Vectorworks Operating System Compatibility List

Thanks Jim....very helpful! This is good news for me. I have two mac mini computers one with Snow Leopard  and the other with High Sierra. Vectorworks 2011 would work on Snow Leopard. 

Last updated on June 24, 2019.

Last updated on October 9, 2019.

This chart is very helpful in my considering whether to invest in a new Mac or not and all of it's associated costs.   I am wondering why all versions of Vectorworks is supported by Windows 10, but only the two latest versions of VW for mac (2019, 2020) will work with Catalina.  I have VW 2018 - so it looks like I will be keeping my old computer and avoid upgrading to Catalina. :(

The main reason for the difference in compatibility is a difference in attitude between Apple and Microsoft. Microsoft makes backward compatibility an absolute priority. That means that newer versions of Windows will support older versions of Vectorworks.

 

Apple on the other hand cares less about backward compatibility and more about moving the Mac platform forward. From version to version of the operating system them keep making changes that break older versions of Vectorworks. Vectorworks has decided that they are better off spending the engineering resources on making VW better rather than making older versions run on newer versions of the Mac OS. Especially as they are advocating for users to subscribe to Service Select where the newer versions are included in the annual subscription.

 

Apples changes over the last couple of years have been especially bad about breaking older software.

That's very helpful.  Can't say that I am a big fan of planned obsolescence but it sounds like par for the course when working with Macs.  Thanks Pat!

I don't think it is so much a case of planned obsolescence as it is a case of we want to go in this direction and if it breaks something then oh well on Apple's part.

Does anyone know for certain if VectorWoks Architect 2011 will run on Windows 10?

Edited February 19, 2020 by j.g.l

18 hours ago, j.g.l said:

VectorWoks Architect 2011 will run on Windows 10?

It is not supported.

 

See legacy OS compatibility list:

 

As an experiment, I was able to run Vectorworks 2015 under Mac OS X 10.14.6, Mojave.

Launch time was a bit painful, but it was able to run. I have a client who still uses it, so I was curious.

 

I don't think I'd want to rely on it a a daily basis, though.

 

VW 2019 and VW 2020 have been running fine, as expected.

Last updated on September 16th, 2020.

As it is now November 14 2020 and MacOS 11 has been released will VWX 2021 work on Big Sur properly now?

 

 

On 11/28/2019 at 10:25 PM, Pat Stanford said:

Apple on the other hand cares less about backward compatibility and more about moving the Mac platform forward. From version to version of the operating system them keep making changes that break older versions of Vectorworks. Vectorworks has decided that they are better off spending the engineering resources on making VW better rather than making older versions run on newer versions of the Mac OS. Especially as they are advocating for users to subscribe to Service Select where the newer versions are included in the annual subscription.

I really feel that there should be some joint responsibility here.  It can be rocket science doing a bit of tweaking to older versions of VWX to maintain some program longevity, instead of just ignoring it and forcing paid upgrades.  

2019 (only 2 years old!) is great but now redundant if you want to move on to the latest operating system & hardware.  That does not demonstrate a company that wants to support their customer base.

Thank you for the information. I will update Vectorworks to 2020. That really explains a lot.

When Nemetsheck declares an older version of VW is not compatible with certain more recent Mac OS versions, does that mean that it will not work or run at all ?   ... or ... does that mean that it just doesn't run very well ?     Is it possible to figure out what portions of the older VW program won't work at all ?

@domer1322When the older version is deemed incompatible, it can be for a variety of reasons. In many cases, that version will not launch at all, or will cause such issues that its use is almost impossible. In other cases, there may be major tools or workflows that do not work. We say incompatible because it does not meet the standards that are acceptable for our software to run on an operating system and because it will not be updated in the future if any issues arise with that version on the incompatible operating system. In my experience, I have found that some users get lucky and are able to successfully launch a version of the software on an unsupported operating system, but it is almost always met with immediate performance and stability issues. 

Last updated September 15th, 2021.

Recently updated Mac Mini (late 2012) to macOS 10.15.7 Catalina in anticipation of running 2021 and eventually VW's 2022.  After installing Catalina, the updated computuer runs fine.  Then we installed VW's 2021, that should be compatible with Catalina, however, the software runs for a bit, then crashes.  We were running macOS 10.11 El Capitan, and VW's 2019 w/o any issues. 

 

Is there a hardware / macOS / VW's softare limitation with this combination?

 

Thanks in advance for your comments.

On 3/2/2020 at 12:04 AM, jeffharris said:

As an experiment, I was able to run Vectorworks 2015 under Mac OS X 10.14.6, Mojave.

Launch time was a bit painful, but it was able to run. I have a client who still uses it, so I was curious.

 

I don't think I'd want to rely on it a a daily basis, though.

 

VW 2019 and VW 2020 have been running fine, as expected.

 

I am considering buying an old mac to run a legacy copy of Vectorworks 2015.  I have previously seen that the OS can be updated beyond the officially supported version if Vectorworks is already installed (perhaps because the compatibility issues relates to installation or maybe I just got lucky).  Can you tell me, where you able to run previously installed VW 2015 on 10.14.6 or were you able to install and run it from scratch? Thanks.

The Legacy Compatibility chart only shows VW2015 running through MacOS 10.11.

 

I would hesitate to run it on 10.14 in any type of important environment.

 

I have never heard your statement of a version of VW running better on a machine which had the operating system upgraded after the OS install.  VW does not have deep hooks into the OS. It is just an application. 

 

The legacy compatibility chart is available here:

 

 

I didn’t mean to imply that VW2015 ran better on a later OS then was officially supported! Just that I have previously inadvertently updated the OS past 10.11 and Vectorworks 2015 continued to work. I was curious to know whether Jeff Harris’s or anyone else’s experience was of a successful clean install of VW2015 on 10.14 or if he, like me, simply upgraded the OS past 10.11 with VW2015 already installed.

 

I need to get a machine I can run a spare 2015 licence on. It isn’t a primary or critical use, more for convenience. I have the option of a Mac running 10.14 and simply wondered if there was any prospect of a clean install of VW2015 on it, in the knowledge that it isn’t officially supported.

@RobinS,

   I seriously doubt this answer is timely enough to help you, but maybe it will help another. Last year (2022) I bought a new Mac to be able to upgrade the OS past OS 10.15, which enables me to run VW 2023. Currently, I'm using a macMINI (M1, 2020) with OS 12.6.4. VW 2015 seems to run well. I do have problems with VW 2019 needing manual screen redraws to update the display, and VW 2016 does not load anymore. These are the only two versions that are giving me problems.

 

VW 2015, '17, '18, & '20 all work without noticeable problems. This does not mean they will work without any issues, just that my workflow does not suffer from them being unsupported. Additionally, VW 2015 worked for me when I had OS 10.11 - OS 10.15 (macMINI 2012), and OS 11 (macMINI M1 2020) loaded. I was very surprised and elated with these results. Still am.

 

HTH,

Raymond

@JuanP this compatibility chart needs to be updated to include Vw2024. Thanks.

@JuanP - there’s a typo in the updated chart for MacOS compatibility as it has two columns for Vw2023; I assume the left-most column is for Vw2024.