I’ve tried Zwift today for the first time and my laptop seems to be struggling a bit with it. With Zwift running the laptop fans are going flat-out and the playback is only set at the low resolution.
The laptop is a 2012 MacBook Pro with the 2.9GHz i7 processor, 8Gb RAM and Intel HD Graphics 4000 1536 MB graphics card.
Would it be worthwhile to increase the RAM up to 16Gb? Would it help with the running of Zwift?
Hi,
I have a late 2013 mac book pro, i5, 8Gb ram and same graphics card. It handles the high resolution but hangs for about 3 to 4 minutes, usual just as I’m getting into the ride and every so often until it crashes. Zwift haven’t replied with any useful info or suggestions as yet. Everything I’ve read suggests the graphics card is the key as it runs quite heavily on it.
no help, but if you get any info please update this thread as its driving me mad.
I’m not absolutely certain but I don’t think you can update RAM on these machines. I have a 2012 Retina MBP and at purchase I had to get the larger RAM because of this restriction.
Your machine may be a different model and upgradeable.
The RAM is upgradable, I can go up to 16Gb if necessary.
I’ve never known the machine to struggle so much, especially with something running at low-resolution settings with something that has seemingly basic graphics.
I’ll keep trying it for now but if it gets any worse I’ll be looking to finish my time with Zwift before I’ve even finished the free trial period!
I’ll also look at an upgrade in due course, please let us know if its a success. Until then i can recommend using bootcamp and running it on windows, so far so good anyway!! time will tell!!
I doubt increasing the RAM from 8-16 will make any difference at all. The HD 4000 graphics is the problem and won’t do well with Zwift. You can get external graphic cards but I don’t think it is worth the time and expense. The game works great on a Windows gaming desktop but unless you have a gaming laptop the GPU isn’t adequate. I would also strongly suggest a USB extension cable to move the Ant+ dongle as far from the laptop and as close to the trainer as possible
I tried to run zwift on a new early 2015 MacBook pro and it also had the same issue (fans on high speed). 8gb ram, 128gb pci-e based SSD, Intel Iris 6100 graphics.
I had to go back to an old windows based laptop (HD 4000 graphics) which works fine.
Same problem as above on same spec 2015 MacBook pro. I unfortunately don’t have an old windows laptop to go back to 
I run Zwift on my 2011 MacBook Air. It runs fine and my secret is to put it on a stand where I’m able to point a small desk fan directly at the CPU area that gets hot. I’m sure it will look prettier when I upgrade, but the game works fine and the internal fan never turns on.
I use a laptop fan thats my mac book pro sits on.
2.7 i7 16 GB 2013 year
NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M
doing well so far.