When it has booted into Chrome, you will be offered the chance to continue running it from the USB key, or wiping your Mac and installing on the drive.

Select the USB key as your startup device (it will show as an external drive).

Once you have it installed on the USB key: The installation process only takes a few minutes. Instead, just select Google Chrome OS Flex as the make, and Chrome OS Flex as the model. The only bit that isn’t 100% clear is that when you are asked to identify your Chromebook, you are not searching for your Mac. Open Chrome, and follow the instructions on this page. You’ll need to install Chrome on your Mac if you don’t already have it.

You need an 8GB USB key or larger, and make sure you retrieve any files you need from it as it will be wiped during installation. The process begins with installing Chrome OS Flex onto a USB key, and you can then (optionally) install it directly on your Mac. However, I installed it on a 2011 MacBook Air, and it runs absolutely fine, so there’s no reason not to try it on older models. A beta version was offered in February, and it has now launched as a stable product suitable for general use. In 2020, Google bought the company, and promised to turn CloudReady into an official product.Įarlier this year, Google kept that promise, renaming the operating system Chrome OS Flex. In 2017, a company called Neverware created CloudReady, an unofficial Chromium-based operating system that turns old Macs and PCs into Chromebook-like devices. Even so, the original vision is alive and well, with many budget models.

These days, you can get some pretty expensive Chromebooks, with higher prices than a shiney new M2 MacBook Air. The real work is done on a server, with documents also stored in the cloud, enabling the use of Chromebooks with very little power or on-board storage. The secret to their efficiency is that the apps are essentially just wrappers for websites. The original vision of Chromebooks was that they would be cheap, low-powered laptops, making them accessible to a much wider range of people than Macs or Windows PCs. That’s true, but I’d still suggest that most owners of older Macs shouldn’t do it … Chromebooks You can even run Chrome OS from a USB key if you’re not sure whether you want to remove macOS.Ĭhrome OS is designed to be an extremely lightweight operating system, which can breathe new life into older hardware that is struggling to keep up with today’s demands. Although it’s been possible for some time to turn an old Mac into a Chromebook, Google has now made the process easier than ever.

Google chrome macbook air