1VMTool vs VirtualBuddy
VirtualBuddy does one thing — macOS guests on Apple silicon — and does it free and well. This comparison is only interesting once you need a second guest type, or a snapshot.
Side by side
| 1VMTool | VirtualBuddy | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | One-time purchase. | Free and open source. |
| macOS guests | Supported, with snapshots. | The whole point, and very well done — version picker plus automatic restore-image download. |
| Snapshot mechanism | APFS clone of the disk bundle. Take and restore in well under a millisecond, independent of disk size. | Not a first-class feature. |
| Windows guests | Experimental, on the first-party engine. | None. |
| Command line | 1vm covers every GUI action. | Not a scripting-oriented tool. |
| Linux guests | Supported on both engines. | Some ARM distributions. |
| Guest integration | Clipboard, shared folders, Mac-shortcut translation. | A guest app gives clipboard and automatic shared-folder mounting. |
| Open source | Closed source. | BSD-2-Clause. |
Highlighted cells mark the stronger side of each row. Competitor details checked September 2026 against vendor documentation — pricing and features move, so verify anything decision-critical at the source.
When you should stay on VirtualBuddy
You test your app against macOS betas. VirtualBuddy picks a macOS version from a list, downloads the restore image and installs it, which is the shortest path to a throwaway macOS that exists. It is free, it is focused, and for that job it is genuinely excellent — this is the most honest 'stay put' on the list.
Where VirtualBuddy frustrates people
- No Windows guests at all. It is a macOS-first tool and does not pretend otherwise.
- No command line to speak of. Automating a fleet or wiring a VM into CI is not what it is for.
- Snapshots are not the product. There is no branching tree, no rollback mode, no per-node disk accounting.
- Installing a newer macOS beta on an older host still needs device support packages from Apple, which is an Xcode-download errand rather than something the app can solve.
Why someone moves to 1VMTool
- You need Windows on ARM as well as macOS and Linux, from one app.
- You want snapshots and rollback as first-class features rather than absent ones.
- You want a CLI that is a peer of the GUI so machines can be scripted.
- You want host metering and per-guest limits stated before you create anything.
Frequently asked questions
VirtualBuddy is free and does macOS guests — why pay for 1VMTool?
If macOS beta testing is your whole use case, you probably should not. VirtualBuddy is free, focused and good at it. 1VMTool is worth it when you also need Windows or Linux from the same app, or when you want snapshots and rollback to be cheap enough that you stop deciding whether to take one.
Can VirtualBuddy run Windows?
No. It virtualizes macOS 12 and later plus some ARM Linux distributions. For Windows on ARM you need Parallels, Fusion, UTM, VirtualBox or 1VMTool's engine.
Does VirtualBuddy have snapshots?
Not as a first-class feature with a branching tree and restore. If your workflow is break-it-then-roll-back rather than install-once, that is the practical difference between the two.
Try it against your own workflow
The limits are stated on every screen before you commit to anything, which is the fastest way to find out whether this is your tool.