World of Warships used to have a fully-functioning Mac version, but in 2022 that version got discontinued, making it impossible to play the current version of WoWs on Apple computers. Needless to say, that didn’t stop us from playing the game on our Macs anyway.
After spending some time testing potential workarounds for this game, we came to the conclusion that there are 4 solutions that work here: Boosteroid, GeForce Now, Parallels, and Boot Camp. However, picking the right one for you can be tricky, so we made this post to share with you our experience and to help you choose the one that best fits your needs and preferences.
How to play World of Warships on Mac: All working methods
Here are the four methods that we’ve confirmed will allow you to play World of Warships on your Mac computer. If you want to read about our experience with testing them, you can scroll further down this page.
Boosteroid Cloud Gaming (Recommended method)
Features: Constant 1080p/60 FPS; Stable connection; Low bandwidth requirements (15 MBPS); Huge gaming library with all the latest AAA titles.
Pros
- Cheapest cloud-gaming option
- Compatible with all macs
- Hardware specs don’t matter
- You can play in your browser in about 15 minutes
Cons
- Requires a good internet connection
- You need to look if the game is supported with your chosen vendor
Extras: Here’s our review of Boosteroid with a comparison to GeForce Now; also check out our Boosteroid Games List.
For those who prefer a casual gaming experience on their Mac, Boosteroid emerges as a top pick. This method is perfect for those who want to game on their Mac without complicated setups, offering a blend of good visuals and smooth performance.
- Click on the “Play with Boosteroid” button to reach the Boosteroid site. You’ll need to sign up for a new account or use your existing Google Account to log in.
- On the top right of the screen, find and click “My account”. Here, you’ll need to choose and activate a subscription plan under “My subscription”.
- Find the game by clicking the magnifying glass icon at the top and typing its name.
- When you find the game, select “Play”, then click “OK, let’s go”, and after a brief loading, log in to your Wargaming account to begin the game.
GeForce Now
Pros
- Access to a vast library of games.
- High-quality graphics and performance.
- No need for powerful local hardware.
- Cross-platform support.
Cons
- Requires a stable and fast internet connection.
- Limited to supported games.
- Potential latency issues in online games.
- Requires a subscription for some features.
GeForce Now stands out as a game-changer for Mac users, offering a wide range of games through its cloud gaming service.
- GeForce Now is a boon for Mac users, enabling access to numerous games, irrespective of the Mac’s hardware capabilities. The service is powered by NVIDIA’s servers, ensuring high-quality graphics and performance. Additionally, its cross-platform nature allows seamless transition between devices.
- However, a stable internet connection is crucial for a flawless experience on GeForce Now. Be aware that not all games are available, and some features require a paid subscription. Despite these considerations, GeForce Now offers a versatile gaming experience, provided you have a reliable internet connection and your preferred games are available on the service.
Parallels Desktop
Features: Provides you with Windows OS functionality without the need for a separate Windows installation. Easy to set up and doesn’t take much space.
Pros
- Don’t need to buy the game
- M1/M2/Intel-compatible
- Hardware specs don’t matter
Cons
- Requires good Internet
- Console-based controls
- Available in few countries.
Parallels Desktop creates a virtual Windows environment within macOS, offering an easy setup and more stability than alternatives. The main limitation is the split resource allocation between macOS and the Windows virtual machine.
Boot Camp
Features: Provides a native Windows 11 experience. Allows running all Windows-compatible programs and games as long as the Mac’s hardware can support them.
Note: Not available for Apple Silicon models.
Pros
- It’s free
- Unlimited compatibility
- Stable and reliable
Cons
- Takes time to set up
- Takes tons of storage
- Unavailable for M1/M2
Boot Camp allows the installation of Windows on a separate Mac partition, offering a stable environment for Windows games. The method is free, aside from the game purchase, but requires significant hard drive space and is compatible mainly with Intel Macs. Setting up Boot Camp is also time-intensive.
Testing World of Warships on Mac with Boosteroid and GeForce Now: How good is cloud gaming?
Venturing into the maritime battles of World of Warships on a Mac, we navigated the waters with Boosteroid and GeForce Now, given the absence of a native Mac version.
These two cloud gaming services let you play any of the games from their libraries on your Mac regardless of whether those games are supported for macOS or whether your machine meets their system requirements. You do need to own the specific game, of course, but since WoWs is a free-to-play title, this is irrelevant here.
The only notable factor that determines the quality of your experience is the strength and stability of your Internet. GFN needs at least 25 Mbps for a stable stream with 1080p and 60 FPS and Boosteroid will work adequately with as little as 15 Mbps, providing the same resolution and FPS rate.
Playing World of Warships on Mac with Boosteroid
Boosteroid was our first port of call. The setup was straightforward – a quick account creation, a hop onto the World of Warships page, and we were ready to set sail after opting for a paid subscription.
Playing through Boosteroid, the game loaded seamlessly, and logging in with our Wargaming.net account was a breeze. Using Boosteroid with Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox is recommended if you want to game directly in your browser, but our advice is to directly download the native macOS Boosteroid client for the best experience.
In action, Boosteroid managed the detailed graphics and dynamic sea battles of World of Warships quite well. Our 25 Mbps internet connection mostly held up and the image quality and FPS remained consistent, with a few momentary exceptions when our Internet was misbehaving.
Playing World of Warships on Mac with GeForce Now
Transitioning to GeForce Now, the experience felt familiar yet slightly different. As we mentioned above, the Internet speed requirement is slightly higher here, so our 25 Mbps Wi-Fi was barely enough to let us stream the World of Warships though GFN. However, in practice, we didn’t get much more stuttering and our streaming quality mostly stayed consistent.
It’s worth noting that GFN tends to decrease the image quality more aggressively during lag spikes to keep the gameplay as smooth as possible, but if that bothers you, you can turn this feature off from the GFN client’s settings.
Should you play World of Warships on Mac with cloud gaming?
In conclusion, both Boosteroid and GeForce Now proved to be capable vessels for bringing World of Warships to our Mac. Boosteroid’s user-friendly approach and modest internet requirements make it a great option for casual gaming sessions. The same can also be said about GeForce Now. Even though GFN requires a bit stronger Internet, you can make changes to the client’s settings to find the perfect balance between image quality and streaming smoothness for your specific Internet.
Playing World of Warships on MacBook with Parallels and Boot Camp: What we learned
The other approach to playing World of Warships on a Mac computer is to download the Windows version of the game and run it in a Windows environment. There are different potential ways to do that. Parallels Desktop creates a Virtual machine for Windows in which you can run the game, Boot Camp directly installs the Windows OS on your Mac, turning half of it into a Windows PC, and there’s also the more elegant option to use Windows translation layers such as CrossOver and Apple’s Game Porting Toolkit.
Unfortunately, we weren’t able to get the latter two to work in our tests which tracks with reports from other users who’ve also tried these two methods.
On the other hand, both Parallels and Boot Camp did work and allowed us to play World of Warships on our Macs even if there were some caveats.
Is Parallels a good option for playing World of Warships on Mac M1?
Parallels is currently the only non-cloud way of playing World of Warships on an Apple Silicon MacBook and setting it up and using it is a quite streamlined process. We quickly installed it, created a Windows 11 VM, and downloaded World of Warships in it (through the Wargaming client).
The Mac we used for this test is an M1 MacBook Air with 16 GB of memory and playing the game on it with Medium settings and 1080p resolution gave us anywhere between 35 and 60 FPS depending on the amount of stuff that was happening on the screen. This is not an amazing performance to be sure, but it’s still acceptable if you are a casual player. Also, it’s worth remembering that gaming through Parallels only uses a portion of your Mac’s hardware, as some resources still need to be left for your macOS.
The main advantage of Parallels (when compared to cloud gaming) is the performance won’t be affected even if your Internet isn’t great. However, bad Internet will still lead to lag during multiplayer matches, so you’ll still need a decent connection for a game like World of Warships. As for whether Parallels is better than Boosteroid or GeForce Now, we cannot definitively say yes or no, but we do think the advantages of the two cloud gaming options are more in this particular case.
Should you choose Boot Camp for playing World of Warships on Intel Macs?
The two main differences between Boot Camp and Parallels is that Boot Camp only works on Intel Macs and that it allows all of the Mac’s resources to be used for the game.
For our World of Warships test with Boot Camp, we used a 2016 MacBook Pro that only has 8 GB of RAM, yet the performance here was mostly acceptable. With 1080p and Low settings, we were getting around 35 to 45 FPS most of the time, so while not amazing, this did allow us to play a couple of matches without any issue. Also note that this is a rather weak and old Mac and on a newer machine, the performce will be significantly better.
However, Boot Camp has several notable disadvantages, including the fact it took us around two hours to set it up and we had to dedicate around 120 GB of our Mac’s storage space. Last but not least, since this is an Intel Mac with an integrated GPU, there was a lot of heat even after a couple of minuts of gameplay.
Overall, while the Boot Camp method definitely works, it is not without its flaws and so we can’t really recommend it over the cloud gaming alternatives for users with Intel Macs.
Stay connected