Installing Rosetta 2 on M1 Apple Silicon Macs (why checks matter)

Actual guides

This isn’t really a guide to how to install Rosetta 2. There are already much better guides for those:

Rich Trouton’s blog post has some checks to make sure the Mac is running at least macOS 11 (Big Sur), to make sure it’s an actual M1 chip (and not Intel), and to make sure the Rosetta launch daemon isn’t already running.

I think Graham’s script (with fewer checks) has a cleaner check for Intel vs. ARM (arch=$(/usr/bin/arch) instead of processor=$(/usr/sbin/sysctl -n machdep.cpu.brand_string | grep -o "Intel")). Technically, that may be the only check you need, since an M1 chip will almost certainly be macOS 11 or higher.

This weird guide

That said, I thought I’d just see what happens if you don’t do those checks, and I also explore some other nuances.

Catalina on an Intel Mac

If you try to install Rosetta 2 on an Intel Mac, you’ll just get the command not being found.

softwareupdate --install-rosetta --agree-to-license
softwareupdate: unrecognized option `--install-rosetta'
softwareupdate: unrecognized option `--agree-to-license'
usage: softwareupdate  [ ...]

** Manage Updates:
	-l | --list		List all appropriate update labels (options:  --no-scan, --product-types)
	-d | --download		Download Only
	-e | --cancel-download		Cancel a download
	-i | --install		Install
		

Big Sur on an Intel Mac

If you’re running Big Sur on an Intel Mac, the command is there, but you won’t be able to install Rosetta 2.

softwareupdate --install-rosetta --agree-to-license
Installing Rosetta 2 on this system is not supported.

Big Sur on an ARM Mac

Not agreeing to the license

If you run it without agreeing to the license, you’ll get a link to the license agreement and then be prompted to agree:

softwareupdate --install-rosetta
I have read and agree to the terms of the software license agreement. A list of Apple SLAs may be found here: http://www.apple.com/legal/sla/
Type A and press return to agree: A
2020-11-24 09:49:37.314 softwareupdate[9105:207504] Package Authoring Error: 001-26049: Package reference com.apple.pkg.RosettaUpdateAuto is missing installKBytes attribute
Install of Rosetta 2 finished successfully

Installing if it’s already installed

If you install it after it’s already been installed, it just installs again:

softwareupdate --install-rosetta --agree-to-license
By using the agreetolicense option, you are agreeing that you have run this tool with the license only option and have read and agreed to the terms.
If you do not agree, press CTRL-C and cancel this process immediately.
2020-11-24 09:49:52.526 softwareupdate[9127:207674] Package Authoring Error: 001-26049: Package reference com.apple.pkg.RosettaUpdateAuto is missing installKBytes attribute
Install of Rosetta 2 finished successfully

Note: this command seems to run fine whether you run it with sudo or without sudo. That said, if you’re scripting this command, you’re likely using some kind of management tool that runs as root, so sudo should be irrelevant.

Name of the installed package

Here’s the package receipt:

pkgutil --pkgs | grep Rosetta
com.apple.pkg.RosettaUpdateAuto

Rosetta is SIP-protected

You can’t delete the Rosetta binary once it’s installed:

ls -lO /Library/Apple/usr/share/rosetta
total 8
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  restricted 64 Oct 18 13:24 rosetta
ls -lO /Library/Apple/usr/share/rosetta/rosetta 
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  restricted 64 Oct 18 13:24 /Library/Apple/usr/share/rosetta/rosetta


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20 responses to “Installing Rosetta 2 on M1 Apple Silicon Macs (why checks matter)”

  1. Brittany Avatar
    Brittany

    I’ve tried doing what you and others have suggested to instal Rosetta 2 on my new M1 MacBook Pro, but I keep getting this response:
    “Installing Rosetta 2 on this system is not supported.”

    I can’t figure out why it’s not supported on my computer. Supposedly I need it to run my Native Instruments in Logic, they keep causing it to crash… You have any idea about this? Any help much appreciated!

    Thanks!

    Brittany

    1. alanysiu Avatar
      alanysiu

      That’s odd. I’ve seen that error only on Intel Macs. So if you run the arch command, it returns arch64?

      1. mndvns Avatar
        mndvns

        I have this same issue, and it returns i386. But my computer says it possesses and M1… not sure what’s going on. My terminal was not opened with Rosetta.

        1. Camryn Avatar
          Camryn

          I have the same issue. Did you figure it out?

          1. Bento Avatar
            Bento

            Same here.
            Running `uname -m` prints `x86_64`
            but `arch` prints `i386`

          2. Sujan Shrestha Avatar
            Sujan Shrestha

            Same with mine too…. Can somebody tell is why??

        2. Dan Avatar
          Dan

          You may have turned on the option ‘Open using Rosetta’ for your terminal windows. You are turning on Rosetta for every terminal in this case.

          You will want to use Finder to open /Applications/Utilities/ and select ‘Get Info’ from the right-click menu on Terminal. Uncheck ‘Open using Rosetta’ if it is checked.

          Now try again to run ‘arch’ and ‘softwareupdate –install-rosetta’

  2. Leon Avatar
    Leon

    Hi there – thanks for writing this.
    Is there a way to pull the Rosetta 2 pkg to have it for offline installations? I would love to have it.
    For me this thing of actually missing the component which is online – kills the purpose of traveling with my M1 Mac, as you need to be online to pull Rosetta even though you reinstalled the Mac.

    1. alanysiu Avatar
      alanysiu

      I haven’t yet seen a documented way to do this, but there may be a .pkg cache somewhere if you dig around enough.

  3. Mack Booke Avatar
    Mack Booke

    How does one check if Rosetta 2 is installed in the system?

    1. alanysiu Avatar
      alanysiu

      See above the Name of the installed package and Rosetta is SIP-protected sections. If it’s installed, the package leaves a receipt, and the binary exists and is SIP-protected.

  4. Daniel Avatar
    Daniel

    Same problem:
    Installing Rosetta 2 on this system is not supported.

    1. Serhii Avatar
      Serhii

      Did you move from intel mac with Migration tool? I think the issue with it

  5. Biswajit Avatar

    Mora bi hauni
    2022-02-14 15:07:48.975 softwareupdate[1460:10879] Package Authoring Error: 002-66270: Package reference com.apple.pkg.RosettaUpdateAuto is missing installKBytes attribute
    please help

  6. Marta Avatar
    Marta

    You have to uncheck at Terminal, the run with Rosetta option, then restart. After that you will be able to install.

    1. Jesus Avatar

      excelente! funciono para mi gracias

    2. Satyadev Avatar
      Satyadev

      Using the command “softwareupdate –install-rosetta –agree-to-license” on MacOS monterey, i get the following error:

      softwareupdate[1272:21318] Package Authoring Error: 012-06883: Package reference com.apple.pkg.RosettaUpdateAuto is missing installKBytes attribute

      Any way to solve this,Marta?

  7. sam Avatar
    sam

    Air invite % softwareupdate –install-rosetta –agree-to-license
    By using the agreetolicense option, you are agreeing that you have run this tool with the license only option and have read and agreed to the terms.
    If you do not agree, press CTRL-C and cancel this process immediately.
    2022-02-19 08:26:11.042 softwareupdate[15651:1455550] Package Authoring Error: 002-23768: Package reference com.apple.pkg.RosettaUpdateAuto is missing installKBytes attribute
    Install of Rosetta 2 finished successfully
    Executing command –
    Air ~ % pkgutil –pkgs | grep Rosetta
    com.apple.pkg.RosettaUpdateAuto
    Air ~ %
    NULL

  8. ma bao liang Avatar
    ma bao liang

    Installing Rosetta 2 on this system is not supported

    macOS monterey

    Version 12.3.1

    Chip Apple M1

  9. Cent Avatar
    Cent

    Thank you for this post, I was really hoping to find something about the password prompt after running this command “softwareupdate –install-rosetta –agree-to-license”

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