New features are added and old features are eventually retired. That's the cycle of software development, and macOS (formerly Mac OS) has gone through it more than a few times in its 40-year history. There are many old Mac OS features that have been discontinued or forgotten, and we've rounded up 10 of them in this list.
Many have been completely removed from the operating system, but some are still present – albeit little used and hard to find – in the latest version of macOS Sequoia. If you've been an avid user of the best Macs over the years, let's see how many of these apps and features you remember.
10 MobileMe
This service took on many names over its 12-year lifespan before iCloud replaced it
MobileMe went through several rebrands before finally disbanding in 2011 – it started as iTools in 2000, .Mac in 2002 and finally MobileMe in 2008. In the beginning, iTools was a free set of online services for Mac OS 9 users. But when Apple released Mac OS X, the new .Mac version was a paid subscription service. MobileMe introduced this service across platforms as it supported Mac OS X, Microsoft Windows and iOS at the time. It hosted many services that still exist today, such as Apple Mail, Find My, cloud storage and system backups.
MobileMe was the predecessor of iCloudand it was left behind when its services were ported to iCloud and made free. Of course, we now know that the iCloud+ subscription now combines iTools, .Mac and Mobile Me. You can access basic iCloud features like iTools for free and pay extra for additional features similar to MobileMe. Although iCloud is the spiritual successor to MobileMe, the original service has been removed from Mac OS X and macOS for over a decade.
9 Coverflow
This fun feature helped you scroll through your Finder and iTunes libraries
Cover Flow in the Finder app in Mac OS X Snow Leopard.
Coverflow was a fun and useful feature that users of Mac OS It's like a mix of list And gallery Views in macOS Finder today, but better. It worked on MacOS Tiger and iTunes 7 until the release of macOS High Sierra. The reason for the disappearance of the fan-favorite feature? Apple settled a patent dispute with Mirror Worlds over the use of this feature and subsequently removed it from all Apple platforms.
8 AppleWorks
Source: Apple
If you use the pages, PayAnd Keynote Apps in the iWork suite in modern versions of macOS, you might be surprised to learn that these productivity apps can be traced back to the very first version of Mac OS in 1984. Back then they were called AppleWorks. However, the AppleWorks program was more tightly integrated than iWork and could be improved with third-party tools. iWork does not have all the features that AppleWorks once had, but the latter was discontinued in 2007. You can use the software suite from Mac OS
AppleWorks lasted a respectable 23 years, but has since fallen into obscurity. Initially, AppleWorks files could be launched with iWork apps, but that hasn't been possible with modern versions of macOS for more than a decade.
7 iLife
A range of fun apps including iPhoto, iDVD and iMovie
Source: XDA / Apple
iLife was a software expansion pack with up to six apps that was first released in 1999. This was a perfect fit for the release of the iMac G3 DV, which stood for “Digital Video” and was intended to appeal to filmmakers, content creators, and other people just excited to give home video a try. However, as is well known, the full iLife suite was launched in 2003 at a price of $50. Of the six apps included – iTunes, iMovie, iPhoto, iDVD, GarageBandAnd iWeb — The only apps currently found on macOS Sequoia are iMovie and GarageBand. The last iLife release was iLife '13.
Interesting fact: Apps in the iLife suite have been compiled for PowerPC, Intel and Arm architectures at different times.
6 QuickTime Player
During the digital video boom of the 1990s and 2000s, there was a need for a cross-platform multimedia architecture. For this reason, Apple created the QuickTime file format, which would eventually become the most widely used format for media. You could watch videos in QuickTime Player, which came preinstalled on Mac OS and was also available on Windows. Finally, QuickTime Player has been effectively replaced by other apps in newer versions of macOS. The Screenshot, iTunes, finderAnd preview Apps are just a few of those that have taken over the default roles that QuickTime Player previously held.
Although you can still use QuickTime Player in the latest macOS Sequoia, it is no longer the default app for video playback. It is also no longer cross-platform as the Windows version was discontinued in 2016.
5 AirPort Utility
AirPort Utility is a standard macOS utility that can still be found in macOS Sequoia, but its usefulness has gradually diminished over the years. It was unique in that it was a full-fledged router and network management application. Back then, it was quite common to use web-based tools for router setup. The app was primarily used for Apple's in-house routers, the AirPort product line. Since these have been discontinued for years now, AirPort Utility is rarely used by macOS users unless they still have an AirPort router in use.
4 macOS server
Source: XDA / Apple
Mac OS X Serverand later macOS serverwas an operating system designed to help you use Mac hardware as a server. It was bundled with Xserve, a dedicated server sold by Apple. You can also buy Mac Mini and Mac Pro systems with Mac OS X Server preinstalled, or pay for them separately to use on any Mac. MacOS
3 First row
First row is a unique piece of Mac history because it represents Apple's positioning of the Mac and iPod as killer media devices. The company began shipping new iMacs and MacBooks with the Apple Remote, a small plastic IR remote that could be used to remotely control a computer. That paired with Front Row, a full-screen media center application with a simple navigation menu and large icons and text, quite well. It was essentially an optional interface that interacted with the existing iTunes and iPhoto content on your Mac.
Unfortunately, Mac OS X Lion has removed Front Row. It was such a popular feature at the time that some passionate users tried to hack it into the new operating system by recompiling Mac OS X Snow Leopard's source code files into a working app for Lion (via 9to5Mac). However, this shaky solution wouldn't last long.
2 DVD player
DVD player is a pretty straightforward app – it's been used to play DVDs on Mac desktops and laptops with SuperDrive. You can still use it on macOS Sequoia, but that will be difficult. Apple hasn't sold a Mac with an optical drive in some time and recently discontinued the Apple USB SuperDrive. Despite the existence of the DVD player, there is currently no official way to play DVDs on your Mac unless you can track down an old USB SuperDrive or use third-party optical drives. It's clearly a relic from another time.
1 Cyberdog and Internet Explorer
Two old Mac OS browsers that are equally memorable
Source: Apple
Safari users don't realize how easy they have it in newer versions of macOS. There have been a handful of strange default browsers for Mac OS over the years, such as: Cyberdog. It was based on OpenDoc and was launched as a beta version in 1996. If you don't remember Cyberdog, that's because the browser was killed off just a year later, in 1997. When Steve Jobs returned to Apple, he pushed to leave the OpenDoc apps behind, including Cyberdog. Here's what he had to say at WWDC 1997 in response to a question about killing OpenDoc:
I know many of you have spent a lot of time working on things that we put a bullet in the head about. I apologize. I feel your pain. But Apple suffered from terrible technical management for several years. I have to say it.
Ultimately, Jobs was right, but “putting a bullet in the head” of Cyberdog was a casualty of his restructuring efforts – and it would get worse before it got better. About the same time, Internet Explorer for Mac became the default browser for Mac OS as part of a groundbreaking agreement between Apple and Microsoft.
Internet Explorer for Mac was the official Mac OS browser for about six years until Mac OS X Panther was introduced safari in 2003. Of course, Safari still exists today. However, getting there was a rocky and inconsistent road that involved crazy default browsers like Cyberdog and Internet Explorer for Mac.
What app, utility, or feature will be added next to this list?
Apple adds and removes features with every version of macOS, and more are forgotten. If you had to ask me, Stage Manager is the macOS Sequoia feature most likely to join this ranks in a few years. It recently launched with macOS Sonoma, but we didn't hear about it when macOS Sequoia was revealed. Additionally, I haven't spoken to a single person who uses Stage Manager on their Mac. I would never use it even though it is an essential feature on my iPad Pro. Even Apple seems to have forgotten about it just a year later.
To find out for yourself, check out our roundup of all the features added to macOS Sequoia – there are a whopping 164 of them. At least one of these features will likely be lost over time, as will the ten we've summarized here.