You might think this title contrary. In the first place if a person prefers iOS over Android, then they simply get an Apple device or vice versa. So where does getting an Best Android Emulators for Mac fit in in all this?
Well there are many reasons why you might want to get a best Android emulators for Mac. The first being that you recently transferred from Android to iOS and are now missing out on some solely android apps. The other reasons is that you’re an app developer and are looking for ways to debug your apps. There are a lot of options out there, some of which you might already have tried out and hated. They may or may not have come bundled with Android Studio. Whatever the case may be we have a list of best Android emulators for Mac. These emulators not only work well with Mac but are also faster that your default Android Emulator.
Also, with Hyper-V compatibility you can run the emulator side-by-side with the Windows Phone Emulator and other Hyper-V VMs, cutting the time you spend switching between platforms. Work-From-Home is covered too—unlike other Android emulators, the Visual Studio Emulator for Android works over remote desktop. Andy for light Android Apps: This Android emulator is great for testing light Android apps. You get the navigation bar at the bottom of the screen with toggles for microphone access, screen rotation, keyboard controls and the hamburger menu. But as mentioned earlier this emulator is great for light weight apps such as messaging ones.
- Ko player is an Android emulator tool that helps users gain the quality Android playing experience on their Windows PC or Mac. The main focus of this Emulator is to provide a lag-free gaming experience to its users.
- The android emulator- Nox Player is Based on Android 7.1.2 Nougat and is developed by Big Nox. This stands out to be one among the best lightweight tools. You can use this emulator on both Windows and Mac systems. This emulator is specifically designed for gaming purpose. It also works well for FPS game lovers.
Bluestacks as one of the best Android emulators for Mac:
This is one emulator everyone has probably heard of. Plus it is easy to install too. You simply download it onto your mac and install it and you’re done. There’s no need for further set up. Bluestacks automatically connects to the network that your Mac connected to. It also comes with an in- built Play Store. So as soon as you install it you can begin to install apps from it. If you happened to have apk app files on your Mac you can also double click on it to get the app downloaded onto Bluestacks. Hence there is no tension of transferring files from APK to the emulator.
Besides all that, this Android emulator for Mac allows users to live stream to Twitch. This makes it easier for gamers to live stream their gaming to their twitch followers. Besides that it also supports non- gaming apps too. So you can install your favorite chat apps on Bluestacks and chat with friends and family directly from your Mac.
There’s also the feature of multi- tasking that Android supports that you can get on the emulator too. At present this is the best of the best Android emulators for Mac.
Nox App Player:
This emulator gives you wide support for gaming. You can drag and drop parts in a game much like a joystick would allow. This is similar to what you have in games like PUBG and Garena Free Fireand other FPS games. Besides applying controls to the apps you can also customize the performance settings of the emulator as well. Besides that you can even designate how much RAM or CPU Cores you would like your android applications to take up.
You can even customize the resolution as well as use the in- built recorder to record what’s on the screen of your virtual Android device. You can download android apps by side loading APK files with the inbuilt option. This makes this app not only useful but also one of the more preferred Android emulators for Mac.
Genymotion as one of the best Android emulators for Mac:
The emulator mainly geared to developers. Genymotion emulates nearly 40 different types of Android devices and gives you access to almost all versions of Android. Also it allows for unlimited downloads of android apps. The emulator also connects to the macOS ecosystem. This means that you can use you mac’s camera without setting up an additional one.
The emulator features are such as to cater to developers and their work. So it comes with features such as Eclipse, Android SDK tools and Android Studio. Via the emulator you can also change up battery levels to check the response of you app to various battery levels.
The emulator also holds support for multi touch, and other sensors like accelerometer and gyroscope. You can even get unlimited screen casts. This allows for smooth recordings of videos.
MuMu Player:
This emulator is great for both Android apps as well as games. The only downside to this app is that it is in Chinese. However this is not an insurmountable problem as you can change the language to English by going to Settings of the Virtual Android Machine. Just like in other emulators you can assign controls by dragging and dropping them over buttons. You can also designate how much RAM you want consumed by the emulator much like other emulators.
To better control the interface, each app comes in a new tab thus eliminating the need for a recents button. However you can install a custom button on the top to enable the feature. If Getting around Chinese is something you can do, then this emulator becomes an excellent option for an Android emulator for Mac.
Andy for light Android Apps:
This Android emulator is great for testing light Android apps. You get the navigation bar at the bottom of the screen with toggles for microphone access, screen rotation, keyboard controls and the hamburger menu. But as mentioned earlier this emulator is great for light weight apps such as messaging ones. Not so much for others.
Andy does have some set- backs such as it comes with bloatware and not a lot of options to customize a person’s experience. Another major let down with this emulator is that it runs only the old Android 4.2.2 Jellybean which means only the basic of apps will work with this emulator.
The only positive with this app is that it can be navigated using the keyboard which is something the other Android emulators for Mac cannot do.
These are some of the best Android emulators for Mac that we’ve covered. Some are meant for basic use like Andy while others allow you to do more. There are options to suit you if you’re a developer or simply someone one who wants to enjoy Android on iOS. These emulators also enable you to run multiple instances of an app on different devices too.
We’re all well aware about the capabilities of the Android platform. There are smartphones today that can compete with a wide range of technologies. However, what makes those devices really tick is the core Android platform. But what if you own an iPhone and still want to try out Android phone ? Well, you no longer have to purchase an expensive (or inexpensive) phone to find out. There are best Android emulator for Mac today that can help you run and bring full compatibility with all the features of Android (without owning one), while some even update their emulators with the latest version of Android.
Mac Emulator For Pc
With these Android Emulator For Mac, you can run apps for android, play games, and do pretty much anything like the Android device can (barring phone calls, obviously). Those are just the three main uses of a built in emulator. So we’re going to talk a bit about some of the most popular emulators out there. While some user friendly emulators are present here, we’re also going to talk about developer emulators that can help test out or run android apps and android games.
Instead of giving your only 5 best emulators, we are citing 7 on this post for cross platform. So let’s get to the best Android apps and games emulator for Mac.
Best Android Emulator For Mac
1. ARChon
ARChon is a little different than most of our best Android emulators for PC or Mac in that this one is actually a Google Chrome extension. That’s right — no installing a program on your machine and wasting precious storage space! It is comparable to a virtual machine, virtual device or virtual devices.
Of course, it’s certainly not nearly as seamless as a native program, as it can take a bit of fiddling to get apps and mobile games to work. To use ARChon, once you have it setup in the browser, you’ll have to push or drag APKs to load the apps within the browser. It’s a nice, free program for those that want to be able to use an Android emulator wherever there is Google Chrome.
Not sure where to find APKs for ARChon? You can find many of them for free over at almost any Android APK repository. Some of our most trusted and favorites are APK Mirror or APK Pure.
Download it now:here
2. VirtualBox
Believe it or not, you can actually use VirtualBox to create your own Android emulator for Mac. Download VirtualBox on your Mac machine, and then set it up with the necessary ISO image from Android-x86.org. You’ll be able to create an efficient emulator that allows you to play almost any game or app within Mac.
As an added bonus, VirtualBox gives you a lot of control over how much resources and hardware you devote to it. That allows you to keep your overall machine running smoothly while still running your Android operating system emulator in the background. VirtualBox is free to use; however, it is recommended that you have at least 8GB of RAM on your machine if you want to run this one.
Download it now:here
3. KO Player
KO Player is a relatively new entrant in the emulators game and is one of the newer Android emulators on the list. It markets itself as a mid-market emulator that can run apps and multiple games comfortably. While the focus is mainly on games, this is a full blown Android emulator, so it can run pretty much any app on the Play Store as long as it is compatible with the Android version. The company’s website doesn’t mention which version of Android it’s running, but talks about a few popular apps and games that are compatible with KO Player (WhatsApp, Clash of Clans etc).
It also comes with features like gameplay recording, keyboard gameplay support, and comes with the Google Play Store pre-installed. It is said that about 99% of the Play Store apps are compatible with KO Player. The best part here is that KO Player is a free download, and can be snatched up directly from their official website. As with any free offering, expect some minor issues during usage. However, the app developers are pretty keen on offering a fresh and refined experience through bug fixes.
Light Android Emulator For Mac Download
Download it now:here
4. Nox Player
This is yet another decent alternative for gamers. It comes with the ability to run android games, support joysticks and controllers (assuming your Mac supports actual hardware controller support). There is zero lag during gameplay or general usage, so you can be assured of a smooth performance. Among the list of features here is the ability to keep multiple accounts on Nox, which is handy if you want to use it on the family computer. You will find that the emulator is compatible with pretty much every popular game and app right now.
Further, the emulator is compatible with x86 as well as AMD processors, thus bringing a variety of devices under its compatibility list and access to most Android games. Like with KO Player, Nox allows users to record their screen and share it on social media as they please. It’s one gaming oriented emulator can be very handy for graphics heavy games available as well as strategy games like Clash of Clans and Fortnite (which will reach Android emulation shortly).
More importantly, it’s light on your computer, much like helping it run smoothly and devoid of lag. This is also a free offering with no hidden caveats. Nox also offers the keyboard mapping feature, so the user can play more efficiently with mouse and keyboard. If you are one of those mobile gamers, this one is for you as it is considered as the Android emulator for gamers.
Download it now:here
5. Bluestacks
Bluestacks is probably the most popular Android emulator currently available in the market, and with good reason. This app has served Windows and Mac OS users for a few years now, giving them a viable way using Android on their desktop. This isn’t an ideal setup for developers, though, as Bluestacks is marketed for the masses. This means there will be some lag when you operate, although it’s rapidly diminishing with each update. The recent version of Bluestacks was updated to Android Nougat, making it the freshest Android emulator out there. It’s too soon to tell if and when Bluestacks will update its offering to Android 8.0 or even 9.0 as the latest Android version, so it will have active updates nearly every month.
As it stands, if gaming and social media is your priority, Bluestacks is an excellent emulator to have as it aims itself at gamers. GameLoop is an Android emulator that is used as a gaming platform. It can run all the heavy games and even offer key mapping support, which has become a prerequisite with modern day Android emulators and can bring the better or for worse Android app and game on your Mac. With the added smart keymapping along with a customizable game support, this android emulator is mostly going to boasts a gamer experience.
Bluestacks official emulator is entirely free to download, but will require a subscription per month for continued usage.
Download it now: here
6. Genymotion
One of the newer emulators if you want to run Android on your Mac is Genymotion. We are now coming to the dev-friendly emulators out there. You won’t find all the bells and whistles that you probably see with Bluestacks, Genymotion lets you test out how an Android device and version would work with a particular app or supports Android operating systems. For example, you can have a Nexus 4 running Android 5.0 or an even older device running that version like Android 4.2 Jelly Bean Kit Kat(assuming it’s compatible).
Genymotion can let you run an emulator directly on your PC or on the cloud, which very few emulators out there can do. This means you can share the functionings of your app with the rest of the world without them having to download a dedicated emulator.
This is a game changer for developers who like to get opinions on their projects from the masses or close associates. Naturally, the android emulator for PC option is also present, so you’re free to use it the old fashioned way. This isn’t a free version offering for personal use, though, so be prepared to subscribe to one of Genymotion’s plans to reap the benefits of all the features mentioned above.
Download it now: here
7. Android Studio
Google’s very own Android Studio emulator also comes with an emulator you can download, although it’s significantly less flashy than a few commercial use emulators and actually run android natively. However, it is updated frequently with new features. This is designed specifically for budding and experienced Android developers to test out their apps before it is pushed to the Play Store. It works with both PCs and Macs, so neither platform is left out. It has all the tools to build and design your apps, while the emulator feature allows you to glance through your creation.
Given the feature set, it is definitely not recommended for amateurs, as setting it up could take some time. Android Studio is a free download on both major platforms, and is a 880MB download for Macs. Though updating those services may take time, watch out for more active development in years with this productivity emulator.
Download it now: here
While these emulators offer a great experience for your Mac as it runs android apps/games like Call of Duty Mobile and PUBG mobile, this may also create a negative effect on your device as the level use might increase, especially with the battery life. Running multiple emulators may affect your device operation as it depends on the operating systems and hardware.
Always test your apps or test apps on the emulator you install once you’ve downloaded them and see the emulators ability to run smoothly and see if it is usable as a productivity tool for PC and Mac. There are still best android emulators that you can discover around the web that can run an Android app or game. The installation process may take longer than expected, depending on various factors such as internet speed and the likes.
If you find another Android emulator or free android emulator that is actually a fairly decent, actually works pretty well and that suits your taste, feel free to use it as long as it runs well or work well, gets the work done or the emulators run properly. You can use emulators as a productivity tool for video loading or loading video. Just find one that supports this kind of function. You might be able to get the price free for personal use just like PrimeOS Remix OS player and other Android Studio S emulator or ldplayer android studio.