Apple has seeded the first beta of macOS Sonoma 14.4 to developers for testing purposes. This comes after the release of macOS Sonoma 14.3. Registered developers can opt-in to the beta through the Software Update section of the System Settings app. An Apple ID associated with an Apple Developer account is required to get the beta.

macOS Sonoma 14.4 introduces some features from the iOS 17.4 beta, such as new emoji characters. Mac-specific features included in the update are yet to be disclosed. The beta may bring additional improvements and bug fixes, which will be updated as they are discovered.

Comparison of 14.4 beta to previous 14.3 RC:

• macOS 14.4 beta (23E5180j)* Version 17.4 (19618.1.11.11.3)* System Firmware Version: 10151.100.738.0.1 (M1 based Macs)* Darwin Kernel Version 23.4.0: Fri Jan 12 22:41:06 PST 2024; root:xnu-10063.100.610.0.2~19/RELEASE_ARM64_T8103 arm64
• macOS 14.3 RC (23D56)* Safari Version 17.3 (19617.2.4.11.8)* System Firmware Version: 10151.81.1 (M1 based Macs)* Darwin Kernel Version 23.3.0: Wed Dec 20 21:30:27 PST 2023; root:xnu-10002.81.5~7/RELEASE_ARM64_T8103 arm64* Apple Music/TV now 1.4.4.29 was 1.4.3.27

SDK notes indicate that updates to macOS 14.4 from macOS 11.0–12.3.1 will not work. Users are advised to update to macOS 12.4 or later before updating to macOS 14.4. This information may explain why some Big Sur users were inadvertently pushed to Sonoma MacOS 14.3 instead of with admin permissions.

Resolved issues in macOS Sonoma 14.4 Beta Release Notes include:

• Fixed: When using the transfer learning algorithm option, the CreateML app and framework object detection template might fail to converge and cause poor model quality and produce more than expected false positives. (114480994)