These macOS Monterey features won’t work with Intel-based Macs

Apple’s next OS for Macs — macOS Monterey — is coming out sometime this fall. The company has already revealed loads about the new macOS, and we are all super excited for the coming new features to make our lives and workflows more streamlined and efficient.

The catch with the macOS update this time around though is that some macOS Monterey features won’t work with Intel-based Macs.

Now, don’t throw away your Intel-based machine just yet. Let’s take a closer look at what exactly is going to be absent from previous generation Macs compared to M1 chip Mac devices, and how that bodes for your Mac needs.

macOS Monterey overview

Here’s an at-a-glance look at all the features that we’ve found out so far won’t be available on Intel-based Macs:

Portrait mode in FaceTime
3D interactive globe view in Apple Maps
Unprecedented detail for maps of San Francisco, LA, New York, and London
Keyboard dictation updates: offline dictation plus continuous dictation
Neural text-to-speech voice in Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, and Finnish

Maps updates

Next, M1 devices will have access to a set of wonderful updates to Maps. Users will be able to explore 3D interactive globe view plus super-detailed maps of these major cities: San Francisco, LA, New York, and London.

Interactive globe view will show enhanced details of mountain ranges, deserts, forests, oceans, etc.

Improved maps of San Francisco, LA, New York, and London will contain detailed elevation, roads, trees, buildings, landmarks, and more.

FaceTime Portrait mode

FaceTime is getting a bunch of updates with Monterey, and Portrait mode is one of them, but it’s only coming to Apple silicon devices.

You will be able to use the new mode to blur the background and keep the focus of your video chatting app on just you. We, for one, can’t be more excited — no need to tidy up the room before an unexpected video call!

Keyboard dictation improvements

A new offline dictation feature is set to keep the information you give to your macOS on your device. This is a great privacy precaution, but, unfortunately, looks like it will be only accessible to M1 machine users.

Additionally, another new dictation feature — continuous dictation — will enable M1 chip Mac owners to perform on-device dictation of texts of any length, without the need to take breaks. Previously limited to 60 seconds, now on-device dictation will work without any annoying timeouts.

Conclusion

The next macOS is looking to embrace M1 chip functionalities with a few features exclusive to Apple silicon: Live Text, Portrait mode in FaceTime, 3D interactive globe view in Maps, incredibly detailed for maps of San Francisco, LA, New York, and London, keyboard dictation upgrades — offline and continuous dictation, as well as neural text-to-speech voice in additional languages — Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, and Finnish.

You can explore the list of best macOS Monterey features in our overview here. The full list of all the officially announced upcoming new features with this macOS is available on the official Apple page here.

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Update: Live Text feature was initially announced as available for M1 chip devices only, but with macOS Monterey beta 5 Live Text was made available for all Macs that support Monterey macOS, so we removed bits about Live Text from this blog post, but don’t worry, they were really there, you aren’t imagining things;)