Whonix for macOS: Download and Installation

Whonix for Apple macOS inside VirtualBox .

About this MacOS Page
Support Status	under construction
Difficulty	easy
Maintainer	ryjorny
Support	Support

1. Install VirtualBox

Download VirtualBox by clicking on 'OS X hosts' and when prompted decide to either open or save the Apple disk image file (e.g. VirtualBox-5.2.22-126460-OSX.dmg). After it mounts, install it by double-clicking on the blue VirtualBox logo.

2. Download the Whonix Virtual Machines (VMs) FREE

Both the Whonix-Gateway and Whonix-Workstation VM images must be downloaded. For details on the Whonix VM design and why both VMs are required, see here.

Version: 14.0.1.4.4

Whonix-Gateway	Whonix-Workstation	Anonymous Download Possible ^[1]	Download Security without Verification	Download Security with Verification
Download (v3 Onion)	Download (v3 Onion)	Yes ^[1]	Medium	High ^[2]
OpenPGP Signature (v3 Onion) ( sha512 , sig )	OpenPGP Signature (v3 Onion) ( sha512 , sig )	Yes ^[1]	-	-
Verify VirtualBox images using this Signing Key		Yes ^[1]	-	-
Verify KVM images using this Signing Key		Yes ^[1]	-	-

3. Verify the Whonix Images

It is important to check the integrity of the downloaded virtual machine images to ensure that neither a man-in-the-middle attack or file corruption occurred (see Download Security).

Whonix virtual machine images are cryptographically signed by Whonix developer Patrick Schleizer using OpenPGP. ^[3]

If you know how to use an OpenPGP key, download the Whonix Signing Key and the Whonix signatures straight away.

Otherwise, use the following instructions:

4. Import Whonix into VirtualBox

For Windows Whonix VirtualBox import instructions, please press on expand on the right. Mac graphics will come soon.

Start VirtualBox

Click on Filethen choose Import Appliance...

Navigate and select the Whonix image and press next

Do NOT change anything! Just click on Import

Then press Agree

Wait until Whonix-Gateway.ova has been imported

Repeat the import step for Whonix-Workstation.ova

Miscellaneous

Video Tutorials are also available.

If you still need help, please check the Support page.

After the Whonix .ova files are imported they can be removed. VirtualBox will make a new directory with the live virtual machines Whonix-Gateway.vbox and Whonix-Workstation.vbox, and they are contained in directories of the same name. By default this is /Users/(yourusername)/VirtualBox VMs

5. Start Whonix

Starting Whonix is simple. Start VirtualBox, and then double-click on Whonix-Gateway and Whonix-Workstation.

Start both Whonix-Gateway and Whonix-Workstation

6. VirtualBox Screen Resolution Bug

If the display presents like the image on the right-hand side, then you are affected by a screen resolution bug which only occurs in the XFCE version of Whonix in VirtualBox. To correct the resolution, apply the following workaround.

1. Maximize the window.

2. VirtualBox VM Windows -> View -> Virtual Screen 1 -> choose any, resize to some other resolution

3. VirtualBox VM Windows -> View -> Auto-resize Guest Display

First time user?

Miscellaneous macOS Advice

If the same VMs will be used on multiple systems like Boot Camp or even two different physical machines, then they can be moved to a shared or external hard drive:

Copy the VirtualBox VMs folder mentioned earlier to the new location.
Select the VMs you moved and then click remove.
When prompted, select "Delete files".
Re-add the VMs from their new location by selecting Machine=>Add, then navigating to the new folder.

exFAT is the easiest format for cross platform file sharing with Windows and Linux. exFAT is an option built into Apple's "Disk Utility.app" when initializing or reformatting a storage device. Select exFAT from the drop down menu that appears when you click "Erase". The default option is HFS+ on 10.13 "High Sierra" and earlier and APFS on 10.14 "Mojave".

Note that with its POSIX kernel and BSD roots, many issues that arise on macOS hosts can be addressed using strategies similar to other Unix-like OSes.

Virtualization on non-Apple Hardware

Virtualization on osx86 aka "Hackintosh" machines with unmodified "vanilla" kernels works well, but some additional BIOS/UEFI settings need to be confirmed to ensure system stability. As of November 2018 Intel VT-d is not recommended, although some systems may function if it is enabled. Later BIOS revisions from American Megatrends Inc. (AMI) seem to have improved support compared to earlier releases.

AMD-Vi is not supported, since kernel modifications violating Apple Inc.'s End User License Agreement (EULA) are required to run macOS on platforms other than Intel. It is also recommended to disable the Integrated Graphics Processing Unit (IGPU) if PCIe graphics are in use, as well as disabling any SuperIO/Serial Port options if listed in BIOS. If virtualization problems related to unsupported architectures or features are encountered, please first consult appropriate community forums and wikis available on the Internet.

See Also

↑ ^1.0 ^1.1 ^1.2 ^1.3 ^1.4 By using the Tor Browser Bundle (TBB). For an introduction, see Tor Browser. See also Hide Tor and Whonix from your ISP.
↑ It does not matter if the bulk download is done over an insecure channel if OpenPGP verification is used at the end.
↑ OpenPGP is a standard for data encryption that provides cryptographic privacy and authentication through the use of keys owned by its users.

No user support in comments. See Support.

Comments will be deleted after some time. Specifically after comments have been addressed in form of wiki enhancements. See Wiki Comments Policy.

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Anonymous user #1

one month ago

Score 0 You

it works but it's slow like the hell on the lastest macbook air 2018. Is it possible to download older and faster distributions and apply all the patches?

Permalink | Reply

Patrick

one month ago

Score 0

No, and unfortunately I doubt that would be any faster then.

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Footnotes

[anonymousdownload-1] 1.0 ^1.1 ^1.2 ^1.3 ^1.4 By using the Tor Browser Bundle (TBB). For an introduction, see Tor Browser. See also Hide Tor and Whonix from your ISP.

[openpgpverification-2] It does not matter if the bulk download is done over an insecure channel if OpenPGP verification is used at the end.

[3] OpenPGP is a standard for data encryption that provides cryptographic privacy and authentication through the use of keys owned by its users.

[1]

[2]

[3]