How to install and play Witcher 3 on macOS! (2024)
Perhaps you might have heard somewhere that it is possible to install and play Witcher 3 on macOS. If not, well, I can tell you that it is indeed possible. The latest M1/M2 based Mac have a relatively powerful GPU, making Witcher 3 very playable on your Mac.
I have updated this article to be based on the latest Apple Silicon-based Macs, macOS Sonoma, Next Gen v4.04 of Witcher 3 and using CrossOver 23.5 with D3DMetal instead of DXVK.
Here’s a teaser of the results 🙂
What’s the trick?!
I’ve written here how I’ve tried to use Parallels to play Windows games on the Mac. However for Witcher 3, the trick is to use CodeWeaver’s Crossover to translate Windows applications to run on your Mac. This usually means it runs faster when compared to Windows emulation on platforms like Parallels.
This will cost you about $59.95 usually. Sometimes there are promos like Black Friday, etc so you might be able to snag it cheaper. Once you purchased and installed CrossOver, the fun begins.
How to install Witcher 3 on macOS using CrossOver
I personally prefer to get my games from GOG‘s platform as I’m able to play it offline. This is especially helpful to get games working on emulators like CrossOver! But this will also work if you purchase your games from Steam as you would simply install the game via Steam in CrossOver.
Anyways. If you have not bought Witcher 3 yet, I would recommend getting it from GOG.com here. GOG allows you to download the offline installer and thus removing the dependancy on Steam to get it working. One less problem to worry about! Do note that this would take a while. It is an 85.3GB download in total over 21 files.
Once you have all the installer files downloaded, it’s time to start up CrossOver and install Witcher 3 on your Mac. The easiest way to do this is to click on the “Install” button on CrossOver’s interface, and then search for “The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt”. By default it would install it via Steam. Edit that and select an installer instead.
Select the Witcher 3’s offline installer you’ve downloaded from GOG. The latest version as of this post is “setup_the_witcher_3_wild_hunt_-game_of_the_year_edition_4.04a(65527).exe“.
Next up, CrossOver will always default to installing the Windows application in a new Bottle. For Witcher 3, it would use a Windows 10 64-bit bottle. Leave the default selection and click “Install” to start the installation process.
You would notice that it will look and feel exactly like how it installs on a Windows machine. Now, it is just waiting until the installation is complete.
Once done, you should see The Witcher 3 – Wild Hunt icon on CrossOver.
Note: in the screenshot below, it shows Windows 7 64-bit bottle because I installed over the 4.04a version only my existing Witcher 3 bottle. So if you are wondering, that works well too!
The required graphics settings on Witcher 3
First up, the CrossOver installation defaults to using DXVK for Witcher 3. I recommend switching it to D3DMetal if you run macOS Sonoma on a Apple Silicon Mac.
On Witcher 3’s Graphics settings, it now knows to not enable NVIDIA HairWorks if it does not detect an NVIDIA-based GPU. No more accidental crashes if that’s enabled 😀
For my M2 Max, 32-cores GPU, I can get an average of 60 FPS when using 1080p fullscreen, Ultra settings with Screen Space Reflections set to low. I would recommend you
If any of you have read the previous version of my post, notice how much simpler it is now to install Witcher 3 on the latest version of CrossOver 23.5!
Is Witcher 3 playable on macOS?!
The short answer is that it really depends on your Mac’s GPU. Thankfully, the M1 and M2 Macs have relatively powerful GPUs. Check out the video below and see how I was able to get 60 FPS @ 1080p using Ultra settings.
I would encourage you to try tweaking around with Medium settings if you don’t have a GPU as powerful as the M2 Max. But even at medium, Witcher 3 still looks very pretty. I finished the whole game at low-medium settings when I ran it on an RX 580 eGPU on my old MacBook.
If you’re wondering how it runs at 1440p resolution, you can see if in the video below.
Some graphical issues
While it’s 99% playable, there are some graphical issues that would appear. For example, when I was checking how well Witcher 3 runs on D3DMetal on my new Mac, some monsters would seem to be wrongly rendered.
The ekhidna monster for example used to be invisible when running on DXVK. Now with D3DMetal, you can see it but it’s incorrectly rendered. I suspect the issue would be the same with the other invisible monsters like the sirens as well.
Otherwise, the game runs superbly well!
If this post has been useful, support me by buying me a latte or two 🙂
This has been so helpful – and gotten way easier – over the years, much appreciated!
Hi,
so this walk through was amazing and I want others not too slam their heads against the wall troubleshooting somethings I ran into. Skip to “TROUBLESHOOTING EFFORTS” below for help on install and playthrough.
RANDOM INFORMATION:
bear in mind I love this game, purchased mac for software/data engineering projects I want to work on but also be a way to casually game. bought this game for 10$ with all the expansions using GOG (right to own games 🙂 ) ands have sat on it wondering how to play it on my mac, since when I bought it I read it was doable.
I am not a gamer whatsoever so alot of this crossover/wine/bottles language is relatively new to me so hopefullly the efforts below come off helpful for anyone.
TROUBLESHOOTING EFFORTS:
1. ensure you give crossover fulldisk access in macs settings > privacy and security > full disk access
– solves issues with launching the game and not seeing anything
– ensure when the popups come up as you install and poiint to folders you allow access for crossover to see files especially when you are using an SSD to install your game on
2. use the in game options itself to adjust the full screen of the game not the mac OS windows or tools (face palmed myself when I realized I could just do it in game to get the full screen)
3. if you are hearing muffled sounds of voices whether on the mac speaker or connected to hdmi, no worries. it is because you need to adjust the hertz on the devices. go to MIDI settings and adjust from the settings 48 to 41 or whichever herts will work with the device you are using.
– command + spacebar search “midi” OR spotlight “midi” OR youtube how to find “audio midi setup”. pick the device you are having the sound issues on (if external, connect device and you should see it) and switch to different hertz until you hear the sound of the voices come through as you test.
I hope my troubleshooting efforts reaches out to those trying to play with mac m3 and this crossover tool