete the installation process on the startup drive. Be prepared to wait.

With all the files copied, a second restart occurs. The Mac boots to OS X Yosemite, starts the setup assistant, and displays a welcome screen.

Select the country for the installation and then select Continue .

Select the keyboard layout to use and then select Continue .

The Migration Assistant displays, allowing you to transfer personal data from a Mac, Time Machine backup, another startup disk, or a Windows PC. At this time, we suggest selecting the Don't transfer any information now option. You can always use the Migration Assistant later if you want to move data to your new installation of OS X Yosemite. One reason for a clean install is to not have older files present that may have caused problems in the past. Select Continue .

Sign in with your Apple ID. This optional sign-in preconfigures the Mac to use iCloud, iTunes, the Mac App Store, FaceTime, and other Apple-provided services. If you intend to use any of these services, signing in now is a timesaver. However, you can skip this step and sign in to those services later. We're going to assume that you want to sign in with your Apple ID. Fill in the requested information and select Continue .

You're asked if it's OK to enable Find My Mac, a service that uses location information to find a lost Mac or to erase the contents of your Mac if it's stolen. Make your selection.

Additional licensing terms for various apps, such as iCloud, Apple's privacy policy, and the OS X software license display. Select Agree to continue, then confirm the agreement by selecting Agree again.

It's now time to create your administrator account. Enter your full name and an account name. The account name becomes the name of your home folder and is also called the short name for the account. We suggest using an account name with no spaces, no special characters, and no uppercase letters. If you wish, you can also choose to use your iCloud account as your sign-in method. If you check the Use my iCloud account to log in option, you will log in to your Mac using the same details as your iCloud account. Make your selection and then select Continue .

OS X Yosemite makes use of iCloud Keychain, a system of storing encrypted keychain data between multiple Macs on which you have accounts. The process of setting up the iCloud Keychain system is a bit involved. We recommend using our guide to setting up and using iCloud Keychain at a later time. Select Set Up Later and select Continue .

You're asked if you wish to make use of iCloud Drive . Don't set up iCloud Drive if you need to share iCloud data with a Mac running an older version of OS X or iOS devices with iOS 7 or earlier. The new version of iCloud Drive isn't compatible with older versions. Make your selection and select Continue .

If you turn on iCloud Drive, all data stored in the cloud is converted to the new data format, preventing older OS X and iOS versions from using the data.

Your Mac finishes the setup process and then displays your new OS X Yosemite desktop. Have fun, and take time to explore all the new features.

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Tips & Tricks

Troubleshooting, os x yosemite available now as a free download.

Apple has released OS X Yosemite, officially versioned as OS X 10.10. The update to Macs is available now as a free download. OS X Yosemite brings a redesigned user interface to the Mac, as well as many new features that intend to improve productivity and interoperability with iOS devices.

The newest version of OS X runs on all Macs that are capable of running Mavericks, if you haven’t done so yet, you can prepare your Mac for the Yosemite update by following a few simple tasks, including updating your software and backing up the computer before installing the free update.

OS X Yosemite is available as a free download from the Mac App Store. To download and install the update, head to the  Apple menu and choose “Software Update”, the OS X Yosemite installer is several GB in size and can be found under the “Updates” tab. You can also use the download link below to head directly to OS X Yosemite in the App Store.

• Yosemite Download Link to App Store

To start the download of Yosemite on your Mac, simply open the above link and click on the “Free” button. The download weighs approximately 5.1GB and will begin immediately.

If you are having trouble downloading OS X Yosemite, with either a “null” error, a “We could not complete your request” error, or a timeout, it’s likely due to Apple Servers being overwhelmed by requests. Simply try again, or wait a minute or two.

Many users are currently experiencing a “This item is temporarily unavailable” error message when trying to download OS X Yosemite. This simply means you should try again later, as the download is likely propagating through Apple servers. This would be a good opportunity to prepare your Mac for the OS X 10.10 update and backing up the computer if you haven’t done so yet.

Update: Users have reported successfully downloading OS X Yosemite by hitting Command+R to refresh the Yosemite page in the App Store, then try clicking the “Free” button again. The download will begin and appear under the “Purchases” tab:

Users who wish to create a bootable USB installer for OS X Yosemite will want to do so before completing the installation of Yosemite, or, at least make a copy of the OS X Yosemite Installer, which is found in the /Applications/ folder.

Separately, new versions of iWork are also now available as a free download.

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Related articles:

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136 Comments

» Comments RSS Feed

Hi ,i want reboot my system and reached the last step of my account log in afterwards iam getting your id only for indian app purchase so you are switching to that area asap after im not getting any fronts how can I complete my os reboot

I cannot get the Yosemite in the UK from the app store…

How can I get hold of it Please?

Today is July 20, 2016. Is there any way to reinstall Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite? El Capitan has disappeared my iMovie9 and card reader on 2009 iMac. Thanks

I attempted a clean installation and it has been a spinning globe whose progress is inconsistent…it shows complete and reboots then it starts all over. Now it stops and shows apple.com/support with error -2005F. I can’t even access the options for time machine and others. any help or advice?

I’m format my macBook air.. and i have no bootable drive.. so how can i download os x.. and i have no wifi. So i will not able to download from reinstall

Hey,just changed my OS to windows 8 on my MacBook Pro,i want to replace it with yosemite,can anybody help me on what to do

Not sure if this was asked before. I have upgraded to the latest OS but now want to do a clean installation. The installer file is no longer available. Any advice on how to go about it?

I installed Yosemite and once it restarted, it has been frozen on the white screen with the apple halfway loaded for 3 and a half hours. What should I do?

My daughter graduated from Vassar in May 2014… 2 weeks after graduating her university-purchased 2010 MBP crashed out with her thesis and 4 years worth of college information on it. I am a Tech Support “professional” and although I’m not really a “MAC” user, I supposed I can tackle the task of repairing this MBP.

We took it to the Apple Store in Freehold, NJ and they said they could install a new hard drive with the operating system for 175.00. As a tech, it sounds/feels silly to have someone do this for me. So here I am…

Ok, I have a 120gb solidstate harddrive and I will install it, but where can I get the Operating System? From what I understand Yosemite is the lastest OS.. fine. ???? I don’t have a CD.. Now what?

Any help/guidance will be much appreciated. Thanks Tony

I had to try the download 4 times. It kept getting stuck with the blue bar almost across saying 30 min left. it got stuck there every time. Finally on the 4th time it went straight through and download was successful. People are advising that you just wait, but if it isn’t doing anything after 2-3 hours, you should try again.

My screen is stuck on “Os X could not be installed on your computer. File system verify or repair failed quit the installer to restart your computer and try again.” IVE restarted my computer to “try again” five times and this still comes up. Do I need to take it in an Apple Store? I’m a college student and my whole life revolves around my MacBook. I can’t exit out of it at all.

After downloading Yosemite (over about 7 hours), I woke up this morning to see the unhelpful message “An error has occurred” on the screen on which you download the update. I’m running a 2009 iMac.

Anyone come across this error???

i am a macbook pro (mid 2012) user i facing problem with downloaded on purchased page but with a message “an error has occurred” i am not allow to download again although try several times refresh the purchased page. what should i do?

I love Apple products; however, I have installed Yosemite and have had nothing but trouble ever since. My MacBook is much slower and every time I boot it up, all I get is the infamous white screen with the Apple logo and a progress bar. So very frustrating.

After upgrading to 10.9.5 my macbook pro retina screen looks like a negative photograph. I have no idea why or what to do? What’s up

I am having problem while downloading Yosemite by app store,would it will be safe and same if I download from torrent?..plz someone tell me

No you should only download system software from Apple, sketchy sources like a torrent could pack anything they wanted in there. Download OS X Yosemite from the App STore.

I got shocked when I saw the download time. In the image above, it says – 1 hour 19 minutes.. In India, it says – 1 day 12 hours.. mwahahaha :-/ And I even took Airtel 4g LTE service for this.. Speeds suck @ only 125KB/s-234KB/s I don’t think I’ll ever get to enjoy this release… Nevertheless, I’m gonna leave the computer on for downloading and my phone on for tethering, lol :(

You should see the download speeds in Japan or South Korea, a 5GB file like the Yosemite installer would take about 5-15 minutes!

cmd L not working! stuck at logo and half black/ half grey loading bar for 3 hours now. Very amateur effort from apple. Fine if needs to take a long time but dont make everyone scurry on the internet for solutions and reassurance. Put it in a troubleshooting guide or warning. Some people rely on their computer to earn a living, A stunning act of hubris apple team! get professional.

Hi Scott, can you please let me know if and how you sorted this.

Scott (yes another scott)

after down loadeding osx yosemite came up saying needed to download java 8 did this but now every time i turn on mac apple logo comes up with loading bar after loading loading all is ok why does it keep having to load ?

Hello, my mac is frozen while i was trying to update it. It showed a message about the update was not going well and sent it to apple and now i can’t do anything with that. I didn’t back up it, so i hope nothing will happen to my mac:( what should i do?

How do you stop your cookies from disappearing when cleaning the history in safari, in the new os x Yosemite

Hey. I factory reset my mac every monthish, and forgot to reset before i upgraded. Now that I’m on yosemity, when i restart and hold option, i now only see mac hd. not recovery disk. Can anyone help? Thanks, Leo

What is “yosemity”?

Hi. I have successfully downloaded Yosemite but on installation it is going part way through then just freezing. Nothing. I have heard you have to wait it out but it’s been the same for the past 5 hours. That can’t be right surely?

Just installed Yosemite. I must say: it is just incredibly ugly. Who designed the hideous Red/Orange/Green buttons – looks like they were designed by a 3 year old. The Menus look like you are running Windows XP – hideous colours, idiotic transparency … The whole thing feels ugly, bland and corporate. Getting rid of it … moving back to Mavericks.

Install says 22 min. It’s more then an hours now and it’s only 1/100 of the install line

How can you turn off the MacBook Pro’s display with the lid open while using an external monitor on Yosemite??

The tips provided on this site: https://osxdaily.com/2012/06/15/yet-another-way-to-turn-off-internal-lcd-display-of-macbook-pro-with-lid-open/

No longer work. Anyone?

This do not work on Yosemite. I hope an update resolve this troubleshooting!

I am in Uganda, the download is available on app store and am currently downloading. I am read some reviews and am not sure if am to install but am gonna try.

Not allowed in Uganda.

I mean supposed to mean… Sorry!

I downloaded many times the past hour. None of them were successful. If I made it through the last few minutes of the download, I see the error message “no internal inconsistency exception” – what is that supposed to me? How do I fixed it? Thanks.

I’m currently beta version 6, will i still have to update yosemite to get the full version or do I have to download the full version from the app store?

Stuck at white screen of death as well.

My 2012 Mac book air has been stuck at the gray boot screen for 12 hours. I’ve done the hard resets, but no luck. Calling AppleCare today, but does anyone have a fix in the meantime?

Yosemite installed fine! But I don’t see a free iWork download anywhere. :(

Mail app crashes… will not open…

So far this is the only issue I have…

[early 2011 MacBook Pro 17″/16GB RAM/500GB SSD/30″ ACD using Apple’s TB to Dual Link DVI adapter]

Was this ever solved? 2012 retina 15′ with a mail app that will not open. Seriously killing my productivity.

Ok, I have installed OS X Yosemite, but iWork is still NOT for free. Where is free iWork ?

Just waiting patiently for suggestions about the white/blank screen (with only the moveable cursor). I’m stuck, but hopeful that there’s a fix.

Just hard reset your Mac if the install hangs for a long time (hour +) by keeping the power button pressed untill the Mac powers down. Reboot and the install will probably continue and finish without a problem.

Nope this didnt help at all. After reset there was the apple logo with a progress bar and than white screen….again

Have downloaded Yosemite the MacBook air has restarted but now stuck on the apple logo with the status bar at half way been like that now for about 2 hours seems a lot of people having the same issue

Does ” redesigned user interface” mean that we will have to re-learn to use our macs? I hate it when that happens!

no, it means it looks better ;) the operations are the same

Anyone know how to turn off the Macbook Pro’s display with the lid open when connected to an external monitor? The nvram terminal command method no longer works with Yosemite.

If your Yosemite download is stuck pause and try again to resume it.

If Yosemite OS X download is still sticking, cancel the download and then download it again.

It works inrownoadednitnesrkier roman road

Hi i downloaded yosemite this morning but when it starts installing its says 22 min remaning But mac it still stuck on white apple logo screen and loading line status bar is kind of stuck in half way from last 4 hour . Dose anybody know how long will it take ? Has it happend to anyone out there?

Same here, it shows 22, then 21 and again 22 minutes remaining; and this is for last half an hour. Any solution?

Yes, if your OS X Yosemite installation time remaining is stuck, here is what to do:

https://osxdaily.com/2014/10/17/os-x-yosemite-installation-stuck/

Does anyone know how to download the public version if you are currently using the developer beta version?

This. I got same problem.. =)

HUK same problem I have 3 computers 2 Blank screen 1 completed. Please help !!!!

Anyone having installation issues with Yosemite? I downloaded, went through all the agreements, etc. It installed and then rebooted, Apple logo came up with another install and then to a totally blank white screen with a movable mouse cursor. Sounds like the harddrive is busy in the background but nothing happens. Totally blank, no status or installation update bars or logo, only the cursor. I’ve been all over the net and can only find stuff from June with developers posting all sorts of command structures for the beta that I don’t understand. Will it eventually just come up? Late 2009 iMac, i7, 16g RAM Thanks! HSUK

Exactly the same thing happened to me on my late 2012 iMac, the download seemed to be ok, I went through all the legal steps, the white screen came up and the line status bar got stuck in the middle of the process. I pressed the power button to reset it, but it took me again to the same white screen, with no other option, and the process is again stuck in the middle of the line status bar. I did that 3 times, with the same results.

Same problem here…anyone have a fix

This is very frustrating…tried rebooting and still have the white screen

Here’s what to do if your Yosemite installation is stuck.

Rebooting mid-installation of any operating system is never a good idea. Would you try to start a car while the engine was being serviced?

Hope you had backups ready!

I went to bed with white screen on…did nothing and when I woke up all was good and installed

Any feedback on using Yosemite on 2009 MBP? Specifically- any speed issues; – what conectivity features work and which dont?

In Korea. I just download .

Hi. How do I go about updating to the official release of Yosemite when I currently have Yosemite Public Beta 6 running on my mbp? Thanks

You probably don’t need to, in terms of build numbers the OS X Yosemite Public Beta 6 is basically the same as OS X Yosemite Final. But if you want to, you can download the entire installer and update – it will likely be unnecessary to update from the Yosemite GM 3.0 build or the Public Beta build, however.

search for “OS X Yosemite” in app store and it comes out as a standalone product download

Yo, will this work in the final build?

https://osxdaily.com/2014/07/25/make-os-x-yosemite-beta-boot-usb-install-drive/

Yes, and we wrote a thorough walkthrough on creating a USB boot installer for OS X Yosemite final here:

https://osxdaily.com/2014/10/16/make-os-x-yosemite-boot-install-drive/

still cannot download in Indonesian (ID) appstore…

It’s out in the US!

If you are unable to download OS X Yosemite due to an error message, hit Command+R on the Yosemite page in the App Store, then click the “Free” button to successfully begin the download on your Mac.

This just worked for me, it may be due to a caching issue.

The link just worked for me!

Downloading in Sweden now!

USB INSTALL

sudo /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Yosemite.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia —volume /Volumes/Untitled —applicationpath /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Yosemite.app —nointeraction

Thank you! :D

I get this…

“You must specify both the volume and install application path.”

I fixed it…

sudo /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Yosemite.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia –volume /Volumes/Untitled –applicationpath /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Yosemite.app –nointeraction

Woohoo! Finally the download is available!

BTW, how do you create a USB installer for Yosemite?

Not yet here in San Diego….

talked to apple care they said it was still downloading to the server. She said possibly tonight or most likely tomorrow.

Hello from the future :P it’s now 22:55 :D Europe baby :D

still not available in us store

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/id915041082

As of 4:48PM EST, I still get the not available in the US Store. Try again later. Maybe they screwed up and setup the wrong links pointing to iOS 8.1 for today and Yosemite comes out Monday=P

and here is 10:44pm and I must go to work tomorrow morning…

hmm 20th october is more looking like it for Australia thats when a new version of iOS 8.1 or 8.2 comes into play as well. aussie down-under

Even in Poland not available ;)

Not yet available in Indian App store.. :(

Still not available in US stores…

Don’t upgrade, make a fresh new install … it makes a lot of difference (you don’t keep the dust and broken pieces from the old system, just restart from scratch)

backup your data, install, filevault the disk and you are good to go until the next release :)

why post a link that is not currently working

Because it is available to download, perhaps just not for you. That means you should hit Command+R to refresh, then try to download Yosemite again.

Wow, with so many people waiting for the download I bet their servers will crash ! :) It seems that the download is not available anywhere.

hi, how can i merge the partition again ? and what’s the correct way to uninstall the dual boot & yosemite beta ?

i have installed yosemite this way and would like to upgrade my mavericks to yosemite released today.

Still not there in the Netherlands

Dutch not allowed to use this

Wow…. 3hrs after the Keynote, and people are already complaining something is not available…. Wow…

We are all moving way too fast, chill…

Dont chat if you can’t deliver (referring to apple)

Why have a link to “upgrade now” if it has NOT yet been released?

Yosemite still not available in US Store, no one at Apple tech support seems to know when it will be out. 3:46 PM Eastern

No OS XY for Brazil Store so far… Waiting…

I don’t think that you people understand what “will be available today” and “Download Link Coming Soon” means….. it is not even 13pm in the US….

“13pm” ???

Yes – it is certainly NOT 13pm. (Course because 13pm does not exist, it never will be…)

13pm arrives right after 12th noon.

13pm = 1300 = 1pm :)

can not it was meant to say sorry folks

hi, im in the uk and can find a link for the new os can someone help please

Hi Tony, it’s not up in the UK yet.

heres a link to uk app store but not available to download yet: try between 1am – 1pm:

https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/os-x-yosemite/id915041082?mt=12

Its available now :)

Calm, same happen in Mexico Store, they are preparing the server to deploy by zones and don’t saturate servers.

Any update let you know.

For the beta program users, how is the adviced update method? Fresh install or the classic differential update is fine?

Hi mate of course fresh is better im used beta 6 but in few hours install FULL OS X Rgs N1

I am facing issues downloading yosemite. its telling me that its currently unavailable in U.S store. any solution?

The download is rolling out now across the App Store, it should be available to you shortly if you try again soon.

Time is now 16:44 East coast U.S. Yosemite still shows as being unavailable in the U.S. store.

Maybe they figure that NY, Boston, Washington, Miami, etc. aren’t looking to jump in and write reviews on their product.

Or maybe they want to make sure the reviewers start out with a negative image…

Ive been trying since noon does the same thing to me!

Put in the search OS X or OS X Yosemite. It won’t appear in the update section.

Same thing for me. You’re not the only one.

Do you please have a direct download link because it’s not available in the French store yet :(

It’s not available anywhere in the world just yet. It’s 4:32 pm EST (USA) here and Twitter is abuzz about the fact it’s not been released yet. Some rumors that it will go within 30 minutes from now when business networks slow at the end of the workday.

Just a heads up to to those who think something is wrong during the install: If you find that OS X Yosemite update gets stuck on a white screen with Apple logo and a progress bar for a while – DONT DO ANYTHING – just wait, it seems to stall late in the process as the installation completes. DO not interrupt that update process, just let the white screen and progress bar go away on it’s own, yes it can take a while.

It seems to be related to the state of the battery. If charging from a low charge while installing, Yosemite seems to hang in the last few minutes until the moment full charge is achieved. If charging and unplugging and re-plugging battery while charging, this also slows the installation. When installing on full charge while plugged in and no state change in the battery, Yosemite installs the quickest.

I had not seen this forum entry. I got that white screen and it just sat there. So, after awhile, so I turned the machine off with the on-off button and rebooted with Command-R and restored Mavericks. I’m doing this on an iMac, not a laptop, so (with me) it was not a battery issue.

I’ve been waiting for 10.10.1 because I’m afraid of going through the whole process again and finding the same white screen just sit there.

Are you suggesting that I do just let it sit there … and for how long?

Well, I, unfortunately did do something. I restarted my Mac. I am now stuck on the white page with no way to proceed. It will not even load from a startup disk! Bill

hi , just a question , can i update to yosemite without a backup? i dont have time machine , if i go ahead and update will i loose my data or will it just update as normal with no loss ?

Upgrading to Yosemite should not result in data loss – the point of an upgrade is to update the OS version, while preserving apps and data. With that said, backup. I know backing up is a pain, but it’s made super easy with Time Machine, and you’ll thank yourself one day when you have to restore from a backup or experience data loss. Trust me on this one.

great thanks for answering my question.

can anyone give me a direct link to get yosemit without going to apple store plz ! anyone that did already download it and put it somewhere where ppl having trouble with apple store get it without checking applstore

You need to download OS X Yosemite from the App Store from Apple, do not trust other than official sources for installing an operating system.

When I download it, it say not available in the U.S store, which region store is is available in?

having the same issue. Can’t download from the App link. Doesn’t show up in the App store search. I currently having Mojave Dark installed and can’t download earlier versions. Must have stand-a-lone install file. Anyone have any insight about this or where I can get a copy?

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OS X Yosemite

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