Apple Seeds macOS Big Sur 11.4 Release Candidate to Developers

Monday May 17, 2021 10:17 am PDT by Juli Clover

Apple today seeded the release candidate version of an upcoming macOS Big Sur 11.4 update to developers for testing purposes, with the new beta coming two weeks after the release of the third macOS Big Sur 11.4 beta.

macOS Big Sur Feature Purple
Developers can download the ‌‌‌macOS Big Sur‌‌‌ 11.4 beta using the Software Update mechanism in System Preferences after installing the proper profile from the Apple Developer Center.

The macOS Big Sur 11.4 update introduces support for new Apple Music features, including Spatial Audio with Dolby Atmos and Lossless Audio.

Spatial Audio offers an immersive audio experience that makes it sound like music is coming from all around you, while Lossless Audio will provide higher-quality songs that sound exactly like they do when artists record them in the studio. Apple plans to launch these features in June.

Related Forum: macOS Big Sur

Popular Stories

RIP, MacBook Ultra

Monday October 19, 2026 9:37 am PDT by Joe Rossignol

Apple today sent out invites for an experience in Los Angeles on Wednesday, October 28, and the "Pro and tell" tagline on the invitation likely means that the rumored MacBook models with touch-enabled OLED displays will stick with MacBook Pro branding instead of the once-rumored "MacBook Ultra" name. The long-rumored "iPhone Ultra" ended up being named iPhone Duo, so speculation that Apple...

• 160 comments

Here's What Apple's Apps Look Like on the iPhone Duo

Tuesday October 20, 2026 11:12 am PDT by Juli Clover

With just three days to go until the iPhone Duo is released, Apple is getting ready for the launch. Behind the scenes, the App Store now has screenshots of Apple's built-in apps running on the Duo. We've seen some apps in marketing materials, but images of the ones we haven't seen give us an idea of what it will be like using the iPhone Duo day to day. Many apps are shown in landscape...

• 116 comments

Apple Announcing New Products Next Week: 'Pro and Tell'

Monday October 19, 2026 9:05 am PDT by Juli Clover

Apple's Greg Joswiak today hinted at new product announcements coming next week, sharing a social media post that says "Can't wait to pro and tell next week." Rumors suggest Apple is planning to debut the new MacBook Pro with an OLED touchscreen display, an M6 entry-level MacBook Pro, an M6 iMac, an iPad mini with an OLED display. Can't wait to pro and tell next week....

• 128 comments

Top Rated Comments

Freeangel1

71 months ago

So.. your 7 year old laptop is slow with the latest OS. Weird, /s

Who cares if it's 7 years old?
Not all of us open our wallets and buy Every new APPLE computer that comes out.
Windows 10 runs on 7 year old systems
Some of us weren't so foolish to shell out 6 to 10 Grand for a 7.1 Mac Pro. Soon to be a Heavy Paper weight in 2 years

Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)

zorinlynx

71 months ago

So.. your 7 year old laptop is slow with the latest OS. Weird, /s

Historically Apple OS releases haven't slowed down the system.

Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)

certsoft

71 months ago

11.4 also supports making bootable backups on M1 systems. Both Superduper and CCC are working on an update.

M1 Bootable Backups ('https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/m1-bootable-backups.2294345')

Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Realityck

71 months ago

The kernel stability of the 11.4 beta 3 was great compared to 11.3.1 , no wonder this is going RC so soon.

Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)

bp1000

71 months ago

I hope they have fixed the absolutely dire and random performance issues for older MBPs.

Big Sir ruined my late 2013 MBP. Yes its ageing, but its extremely capable still. Catalina is night and day faster since I rolled back.

Score: 4 Votes (Like | Disagree)