5 Ways to Play Payday 2 on Mac

TL;DR – Methods to play Payday 2

Boosteroid / GeForce Now – Perfect if you want fast, hassle-free access. Great for any Mac (or even non-Mac) as long as your internet is solid.
CrossOver / Whisky – Best for Apple Silicon users who prefer local performance and lower input delay. Slightly more setup, but worth it.
Boot Camp – Only for Intel Macs. Gives a near-native Windows experience, but setup is long and limited by aging hardware.

I’ve always liked heist games, and Payday 2 hits that perfect mix of chaos and co-op fun. But if you’re on a Mac like me, you’ve probably noticed – it’s not officially supported. Still, I’ve tested a bunch of workarounds, and in this article, I’m sharing what actually works.

Can You Play Payday 2 on Mac?

So here’s the short answer: Payday 2 doesn’t have a native Mac version anymore. That said, if you’re on macOS and you’re determined to play, there are solid options out there – I’ve tested them myself, and yeah, it’s totally doable.

Let’s start with cloud gaming. Services like Boosteroid and GeForce Now let you stream the game straight to your Mac – no need to worry about your hardware. These are the easiest to set up, and they work on pretty much any device. The catch? You’ll need a good internet connection, and they come with some subscription costs. Still, if you want to jump in fast, this is the way.
If you’re on an Apple Silicon Mac and prefer to run things locally, CrossOver and Whisky are surprisingly good. They take a bit more effort to set up, but they run the game directly using your Mac’s hardware. That means lower input delay and no streaming compression. They’re not perfect, but they’re efficient once configured.
And finally, Boot Camp. This one’s for Intel Macs only. It’s the only local option for those machines, and it gives you near-native Windows performance – but the setup is long, and Intel Macs are showing their age.

I’ve used all of these. Let’s break them down.

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

	Boosteroid and GFN	CrossOver	Whisky	BootCamp
Requirements	≥ 15 Mbps Internet speed (Boosteroid) ≥ 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 Payday 2 on Mac

Alright, so if you’re still with me, here’s where we get into the actual setup part. I’m going to walk you through how I got Payday 2 running on a Mac using each of the methods I mentioned earlier. Whether you’re going with cloud gaming or setting things up locally, I’ll break it all down step-by-step based on my own experience – what worked, what didn’t, and what to watch out for. Let’s start with the simplest option first.

Play Payday 2 With Boosteroid

How to Play Payday 2 on Mac With Boosteroid

1

1.1
Click the Boosteroid button above. Create an account or sign up with Google.
2

1.2
Go to your profile page(top-right), click Subscribe, select a preferred plan, and start your subscription.
3

1.3
Search for “Payday 2”, choose your preferred version of the game (Steam, Epic, etc.) and click Play (or Install and Play).
4

1.4
Click OK, Let’s go, and wait for the game to load.
5

1.5
Log into your game store account. Payday 2 will launch directly in your browser.

Play Payday 2 With GeForce Now

How to Play Payday 2 on Mac With GFN

1

1.1
Click the GeForce Now link → Join Now → sign up for your preferred plan.
2

1.2
Go to the Downloads page. Download GeForce Now for macOS.
3

1.3
Double-click the installer. Drag the app to your Applications folder.
4

1.4
Launch GFN and log in.
5

1.5
Click the menu in the top left → Settings → connect your respective game store account.
6

1.6
Click the menu again → Games → search for Payday 2, and click Play.
7

1.7
Wait for the connection test. If you get a weak connection warning, you can ignore it by clicking Continue and still play the game.
8

1.8
Wait for the game to load and start playing.

Play Payday 2 With CrossOver

How to Play Payday 2 on Mac With CrossOver

1

1.1
Click the CrossOver button, download the app (the free 14-day trial or the paid version), and install it.
2

1.2
Open CrossOver → Bottle (top-left) → New Bottle → Create (Windows 10, 64-bit compatibility).
3

1.3
Right-click the new bottle → Install Software → search for Steam and install it.
4

1.4
Open Steam, log in, search for Payday 2 in your library, and install it.
5

1.5
After it installs, exit Steam, enable E-Sync, and D3DMetal, and Reboot the bottle.
6

1.6
Start Steam again and launch Payday 2 from your library.

Play Payday 2 With Whisky

How to Download Payday 2 on Mac With Whisky

1

1.1
Click the Whisky button above and download the latest version.
2

1.2
Double-click the downloaded .zip file and drag and drop the extracted Whisky to your Applications folder.
3

1.3
Start Whisky. Click Open when asked to confirm the action. Click Next to install.
4

1.4
Select Create a Bottle and create one with Windows 10 compatibility.
5

1.5
Open this Steam page and click the Windows logo (under Install Steam) to download the Windows version.
6

1.6
In Whisky, click Open C: drive. Drag and drop the SteamSetup.exe file into C:.
7

1.7
Click Run in Whisky, find SteamSetup.exe, open it, and follow the prompts.
8

1.8
When Steam installs, log in and click Allow when asked if you want the application to accept incoming connections.
9

1.9
In Steam, find Payday 2, click Install, and launch the game when its ready.

How to Run Payday 2 on Mac With Bootcamp

1

1.1
Head to Microsoft’s official site and download the latest Windows 10 ISO file.
2

1.2
Next, open Boot Camp Assistant (found in Applications > Utilities), click Continue → Choose, pick your downloaded Windows ISO file, then click Open.
3

1.3
Adjust the slider to give your Windows partition at least 50 GB storage, then click Install → Next.
4

1.4
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.
5

1.5
Once Windows is installed and set up, download Steam, install it, and use it to download Payday 2. Once that’s done, you are ready to play.

Payday 2 on Mac – Conclusion

So yeah, Payday 2 isn’t natively supported on Mac anymore, but that doesn’t mean you’re out of luck. Whether you want a quick cloud gaming fix or a more permanent local solution, there’s a way to make it work – I’ve tried them all myself.

If you’re on Apple Silicon, CrossOver or Whisky gives you solid results. For Intel Macs, Boot Camp is still a solid fallback. And cloud gaming? Super easy and flexible.

It’s not always plug-and-play, but with a bit of effort, you can rob banks on a Mac just fine.