Download Barotrauma for macOS

Barotrauma runs on both Intel and Apple Silicon Macs, and the 1.13.4.0 build has been tested on macOS Tahoe with a Mac mini M4. The requirements aren't steep for most modern setups, so you can jump into this 2D cooperative survival horror submarine simulator without fussing over specs. It's equal parts crew management, alien terror, and deep-sea engineering.

Controls and systems you'll juggle

Mac players get the full, claustrophobic command room experience. You're not just steering a sub — you're babysitting a nuclear reactor, wrestling with pumps, firing weapons, and reading sonar signatures while a crewmate might be secretly working against you. The controls map comfortably to keyboard and mouse, and every lever, console, and periscope feels deliberately tactile. Ragdoll physics turn routine hull breaches into slapstick horror shows, and the alien ruins scattered across Europa reward exploration with genuine existential dread.

Performance on Mac and who you'll bring along

On Apple Silicon, the sprite-heavy chaos holds its frame rate well, even when a swarm of sea monsters forces everyone to panic-repair the engine room. The real draw is the multiplayer — you can crew up with friends, randoms, or outright enemies. If someone's playing the traitor, paranoia becomes the fifth crew member. Modding support through the Submarine Editor and Character Editor means the horror keeps getting stranger long after you've survived the abyss.

A full mission walkthrough — from dock to disaster

Let me paint a picture of how a typical cargo run unfolds, because the systems really click once you're in the thick of it. The captain sets a course on the sonar, throttling up while the engineer scrambles to balance reactor output. I usually grab the mechanic role — fixing leaks and rewiring junction boxes gives me a front-row seat to every catastrophe.

About six minutes in, the sonar pings something large. The security officer loads a railgun shell while I sprint aft to check the ballast tanks. Then the hull breaches — water rushes in, ragdolling the medic down a ladder, and the reactor's temperature spikes because the engineer is unconscious. Someone yells about a crawler swarm. I patch two holes, drag the medic to the airlock, and discover the captain has been injecting husk eggs into the crew's morphine supply. That's the traitor mechanic doing its work, and suddenly we're fighting aliens and each other. Twenty minutes later, we limp into the outpost with three crew members alive, half the sub flooded, and a story nobody will believe.

Reworked vanilla subs finally fix cramped layouts

The Summer Update brought five reworked vanilla submarines, and they genuinely freshened up the early-game loop. Layouts that used to feel cramped now flow better — wiring panels are more sensibly placed, and the medical bays don't feel like afterthoughts anymore. Quality-of-life tweaks smoothed out inventory management, which means less time staring at locker screens and more time panicking about the thing outside the hull.

The 1.13.4.0 hotfix sorted crossplay problems that had been splitting friend groups across platforms. If you've got crewmates on different systems, the connection holds steady now, which matters when you're coordinating a reactor shutdown while a moloch is ramming the starboard bow. The fixes aren't flashy, but they're the kind that stop missions from ending in frustration instead of fire.

Solo play works offline with AI crew that won’t betray you

Does it run offline, or is multiplayer required? You can absolutely play solo with AI crewmates. They're competent enough for cargo runs and combat, though they won't backstab you or forget to refuel the reactor out of spite. The real magic lives in co-op, but the singleplayer campaign holds up.

How steep is the learning curve for all these systems? Expect your first few subs to sink. The tutorials cover steering and basic repairs, but wiring, medical diagnosis, and reactor tuning take experimentation. By your fifth mission, you'll be diagnosing morphine overdoses while welding a breach with one hand — it clicks faster than it looks.

Is the modding scene active enough to matter? The Steam Workshop integration means there's a constant stream of custom submarines, creature packs, and total conversion scenarios. The built-in editors aren't afterthoughts — people build entire campaigns with them. If you're hunting for a community that keeps a game alive between official updates, this one delivers.

A hotfix for the Summer Update smoothed out some crossplay snags, while the update itself brought five reworked vanilla submarines alongside a handful of fixes, improvements, and quality-of-life tweaks.

• macOS compatible with the tested build; runs on both Intel and Apple Silicon