# Distributing Mac apps outside the App Store, a quick start guide **URL:** \ **Category:** Blogs/Articles/Talks/Podcasts\ **Tags:** guide, apps, in-the-news\ **Created:** [13 January 2021 13:47 UTC](https://forum.devtalk.com/t/distributing-mac-apps-outside-the-app-store-a-quick-start-guide/5916 "2021-01-13T13:47:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![CommunityNews](https://forum.devtalk.com/user_avatar/forum.devtalk.com/communitynews/32/1113_2.png) [@CommunityNews](https://forum.devtalk.com/u/CommunityNews)\ **Post date:** [13 January 2021 13:47 UTC](https://forum.devtalk.com/t/distributing-mac-apps-outside-the-app-store-a-quick-start-guide/5916/1 "2021-01-13T13:47:13Z")
> The Mac has always been very different from its close relative, iOS, especially when it comes to what a user is or is not allowed to run on their system. Even with the introduction of Apple Silicon, Apple [has made it very clear](https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2020/10686/?t=1161) that the Mac is still the Mac, and is still _hackable_, even when running on the new architecture. > > What this means for us developers is that, when targeting the Mac platform, we have choices: we can distribute our apps independently, outside the Mac App Store, through the Mac App Store exclusively, or through both at the same time. > > This article is my brain dump on the subject. It is meant to be a guide on the things that you’ll need to know about when distributing a Mac app outside the App Store, rather than a how-to tutorial. My hope is that having everything listed here will help demystify the process for beginners, and the descriptions of my own process will be useful as starting points. > **[Distributing Mac apps outside the App Store, a quick start guide | Rambo Codes](https://rambo.codes/posts/2021-01-08-distributing-mac-apps-outside-the-app-store)** > > Gui Rambo writes about his coding and reverse engineering adventures. _This thread was posted by one of our members via one of our news source trackers._