With the September 2023 release of Apple macOS 14 Sonoma, you’re probably wondering if your Adobe software will work in this major annual upgrade to macOS. There isn’t a single “yes” or “no” answer for all Adobe applications; some apps might be OK while others have issues, so this article breaks out compatibility info by application. Also, we don’t usually know everything about compatibility on the first day a new major version of macOS becomes available; that information emerges over time as Apple, Adobe, and other software developers test with the initial 14.0 public release and produce updates with fixes. I’ll update this article as new information comes out.

For more details, or if you have questions about Adobe Creative Suite (CS) software, read on…

What’s covered in this article

I focus on information that’s direct from Adobe, and on verified reports. To make the best use of your time and mine, I don’t repeat rumors and random anecdotes. But I may mention my own experiences.

If you’re wondering what’s known so far about specific Adobe applications and workflows under macOS 14, you can skip ahead to these sections:

Official Adobe statements for current Creative Cloud software

Creative Suite versions (CS2–CS6) won’t work

The rest of this article gives general advice about upgrading from an earlier major version of macOS. The good news: If you’re upgrading from macOS 11 Big Sur or later, the differences between that and macOS 14 Sonoma are relatively minor. But if you’re upgrading from macOS 10.14 Mojave or earlier, or from an Intel Mac, Apple changed macOS in ways that may prevent older applications from running in macOS 14 Sonoma. If you have applications you must use, but you have older versions that aren’t compatible with macOS 14 and you choose not to upgrade them to current versions, you should delay upgrading to Sonoma. If you decide to upgrade to Sonoma, expect to install the most recent versions of the software you use, including Adobe Creative Cloud applications.

What’s new in macOS 14 Sonoma?

For an in-depth review, read the macOS 14 Sonoma review at Ars Technica. As with every major release of the Mac operating system, the Ars Technica review not only evaluates the visible features that Apple promotes, but goes under the surface to explain changes to some of the underlying technologies in macOS and how they affect your Mac experience.

Howard Oakley’s blog eclecticlight.co is a rich source of deep information about macOS. Howard has been writing about the Sonoma beta test versions, so his blog is a great place to get advance notice of things that are changing in macOS 14. He’s written the article Should you upgrade to Sonoma, or wait?

Those sources are useful for understanding macOS in general, so they generally don’t discuss specific commercial applications such as those by Adobe.

Do not upgrade until everything you use is ready

If you’re upgrading from a stable macOS 13 Ventura system, and staying on the same processor (Intel or Apple Silicon), chances are that the macOS 13 Ventura upgrade will be relatively smooth, and things will probably run more or less as you expect.

Caution: if you’re upgrading from macOS 10.14 Mojave or earlier, or from an Intel Mac, it’s particularly important that you research which applications you have on your Mac before you click that Upgrade button. The more years you’ve been using the same Mac, the trickier the macOS 14 Sonoma upgrade may be, because major changes by Apple will block a lot of older software from working.

For almost any system upgrade, whether it’s for Macs, Windows PCs, or mobile devices, certain principles are true, and definitely apply to the macOS 14 Sonoma upgrade:

• Make a complete backup of your current Mac system, and keep that unchanged until you are satisfied that macOS 14 Sonoma is working properly. Start your backups of macOS 14 Sonoma on new media. This is so that if you have to retrieve software, documents, or settings from your old system, or completely revert to it, its backup still exists. And make sure you know how to restore from a backup in as little time as possible. All of this is especially important if you use your Mac to run a business or another activity where you can’t afford to lose productivity.
• Check all of the hardware and software you rely on. Before you upgrade, remember to check compatibility for everything installed on or connected to your computer. Especially anything that depends on driver software being compatible. That could include printers, graphics tablets*, scanners, cameras, networking equipment, calibration equipment, backup software, diagnostic software, adapters, hubs, docks, and so on.
• Test your complete workflow. Published compatibility reports may be on test systems that don’t have the same hardware and software you use. If you must ensure complete compatibility with everything you use, run your own tests with macOS 14 Sonoma on a separate system, such as an external SSD with a Sonoma test system installed.
• Current versions will be the most compatible. You can expect that current versions of Mac software will be updated for full compatibility with macOS 14 Sonoma, but previous versions probably won’t. For Adobe applications, that means you can expect the most recent Creative Cloud versions to be either already compatible or will be updated eventually. But if you use an older version such as CS6 or earlier that Adobe no longer updates, any issues with macOS 13 Ventura will not be fixed. We all want to avoid paying for software as much as possible, but even though a major OS update might be free, there are sometimes unavoidable associated costs when that OS upgrade makes it necessary to pay for software or hardware upgrades too.
• Plan and budget in case you need to upgrade other software that you use, because Apple has changed so much about how macOS works that fewer old applications will run properly, or run at all.
• Be prepared to start over and install some applications and files from scratch on Sonoma. If you’re skipping several versions of macOS to get to Sonoma, especially from macOS 10.14 Mojave or earlier, there is a chance that old applications brought forward during a macOS version or using Apple Migration Assistant might not migrate properly because macOS has changed so much. A clean install is also a good idea if you want to make sure you don’t carry forward any software or orphaned settings files that won’t work in macOS 14 Sonoma.

If you’re upgrading from an Intel Mac to a Apple Silicon Mac,and you haven’t already upgraded or replaced all of your Intel-only software with Apple Silicon compatible versions, you will eventually want to, for two reasons: If you bought an Apple Silicon Mac because you wanted the best possible performance and battery life at the price you paid, then you’ll get that performance only if you upgrade applications to the latest Apple Silicon compatible version. And, eventually Apple will discontinue the Rosetta translation environment that lets Intel software run on Apple Silicon, so one day you will have no choice but to modernize your applications.

A couple of quick examples of how non-Apple software may affect how you time your macOS 14 upgrade: Calibrite, maker of display calibration devices, released a macOS 14-compatible version (1.2.4) of their Calibrate software one day after Apple released macOS 14. But tablet maker Wacom did not release their macOS 14 (version 6.4.4 or later) tablet driver until October 14, 2023, three weeks after Apple released macOS 14.

Official Adobe statements for Creative Cloud software

In the last week of September 2023, Adobe posted the article Can I run my Adobe apps on macOS 14 Sonoma?. It does not yet list all important Adobe applications, but it does list Photoshop, Lightroom Classic, Lightroom, Acrobat and Adobe Bridge. An earlier article about Sonoma was posted by Adobe on June 7, 2023 (the beginning of the macOS 14 beta preview period) in the Adobe Community forums, but with very limited information: Utilizing Adobe desktop applications on macOS 14 (Sonoma)

Information about specific applications is starting to appear separately; see below.

Adobe Photoshop

The Adobe article Can I run my Adobe apps on macOS 14 Sonoma? lists Photoshop version 24.7.1 (2023) and version 25.0 (2024) as compatible with macOS 14.

Adobe Lightroom

The Adobe article Can I run my Adobe apps on macOS 14 Sonoma? lists Lightroom 7.1 is listed as compatible with macOS 14. Note: That is cloud-based Lightroom, not Lightroom Classic (see below).

The Lightroom Queen (expert Victoria Bampton) is keeping her page updated: Lightroom and macOS Sonoma 14 Compatibility. It covers both Lightroom and Lightroom Classic.

Adobe Lightroom Classic

macOS 14 Sonoma has been particularly challenging for Lightroom Classic users. Two different macOS 14 updates have caused problems that affect Lightroom Classic workflows. To avoid those problems, make sure your Mac is running macOS 14.5 or later.

macOS 14.4 caused a frequently reported problem where printer-specific paper sizes disappear from Lightroom Classic and some other Mac apps, leaving only a small number of generic paper sizes. After a long period with no additional information, Adobe responded (presumably after investigations and discussions with Apple) that they “are dependent on the OS manufacturer to supply an update,” which implied that the bug is in macOS and needed to be fixed by Apple. On May 9, 2024, that post was updated to say “Anecdotal reports indicate that Beta 4 of macOS 14.5 corrects this issue.” On May 13, 2024, Apple released macOS 14.5, general reports are that the bug is now fixed, and Adobe updated their post linked above.

macOS 14.2, according to Adobe, “impacts device-related workflows in Adobe Lightroom Classic.” A symptom is being unable to import files from cameras, cards, mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets, or during tethered shooting. If you already updated to macOS 14.2 these problems might not be critical, because there are workarounds for most of the problems. The only problem without a workaround is the failure of tethered shooting in Lightroom Classic under macOS 14.2. Details, including workarounds, are in the heading “macOS 14.2.0 (Sonoma) issues” in the Adobe article “Lightroom Classic and Sonoma | macOS 14” linked below, but the best remedy is to update to macOS 14.2.1 or later.

Adobe posted macOS 14 compatibility info in the article Lightroom Classic and Sonoma | macOS 14. On October 10, 2023, the day they released Lightroom Classic 13 was released, they added the info “Lightroom Classic 13.0 is compatible with macOS Sonoma (version 14).

Before that date, the article only said “Lightroom Classic 12.5 and earlier versions have not been tested for compatibility with macOS Sonoma (version 14).” This has not changed, so if you want macOS 14 compatibility you should run Lightroom Classic 13.

Printing. Over the past year, there have been many support forum discussions about the macOS Print dialog box settings or presets not being remembered in in macOS 13 and later, in some applications including Lightroom Classic. The workaround is to set up print settings or the default printing preset in the Print dialog box in Apple Preview, which somehow makes the settings stick. Then switch back to the application you want to print from.

Adobe Illustrator

In the regularly updated article Known Issues in Illustrator, Adobe acknowledges that Illustrator may crash in the beta test preview version of macOS 14 Sonoma, and that they have filed a bug report with Apple. This information seems to be out of date, because it hasn’t been updated since Apple released the production version of macOS 14, and there have not been widespread Illustrator crashes since that release. So we might assume that’s been resolved.

PDF files (and PostScript)

In the article Fix PDF printing issues for your Adobe apps in macOS 14 beta, Adobe acknowledges error messages that may prevent printing of PDF files in the beta test preview version of macOS 14 Sonoma.

Howard Oakley reports that macOS 14 Sonoma completes removing the ability of macOS to display Adobe PostScript code and Encapsulated PostScript (EPS) graphics in (PostScript’s Sudden Death in Sonoma). Apple has been removing support in stages over the last few major versions of macsOS. macOS 14 can still convert a document to PostScript through the Print dialog box, but it can no longer render PostScript code to screen. This is part of the overall drive to remove security vulnerablilities from all areas of macOS, and the nature of PostScript rendering makes it insecure.

It’s important to note that this probably won’t affect you, for two reasons:

• What PostScript and EPS were used for 20 to 30 years ago (such as encoding jobs for prepress workflows) is now done much more effectively using Portable Document Format (PDF). PDF solves many of the serious problems that PostScript had, especially related to supporting fonts, transparency, color management, and overall device indepedence.
• Adobe doesn’t depend on macOS support for PostScript. Adobe applications use an Adobe engine for rendering and interpreting PostScript, such as Acrobat Distiller. So most people using Adobe Creative Cloud on a Mac might never even notice this change.

However, this change may affect applications that offer PostScript/EPS support by using this code that’s now removed from macOS.

System requirements

One place to check for compatibility with macOS 14 Sonoma is the system requirements web page for the Adobe application that you use, such as Photoshop or InDesign. Typically, compatibility with a new operating system isn‘t stated on the day a new OS is released, but slightly later. As of the first week of October 2023, the system requirements for several Creative Cloud apps still don’t specifically mention macOS 14 Sonoma yet, although many indirectly imply support by saying, for example, “macOS 12 Monterey or later.”

Although a company like Adobe will fully participate in the non-public beta test programs for macOS and Windows, many developers will not declare official compatibility until they’ve had enough time to thoroughly verify the software against the actual build that ships to the public, in case unanticipated changes were introduced that prevent compatibility (it’s happened before).

There’s a strong chance that new major versions of Creative Cloud apps will be introduced at the Adobe MAX conference in October, as they have been for the past few years. If the current versions of Creative Cloud apps don’t yet assure compatibility with macOS 14, history suggests that the next major versions will. Adobe is already providing advance notice of some changes, as in their article Upcoming system requirements changes for our video and audio apps.

Watch this space

I add info to this section as I find out about articles published for specific applications, or for Creative Cloud in general. So, watch this space, especially in the first week or two after the release of macOS 14.

You may be able to learn about and discuss emerging issues in the Adobe Community user-to-user discussion for the software you use, as other users and Adobe post what they find.

What to expect when upgrading Adobe Creative Cloud applications

Upgrading macOS often requires upgrading Creative Cloud applications for full compatibility. This can cause some complications that you should be aware of, and at least ask yourself if you might be affected.

Only the most recent Adobe applications will be supported

Adobe supports only the current major version of its Creative Cloud applications plus one version back. This policy defines the versions you can install from the Creative Cloud desktop application, so currently you can install those two versions of Photoshop and the minor updates in between. Every year, when Adobe announces the next year’s versions and moves the support up a year, so support for the older version ends and it’s removed from the Creative Cloud installer. For example, as I write this the current version of Photoshop is Photoshop 2024 (version 25), so you’ll probably find that the Creative Cloud desktop applications provides an installation option for that version and Photoshop 2023 (version 24).

This is important if you need to keep using a version older than the last two. If you are a Creative Cloud member with a fresh installation of macOS 14 Sonoma and now need to install applications, you will be able to install the two most recent versions of Adobe applications, but nothing earlier. Also, if Adobe follows the pattern they’ve established for past recent macOS releases, only the most recent version will get compatibility updates for macOS 14 Sonoma. Therefore, for full Sonoma compatibility, expect to run only the most current version of the Adobe applications you use. (Links to installers for some older versions of Creative Cloud applications may be found on the Downloads page at ProDesignTools.com.)

Preserving older versions and settings: Check your update options!

If you want to preserve older versions, it’s vitally important that you make sure the Creative Cloud desktop application doesn’t delete older major versions when you install new ones.

You can set the Creative Cloud desktop application to update apps automatically or manually. If you have it set to update automatically, then before the next major versions become available, set your options for what happens to older major versions: Click the account icon (top right corner), click Preferences, click Apps, and click Advanced Options. If you don’t want older versions to be deleted automatically on upgrade, make sure Remove Older Versions is disabled. You must do this for each application that’s installed.

If you want to preserve preferences and other settings when the next major version is installed, also enable Import Previous Settings and Preferences.

If you update manually, these settings will pop up after you manually click Update. Don’t just blindly click through! Read the options mindfully and make sure they’re set the way you want. After a major upgrade, many people post in the Adobe Community forums about missing old versions or settings, and it’s usually because attention wasn’t paid to these options when updating.

Creative Suite versions (CS2–CS6) won’t work

Already officially unsupported for years, Adobe Creative Suite 2 through 6 applications cannot be installed or used on macOS 14 Sonoma because of many incompatibilities related to how long ago they were written. Some do not meet the Apple requirement for 64-bit code, others don’t meet current Apple requirements for code security or compatibility, or other technical reasons. Apple has made major structural changes to modernize macOS in recent years, and old code just wasn’t written to do the right thing under current requirements.

Many of those old versions already have significant issues running in macOS 10.14 Mojave, and they cannot run on Apple Silicon Macs. CS2–CS5 applications are now 13 to 18 years old. It is time to upgrade…or, if you must continue to use them, you can keep an older Mac that can run an older versions of macOS/Mac OS X.

InDesign Secrets reports that Adobe InDesign CS6 and earlier are 32-bit code and will not run in Catalina and later (see macOS Catalina is Incompatible with InDesign CS6 and Earlier).

As with the last several major Mac system upgrades, macOS 14 Sonoma provides the best performance and compatibility on Macs based on the Apple Silicon processors that were first released in 2020. It’s still possible to run macOS 14 Sonoma on the last Macs based on the Intel processors that have been running Macs for almost 20 years.

However, CS2 applications were written for the PowerPC processors that ran Macs built before 2006. The last version of Mac OS X to run PowerPC software was OS X 10.6.8 Snow Leopard, which was last updated in 2011.

Even if you have the installers for CS2/CS3 applications, Adobe has “retired” the activation servers for those versions, so you can no longer activate them even on older versions of Mac OS X/macOS. By now, activation servers for later CS versions also might have stopped working.

What I’m doing

I rely on my Mac to pay my bills, so I can’t afford for it to be out of service because of a major software problem. So, as with every major release of macOS, I won’t install macOS 14 Sonoma on my production Mac on the day Sonoma is released. I will wait, possibly for several months, through the inevitable series of early bug-fix updates for macOS 14 to settle down and become more reliable. I will also wait until fully Sonoma-compatible versions are released of Adobe software and all of the other applications, device drivers, and utilities that I rely on to get things done.

For the last few macOS upgrades, I typically did not upgrade my production Mac until 6 to 12 months after release. It is possible that I won’t upgrade my Mac to macOS 14 Sonoma until some time in 2024.

This article was originally published on September 25, 2023 and will be updated as new information emerges.