Windows 10 Pro on MacBook M2

[alex143]

Does VMware Fusion support Windows 10 Pro on MacBook with an M2 processor?

[Technogeezer · Accepted solution]

If you mean Windows 10 Pro for x86_64 (Intel) processors, the answer is no. (and Parallels won't do it either). You can not virtualize operating systems that require an Intel or AMD processors on M1/M2 Macs. As another poster puts it,  you can't put diesel fuel in a gasoline engine and expect it to run. And vice versa.

Windows for ARM is required to run on M1/M2 Macs. I'd strongly recommend Windows 11 for ARM. Windows 10 for ARM is supposed to run on M1/M2 Macs, but I'd advise strongly against it. More applications that currently run on Intel PCs will run on Windows 11 for ARM than on Windows 10 for ARM. (Microsoft has a Rosetta 2-like technology on Windows 11 that allows it to run applications compiled to run on Intel PCs. This technology is not available for Windows 10 for ARM).

[ColoradoMarmot · Accepted solution]

I'll just extend that - we don't expect windows 10 ARM guest support in Fusion 13 (though they could surprise us), and it's also pretty difficult to get install media for that version.  From experimentation, it doesn't work nearly as well as Win 11.

Note that a Win 10 key should activate Win 11, so there's no real reason to try to limp along with the older version.