Compatibility
Rooster system requirements
Rooster requires a Mac with Apple silicon running macOS 26 or later. Intel Macs are not supported.
Mac and macOS
- An Apple silicon Mac
- macOS 26 or later
- An Intel Mac is not supported
Rooster relies on the media, machine-learning and security capabilities of current Apple silicon Macs. There is no Windows, Linux, browser or iPad version.
Rooster is signed with our Apple Developer ID and notarised by Apple, so it opens under the standard macOS Gatekeeper settings; you do not need to lower them or override a warning.
Storage
The default transcription engine downloads about 480 MB the first time it is needed. After that model is cached, the core local workflow can run without a network connection.
There is no useful single free-space figure for a video editor. Space depends on your source recordings, projects, thumbnails, downloaded models, derived effects and exports. Rooster keeps originals unchanged and writes exports as new files, so allow room for both the source and the finished video.
Permissions
Recording may require camera, microphone and screen-recording access, depending on what you choose to capture. macOS asks for those permissions. Importing or exporting outside Rooster’s own container uses file locations you choose.
Network access
The default engine’s first transcription needs a connection to download its model. Optional providers and future purchase or update checks also use the network in specific circumstances. The privacy policy provides the complete list, and how local-first works explains how to test the offline workflow.
Before you start a trial
If your Mac meets these, you can download the free trial. They describe the current version and will be reviewed as Rooster changes.