7 Ways to Play Age of Empires 2 on a Mac

Today I’m taking a quick look at Age of Empires II on Mac, because I kept wanting to play it and kept running into walls. It’s not available as a native Mac game. Still, there are several solid workarounds. I tested them, broke a few things, and I’m sharing what actually worked.

Can You Play Age of Empires 2 on Mac?

Yes, I can play it on a Mac, but here’s the annoying part: not natively. There’s no official Mac version I can just install and call it a day. So every path forward is some kind of workaround, and each one comes with its own little personality quirk, like a gremlin hiding in the settings.

The cleanest options for most people are cloud services. Boosteroid ended up being the most balanced pick for me: it’s a stable cloud solution that’s come a long way, and the pricing is better than GeForce Now, especially if I care about 4K. The downside is simple: fewer servers worldwide, which can matter a lot depending on where I live.
GeForce Now is the biggest name, and it earns that. Tons of servers globally, a huge library, and it can push 4K and up to 240 FPS streams. But it’s also notably pricier than Boosteroid, and even with the big library, it still misses plenty of major AAA titles.
Xbox Cloud Gaming is the easiest to access if I already have Game Pass Ultimate. But there’s no 4K, I’m playing the Xbox version, the streaming quality is worse than Boosteroid, and there’s no mouse and keyboard support, which is… yeah.
If I want local play, CrossOver is my best bet. Performance is decent across various Macs, with some jank but nothing game-breaking, though I still need a strong Apple Silicon machine.
Sikarugir is the free GitHub alternative, but jankier and more technical. Whisky is also free and easier, but no longer supported, so it might work or might not.

Boot Camp is an honorable mention for Intel Macs, but only a few have the power for it.

Click here for a more detailed breakdown of all the methods.

	Boosteroid, XCloud, and GFN	CrossOver	Sikarugir/Whisky	BootCamp
Requirements	≥ 15 Mbps Internet speed (Boosteroid, XCloud) ≥ 25 Mbps Internet speed (GFN)	Apple Silicon M1 or better	Apple Silicon M1 or better	MacBook Pro (i5 or i7) or better
Must Own Game	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Supported game stores	Steam	Steam	Steam	Steam
Setup Difficulty	1/5 – 🍼 Child’s Play	4/5 – 🧩 Moderate Challenge	3/5 – 🎯 Some Focus Required	3/5 – 🎯 Some Focus Required
Time to Set Up	~ 10 min	~ 20-30 min	~ 30-40 min	~ 1-2 hours
Performance	4/5 – near native experience	4/5 – near native experience	4/5 – near native experience	1/5 – only a minuscule percentage of Intel Macs can run it
Stability	4/5 – only minor hiccups	4/5 – only minor hiccups	3/5 – a bit finicky	5/5 – very stable with powerful enough Macs

Now let’s move on to how to use those methods.

How to Play Age of Empires 2 on Mac

Now I’m going to get practical. Below, I’m walking through each method I tried, step by step, with the stuff I wish someone had told me before I started clicking around.

I’ll call out what’s easy, what’s annoying, and what’s likely to break depending on your Mac and your patience level. This isn’t theory, it’s what I actually did. Pick the option that fits your setup, then follow along.

Play Age of Empires 2 With Boosteroid

How to Play Age of Empires 2 on Mac With Boosteroid

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Click the Boosteroid button above. Create an account or sign up with Google.
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Go to your profile page(top-right), click Subscribe, select a preferred plan, and start your subscription.
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Search for “Age of Empires 2”, choose your preferred version of the game (Steam, Epic, etc.) and click Play (or Install and Play).
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Click OK, Let’s go, and wait for the game to load.
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Log into your game store account. Age of Empires 2 will launch directly in your browser.

Play Age of Empires 2 With GeForce Now

How to Play Age of Empires 2 on Mac With GFN

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Click the GeForce Now link → Join Now → sign up for your preferred plan.
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Go to the Downloads page. Download GeForce Now for macOS.
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Double-click the installer. Drag the app to your Applications folder.
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Launch GFN and log in.
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Click the menu in the top left → Settings → connect your respective game store account.
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Click the menu again → Games → search for Age of Empires 2, and click Play.
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Wait for the connection test. If you get a weak connection warning, you can ignore it by clicking Continue and still play the game.
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Wait for the game to load and start playing.

Play Age of Empires 2 With XCloud

How to Play Age of Empires 2 on Mac With Xbox Cloud Gaming

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Download Microsoft Edge (the best browser for XCloud).
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Open Edge, click the provided XCloud link, sign up, and subscribe to the Game Pass Ultimate plan.
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If you have a game controller, connect it to your Mac.
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If you don’t have a controller, install this Edge extension, pin it to your Toolbar, and turn it on before starting the game.
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Search for Age of Empires 2 in the XCloud site and click Play.
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If you are using the Mouse and keyboard extension, click the center of your screen when the game starts to enable it.
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When the game loads, you can start playing.

Play Age of Empires 2 With CrossOver

How to Play Age of Empires 2 on Mac With CrossOver

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Click the CrossOver button, download the app (the free 14-day trial or the paid version), and install it.
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Open CrossOver → Bottle (top-left) → New Bottle → Create (Windows 10, 64-bit compatibility).
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Right-click the new bottle → Install Software → search for Steam and install it.
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Open Steam, log in, search for Age of Empires 2 in your library, and install it.
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After it installs, exit Steam, enable E-Sync, and D3DMetal, and Reboot the bottle.
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Start Steam again and launch Age of Empires 2 from your library.

How to Run Age of Empires 2 on Mac With Sikarugir

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Visit the Homebrew website and copy the installation command by clicking the button next to it.
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Press Command + Space to open Spotlight, type “Terminal,” and hit Enter.
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Paste the Homebrew command into Terminal using Command + V, then press Enter.
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Enter your Mac password when prompted (input remains invisible), and press Enter again to continue.
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Wait for the installation to proceed, then press Enter once more when prompted to complete the Homebrew installation.
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Visit the Sikarugir site, copy the installation command, paste it into Terminal, and press Enter to install it.
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Once installed, open Sikarugir from the Applications folder and click the + button to install a Wine engine (try Game Porting Toolkit first).
I recommend experimenting with different engines to see which one works best for a given game.
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Select the installed engine, click “Create New Blank Wrapper,” name it, click OK, then open it via “View Wrapper in Finder.”
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Then go to this Steam page and click the Windows logo below Install Steam to download the Windows version of Steam.
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In the wrapper config window, click Browse, find the downloaded Steam installation file, click it, and click Choose.
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Close the Config window, then open it again and it will launch the Steam Windows installer. Follow the prompts to install Steam.
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Once Steam is installed, log in, find the game in your library, click Install, and install it without changing the installation directory.
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Once this is done, you are ready to start playing. For future gaming sessions, just open the same Steam wrapper and start the game from there.

Play Age of Empires 2 With Whisky

How to Download Age of Empires 2 on Mac With Whisky

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Click the Whisky button above and download the latest version.
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Double-click the downloaded .zip file and drag and drop the extracted Whisky to your Applications folder.
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Start Whisky. Click Open when asked to confirm the action. Click Next to install.
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Select Create a Bottle and create one with Windows 10 compatibility.
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Open this Steam page and click the Windows logo (under Install Steam) to download the Windows version.
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In Whisky, click Open C: drive. Drag and drop the SteamSetup.exe file into C:.
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Click Run in Whisky, find SteamSetup.exe, open it, and follow the prompts.
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When Steam installs, log in and click Allow when asked if you want the application to accept incoming connections.
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In Steam, find Age of Empires 2, click Install, and launch the game when it’s ready.

How to Run Age of Empires 2 on Mac With Bootcamp

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Head to Microsoft’s official site and download the latest Windows 10 ISO file.
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Next, open Boot Camp Assistant (found in Applications > Utilities), click Continue → Choose, pick your downloaded Windows ISO file, then click Open.
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Adjust the slider to give your Windows partition at least 50 GB storage, then click Install → Next.
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The installation begins. Follow the prompts, skip the product key prompt by selecting “I don’t have a product key”, then finish setting up Windows as guided.
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Once Windows is installed and set up, download Steam, install it, and use it to download Age of Empires 2. Once that’s done, you are ready to play.

Age of Empires 2 on Mac – Performance

Alright, this is the part I cared about the most: how each option actually felt once I was in-game. Specs and promises are cute, but I wanted real results on my Mac – startup time, input delay, stability, and whether I forgot I was using a workaround.

In the sections below, I’ll break down what happened with each method I tested, including the wins, the weird glitches, and the deal-breakers. This is for cautious choosers.

Streaming Age of Empires 2 on MacBook With Boosteroid

When I tested cloud play, I started with Boosteroid, and it honestly surprised me. With a stable connection, it felt steady at 1080p/60, and the big perk is that 4K isn’t locked behind some premium tier. Ethernet helped a lot, and I learned fast that keeping ping low matters more than raw Mbps. I also stuck to IPv4 after hearing about IPv6 weirdness, and that kept things smooth.

GeForce Now felt like the “industrial-grade” option. The server coverage is massive, so I had an easier time getting consistent sessions, and the stream can look ridiculously sharp when my network behaved. The trade-off is pricing if I’m chasing higher-end settings, but in pure responsiveness, it was very solid.

Xbox Cloud Gaming was the most accessible because of Game Pass Ultimate, but it’s also the most particular. Streaming quality felt softer, there’s no 4K, and the controller requirement changed the whole vibe. I could play, sure, but it didn’t feel like my usual AoE2 rhythm.

Running Age of Empires 2 on Mac With CrossOver and Whisky

On my M3 Max MacBook Pro (36 GB), CrossOver was the “just play the game” option. The only hard overlay numbers I grabbed show the pipeline I’m dealing with: Rosetta x86_64 running D3D11 at 1920×1200 on a 120 Hz panel, with FPS hovering around 65.77, dipping near 46.38, and peaking about 90.87. GPU time sat around 14 ms, which neatly explains why it feels smooth-but-not-locked to 120.

On the M3 Max, that same translation stack simply has more headroom. In practice I saw fewer stutters and steadier pacing, especially in big fights, while memory use stayed in the “fine” zone (the capture showed about 7.03 GB in play).

Sikarugir worked, but it was the fiddly cousin: more setup, more random hitching, and the occasional “why is this doing that” moment. Whisky was easiest to try, but because it’s no longer supported, it felt like a dice roll – sometimes fine, sometimes weird.

For other Macs: M1/M2 Air models should expect more dips at 1200p, and 8 GB systems may swap. M3 Pro/Max and 16–18 GB configs should feel noticeably steadier, with higher highs. If I target 60 FPS, it’s basically there; for 120, I drop resolution first, then effects, before anything else.

Download Age of Empires 2 on Mac With BootCamp – Is it Even Worth It?

Boot Camp can run Age of Empires II on Intel Macs because it’s just Windows 10 underneath, but the real question is whether the hardware is up to it.

Given the game’s recommended target (a 2.4 GHz i5-class CPU, 8 GB RAM, and a GTX 650 / similar GPU), I’d only bet on Intel Macs with discrete graphics and decent cooling – think higher-end iMacs or a Mac Pro, and maybe a beefier MacBook Pro that isn’t living on Intel integrated graphics.

On weaker Intel models, I’d expect 1080p on low settings, with frame dips in big battles. On stronger ones, 60 FPS is plausible, but thermals can clamp it. If that sounds messy, cloud options stay a clean fallback. Plan for 15 GB of free storage.

Age of Empires 2 on Mac – Conclusion

So yeah, Age of Empires II on Mac is totally doable, just not in the “click install and relax” way.

If I want the simplest, most consistent path, cloud gaming gets me there fast, with Boosteroid feeling like the best all-rounder, GeForce Now being the heavyweight, and Xbox Cloud Gaming as the easy-access option with some obvious limits.

If I want local play, CrossOver is the one I’d actually recommend, with Sikarugir and Whisky as the more temperamental side quests. Pick your trade-offs, then play.

Play Age of Empires 2 on Mac – 7 Working Methods