MacBook Air · 2011

MacBook Air 2011: the newest macOS it can run

Every MacBook Air sold in 2011, what Apple supports, what OpenCore Legacy Patcher adds, and what to expect on each macOS version. Generated from the OCLP 3.0.0 source.

Checked against OCLP 3.0.0-rc.5 sourceUpdated November 5, 20267 min read

On this page 6 sections

Which MacBook Air 2011 do you have?
macOS versions compared
Model by model
Installing on the MacBook Air 2011
Common questions
Other Macs from 2011

Short answer

Apple stopped at macOS High Sierra. With OpenCore Legacy Patcher the MacBook Air 2011 runs macOS Big Sur through macOS Tahoe 26. Our pick for most people: macOS Monterey (its GPU has no Metal support, so newer versions lose more apps). No Intel Mac can run macOS 27.

Which MacBook Air 2011 do you have?

Apple sold 2 different models as the MacBook Air 2011. They can behave differently with OCLP, so check your model identifier: choose Apple menu > About This Mac, then More Info > System Report, and read Model Identifier. Or open Terminal and run sysctl hw.model

Identifier	Sold as	Graphics	Apple's last macOS	OCLP
`MacBookAir4,1`	MacBook Air (11-inch, Mid 2011)	Intel HD Graphics 3000 (Sandy Bridge)	High Sierra	Yes
`MacBookAir4,2`	MacBook Air (13-inch, Mid 2011)	Intel HD Graphics 3000 (Sandy Bridge)	High Sierra	Yes

macOS versions compared

Apple supported by Apple, no patcher needed
OCLP runs with OpenCore Legacy Patcher
Legacy runs with OCLP; older “legacy Metal” GPU, more patches
No Metal runs with OCLP; GPU without Metal, apps that need Metal fail
No not possible

Model	Catalina10.15	Big Sur11	Monterey12	Ventura13	Sonoma14	Sequoia15	Tahoe26	Golden Gate27
MacBookAir4,1	No	No Metal	No Metal	No Metal	No Metal	No Metal	No Metal	No
MacBookAir4,2	No	No Metal	No Metal	No Metal	No Metal	No Metal	No Metal	No

Model by model

MacBook Air (11-inch, Mid 2011)`MacBookAir4,1`

Model identifier: MacBookAir4,1
Board ID: Mac-C08A6BB70A942AC2
CPU generation: 2nd-gen Core i (Sandy Bridge)
Graphics: Intel HD Graphics 3000 (Sandy Bridge)
Wi-Fi: Broadcom BCM4360 (802.11ac)
Last macOS from Apple: macOS High Sierra
T1 / T2 chip: None
Battery rating: 1,000 cycles to 80% capacity, Apple

Our pick

macOS MontereyNewest possible: macOS Sequoia

Graphics: Intel HD Graphics 3000 (Sandy Bridge), without Metal. Monterey keeps the most apps working on it. How we pick

MacBookAir4,1: macOS Big Sur to Tahoe, and what OCLP patches on each
macOS	Status	Root patches OCLP applies
macOS Big Sur11.7.11	No Metal	Intel Sandy Bridge
macOS Monterey12.7.6	No Metal	Intel Sandy Bridge
macOS Ventura13.7.8	No Metal	Intel Sandy Bridge
macOS Sonoma14.8.9	No Metal	Intel Sandy Bridge · Modern Wireless
macOS Sequoia15.8.2	No Metal	Intel Sandy Bridge · Modern Wireless
macOS Tahoe26.7.2	No Metal	Intel Sandy Bridge · Modern Wireless · Modern Audio
macOS Golden Gate27	No	No Intel Mac can run macOS 27, with or without OCLP.

Compared with the MacBook Air (11-inch, Late 2010) `MacBookAir3,1`

What	MacBookAir3,1	MacBookAir4,1
CPU	Core 2 Duo (Penryn)	2nd-gen Core i (Sandy Bridge)
Graphics	NVIDIA GeForce (Tesla)	Intel HD Graphics 3000 (Sandy Bridge)
Wi-Fi	Broadcom BCM4331 (legacy)	Broadcom BCM4360 (802.11ac)
Bluetooth	BRCM2046	BRCM20702 v1
Ethernet	—	Broadcom

Root patches on Tahoe. New compared with the MacBook Air (11-inch, Late 2010): Intel Sandy Bridge and Modern Wireless. No longer needed: Nvidia Tesla, Legacy Wireless and Legacy USB 1.1.
Kexts OpenCore loads. Added: CatalinaBCM5701Ethernet.kext, AirportBrcmFixup.kext, IOSkywalkFamily.kext, IO80211FamilyLegacy.kext and AirPortBrcmNIC-Tahoe.kext. Dropped: AAAMouSSE.kext, telemetrap.kext, NoAVXFSCompressionTypeZlib.kext, NoAVXFSCompressionTypeZlib-AVXpel.kext, NoAVXFSCompressionTypeZlib-AVXpel-Tahoe.kext, corecaptureElCap.kext, IO80211ElCap.kext and Bluetooth-Spoof.kext. (22 kexts on the MacBook Air (11-inch, Late 2010), 19 here, from our builds.)

How much patching MacBookAir4,1 needs on each macOS

macOS	Patch sets	Files installed	Files removed	KDK	MetallibSupportPkg
Big Sur	Intel Sandy Bridge	11	25	No	No
Monterey	Intel Sandy Bridge	14	25	No	No
Ventura	Intel Sandy Bridge	15	25	Yes	No
Sonoma	Intel Sandy Bridge · Modern Wireless	17	25	Yes	No
Sequoia	Intel Sandy Bridge · Modern Wireless	18	25	Yes	No
Tahoe	Intel Sandy Bridge · Modern Wireless · Modern Audio	20	25	Yes	No

OCLP installs 11 files for this Mac on Big Sur and 20 on Tahoe. A Kernel Debug Kit is needed from Ventura.

From OCLP's own documentation

Universal Control. Wi-Fi and Bluetooth hardware: Wi-Fi 4 + BT 4.0. Universal Control works out of the box. Universal Control will work. Dortania, Universal Control guide

OCLP changelog entries that name this Mac, newest release first, word for word:

0.6.2 Work around Black Box rendering issues on certain Display Color Profiles → Applicable for HD3000-based machines (ex. MacBookAir4,x, MacBookPro8,x, Macmini5,x)
0.1.7 Fix Thunderbolt Ethernet support on MacBookAir4,x

On Tahoe this Mac needs Intel Sandy Bridge, Modern Wireless and Modern Audio. What each of those restores, and what to keep ready when root patching: macOS Tahoe: what works and what does not.

Known issues

non-Metal GPU (macOS 11+) (source) Dortania, Supported Models
USB 1.1 (macOS 13+) (source) Dortania, Supported Models

What OCLP puts on the EFI partition for MacBookAir4,1 OpenCore 1.0.6 RELEASE · 19 kexts

From our build with the OCLP 3.0.0-rc.5 app's command line (--build --model MacBookAir4,1) on a GitHub macOS runner, 2026-11-05. Boot arguments: keepsyms=1 debug=0x100 -lilubetaall amfi=0x80.

Kexts Reasons are shown for kexts that set this Mac apart; the rest are explained in the kext glossary.

Lilu.kext 1.7.2
CryptexFixup.kext 1.0.5
AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement.kext 1.0.0
AppleIntelCPUPowerManagementClient.kext 1.0.0
ASPP-Override.kext 1.0.1 Forces ACPI_SMC_PlatformPlugin to outmatch X86PlatformPlugin and disable firmware throttling
CatalinaBCM5701Ethernet.kext 1.0.2 Inject old Broadcom Ethernet kext to resolve networking in Big Sur Needed on: 2011 and older Broadcom Ethernet require.
ECM-Override.kext 1.0.0
CatalinaIntelI210Ethernet.kext 1.0.0
AirportBrcmFixup.kext 2.2.1
IOSkywalkFamily.kext 1.2.0
IO80211FamilyLegacy.kext 1.0.0
AirPortBrcmNIC-Tahoe.kext 1.0.0
AppleALC.kext 1.6.3-Jazzzny
BlueToolFixup.kext 2.7.2
CSLVFixup.kext 2.6.1
AMFIPass.kext 1.4.1
RestrictEvents.kext 1.1.7
AppleUSBTopCase.kext 1.0.0 Restore USB Keyboard support on Mac OS Ventura
AppleUSBMultitouch.kext 1.0.0 Restore USB Trackpad support on Mac OS Ventura

Settings specific to this Mac

Overriding ACPI SMC matching 41 of 86 builds
Enabling Windows 10 UEFI Audio support 21 of 86 builds
Enabling BCM943224 and BCM94331 Networking Support 24 of 86 builds
Using known ARPT Path: PciRoot(0x0)/Pci(0x1C,0x1)/Pci(0x0,0x0) 19 of 86 builds
Setting RestrictEvents patch arguments: sbvmm 43 of 86 builds

10 more settings are applied to most of the 86 Macs we built; they are listed in the full build log.

Full build log · config.plist · file list

Our build for MacBookAir4,1 loads 19 kexts in an EFI folder of 36.1 MB. Across the 86 Macs we built, the median is 18; 51% of builds load fewer.

What owners reported for MacBookAir4,1 2 reports on GitHub

2 issues were filed in OCLP's tracker with MacBookAir4,1 as the machine model (2 closed, 0 open), filed 2021; the newest is from 2021-08-06. The topics that come up most, by keyword match in the title and text: sleep and power (1). These are owners' reports, not confirmed bugs, and all of them were filed on OCLP versions from before 2024, so many describe problems that have since been fixed.

#423 2021-08-06 · closed · 2 comments MacBookAir4,1
#165 2021-04-22 · closed · 2 comments MacBookAir4,1 does not sleep, ever

MacBook Air (13-inch, Mid 2011)`MacBookAir4,2`

OCLP treats this model exactly like MacBookAir4,1: the same CPU, graphics, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth data, the same root patches on every macOS, and the same kexts in our build. What differs: board ID Mac-742912EFDBEE19B3 instead of Mac-C08A6BB70A942AC2, a 13-inch screen instead of 11-inch and sold as MacBook Air (13-inch, Mid 2011). The macOS table, patch timeline and build details above apply unchanged.

What owners reported for MacBookAir4,2 3 reports on GitHub

3 issues were filed in OCLP's tracker with MacBookAir4,2 as the machine model (3 closed, 0 open), filed 2021; the newest is from 2021-11-30. The topics that come up most, by keyword match in the title and text: wi-fi (1), black screen or boot failure (1) and bluetooth (1). These are owners' reports, not confirmed bugs, and all of them were filed on OCLP versions from before 2024, so many describe problems that have since been fixed.

#769 2021-11-30 · closed · Monterey · 1 comment Bluetooth not working on macOS Monterey 12.0.1 - I think it worked on Sur
#770 2021-11-30 · closed · Monterey · 1 comment macOS Monterey does not recognize other APFS Partitions - as a result I cannot boot into my other macOS'
#404 2021-07-24 · closed · Big Sur · 2 comments MacBook Air 4,2 (HD3000) not recognized any more

Installing on the MacBook Air 2011

Choose MacBookAir4,1 or MacBookAir4,2 as the target model when OCLP builds OpenCore (it detects it automatically when you run OCLP on this Mac). Before that, install the newest macOS Apple offers for it, macOS High Sierra, so the firmware is current. The steps themselves are the same for every Mac: How to install OpenCore Legacy Patcher.

Common questions

What does OCLP patch on a MacBook Air 2011 running Tahoe?

The root patches for its hardware: Intel Sandy Bridge, Modern Wireless and Modern Audio. Which one applies depends on the model identifier; the table above lists each. Updates to macOS remove them, and Post-Install Root Patch puts them back.

What is the latest macOS for a MacBook Air 2011?

Officially, macOS High Sierra. With OCLP: macOS Tahoe 26.7.2. macOS 27 does not support any Intel Mac.

Why do some apps not work on a patched MacBook Air 2011?

Its graphics processor does not support Metal, Apple's graphics API. OCLP restores OpenGL acceleration, so the system runs smoothly, but apps that require Metal cannot run. That gets worse with each macOS version, which is why we suggest Monterey for these Macs.

Other Macs from 2011

MacBook Pro 2011 MacBookPro8,1, MacBookPro8,2, MacBookPro8,3
iMac 2011 iMac12,1, iMac12,2
Mac mini 2011 Macmini5,1, Macmini5,2, Macmini5,3

Keep going

How to installThe complete step-by-step guide for OCLP 3.0 macOS TahoemacOS 26 on unsupported Macs with OCLP 3.0 Mac compatibilityEvery Intel Mac and the macOS it can run, with and without OCLP

Something wrong or out of date on this page? Email hello@oclp.dev and we will fix it (see our corrections policy).

#Which MacBook Air 2011 do you have?

#macOS versions compared

#Model by model

MacBook Air (11-inch, Mid 2011)MacBookAir4,1

Compared with the MacBook Air (11-inch, Late 2010) MacBookAir3,1