Get available macOS Full Installers

by: Barney-15E

Last modified: Nov 18, 2023 1:36 PM

5 1510 Last modified Nov 18, 2023 1:36 PM

Getting macOS Full Installers

The softwareupdate utility in the command line (Terminal) can be used to list and download older macOS versions.

This only works on macOS Catalina or later.

List Available Full Installers

Copy/paste the following command into Terminal:

softwareupdate --list-full-installers

This is the list I receive when I run the above command as of this posting:

Finding available software

Software Update found the following full installers:

* Title: macOS Sonoma, Version: 14.1.1, Size: 12604952KiB, Build: 23B81, Deferred: NO

* Title: macOS Sonoma, Version: 14.1, Size: 12603757KiB, Build: 23B74, Deferred: NO

* Title: macOS Sonoma, Version: 14.0, Size: 12555162KiB, Build: 23A344, Deferred: NO

* Title: macOS Ventura, Version: 13.6.2, Size: 10226663KiB, Build: 22G320, Deferred: NO

* Title: macOS Ventura, Version: 13.6.1, Size: 11662168KiB, Build: 22G313, Deferred: NO

* Title: macOS Ventura, Version: 13.6, Size: 11657005KiB, Build: 22G120, Deferred: NO

* Title: macOS Ventura, Version: 13.5.2, Size: 11655353KiB, Build: 22G91, Deferred: NO

* Title: macOS Ventura, Version: 13.5.1, Size: 11655520KiB, Build: 22G90, Deferred: NO

* Title: macOS Ventura, Version: 13.5, Size: 11654590KiB, Build: 22G74, Deferred: NO

* Title: macOS Ventura, Version: 13.4.1, Size: 11513284KiB, Build: 22F82, Deferred: NO

Note the version number you wish to download. Use the following command to fetch the desired version:

softwareupdate --fetch-full-installer --full-installer-version 14.0

It will download the installer into your Applications folder. you can then use that to create a bootable USB Installer.