Moving to a New Mac with an Android Emulator: How to Transfer Your License

Moving to a new Mac, or want to play on the one at the office too? With an Android emulator, what takes a little order is not the installation but the license. In MACOS EMULATOR, one license covers one Mac. Here is how to move it without running into a refusal, and what does not come along.

One license, one Mac

Monthly subscription or lifetime license, the rule is the same: one license covers one active Mac. In your customer area, the Active Mac line shows it: 1 / 1 when your key is activated on a Mac.

The launcher recognizes each Mac by its hardware, not by the app: it computes a fingerprint of the Mac’s hardware identifier, and that identifier never leaves the machine. Reinstalling the app on the same Mac costs no seat: the launcher asks for your key again, and your Mac gets its seat back. But an app copied to another Mac does not carry the activation.

The “already active on another Mac” message

Paste your key on a second Mac without doing anything else, and the launcher refuses it with this message: “This license is already active on another Mac. Release it from your account first (one Mac per license).” Nothing is wrong with your key: the seat is simply taken by the other Mac.

Freeing up that seat is what the “Switch Mac” button in your customer area is for. But start with the old Mac.

Switching Macs in the right order

1. On the old Mac: remove your key

As long as the old Mac keeps your key, it presents it to the server every time the launcher opens. If it opens after you free up the seat but before the new Mac takes it, the old Mac takes the seat back. Two ways to prevent that:

• You are leaving this Mac for good: in Settings (the gear icon, at the top right), at the very bottom, click “Uninstall…”. It erases the engine, the device and your configuration, including the saved license key and your Google session on the device: also the right move before selling or giving away a Mac. The guide to uninstalling an Android emulator details what goes.
• You are keeping this Mac and what is on it: in Settings, the “Subscription” card, at the very top, has a “Sign out” button. It removes the key from this Mac and nothing else: the device and your games stay in place.

Neither one frees up the seat: they remove the key from the Mac, not its activation. Is the old Mac broken or already erased? Go straight to step 2.

2. In your customer area: “Switch Mac”

Sign in to your customer area with your license key or email address, then click “Switch Mac”. A message confirms it: “Done: you can now activate macosemulator on another Mac.” The Active Mac line goes back to 0 / 1. Your key and your subscription stay the same: only the seat is freed up.

3. On the new Mac: install, then paste your key

First, check that the new Mac has an Apple Silicon chip (M1 or later) and macOS 12 or later: Apple menu, then About This Mac. Then, from your customer area, click “Download the app”, drag it into Applications and start the engine installation.

The launcher asks for your key the first time you click “Install” or “Play”: paste it, then click “Validate”. The new Mac takes the seat, and the Active Mac line goes back to 1 / 1. Do steps 2 and 3 back to back: the freed seat goes to the first Mac that presents your key. The emulator installation guide walks through every screen on the new Mac.

What does not come along to the new Mac

Only the license moves. Everything else belongs to the old Mac and has to be redone on the new one:

• the emulation engine, about 3.5 GB to download, only once;
• the Accessibility permission, without which your keys do not respond and a right click takes you out of the match;
• your games: in Full mode, the app installs the game from Google Play, with your own Google account, which you sign in to again once, inside the launcher;
• your keys, stored with the old Mac’s configuration: place them again with the key editor.

Do not copy the old Mac’s settings

On the new Mac, the launcher applies the values for its class on its own, based on its memory: 4.5 GB for the emulator on an 8 GB Mac, 6.5 GB from 16 GB, 10.5 GB from 24 GB, and 60 Hz from 24 GB. Keep them: more memory is not better, and past roughly half of the Mac’s memory, macOS swaps to the disk and the game stutters.

Already moved some sliders? The Machine profile buttons (8, 16 and 24 GB, in Settings) restore a class’s values in one go. The guide to the emulator on a MacBook Pro details what each class gets.

What about playing on two Macs?

One license covers one Mac: to play on two Macs, you need one per Mac. “Switch Mac” moves your license from one Mac to another; it does not activate it on both.

Frequently asked questions