The result is a PC gaming experience on Mac like no other and reason alone to upgrade to Parallels Desktop 17. There's also a new display driver in place that increases the frame rate. Parallel's improved performance mentioned above means smoother Windows UI and synchronized video playback. Until now, however, a poor performance made it difficult to do PC gaming through virtual Windows on a Mac. Gaming has always been popular for Windows users. Parallels Desktop 17 (Image credit: iMore)įinally, it's important to circle back around to the improved gaming performance on Parallels Desktop 17. Now you can have them both with no slowdown or disruption when moving between the two. This type of setup is important for anyone who doesn't want to choose between using macOS and Windows. Improvements make it nearly impossible to tell the difference between these and open macOS apps. When using this mode, the actual Windows desktop gets removed, keeping only active Windows apps in the foreground. Parallels also deserves kudos on making Coherence mode even better. One impressive highlight: in macOS Monterey, you have the amazing ability to drag and drop content from Windows apps to Apple's new Quick Note feature. Shifting gears, although it's definitely not a technical term, cool is the best word to describe drag and drop between a virtual Windows desktop and your Mac.

Additionally, disk performance is up 20% for Apple M1 users versus Parallels Desktop 16.5.Īcross the board, there are significant performance improvements that almost make you forget you're using a virtual desktop. The latest Parallels Desktop version runs Windows 38% faster than before, while graphics performance has increased 25% for 2D graphics and 28% for Directx 11. Across the board, there are significant performance improvements that almost make you forget you're using a virtual desktop. Speed isn't just left for the Parallels Desktop 17 installation.

Once you've downloaded Parallels Desktop 17, the installation process is a breeze that takes just a few minutes. It wasn't that long ago when installing Parallels Desktop required a lot of time and patience. MacOS Monterey and Windows 11 using Coherence mode (Image credit: iMore)

Parallels pro edition worth it