Emulation and virtualization on iPad in 2025
Published on 29 May 2025 by Andrew Owen (6 minutes)
On a personal level, the last 12 months has been a lot. I stopped posting weekly updates back in June 2024 and I’ve been posting on an ad hoc basis since then. This probably explains why I missed the news that in April 2024 Apple approved retro console emulators in the App store; a decision that it subsequently updated to include retro computer emulators. I also missed that in the same month AlStore PAL, an alternative app store, launched in the EU; and while there was initially a small annual fee, a grant from Epic Games means that it’s now free. This is game-changing for emulation and virtualization on iPads (and to a lesser extent on iPhones too).
The original AltStore was created as a way to sideload apps on Apple mobile devices without the need for jailbreaking. It relies on Developer Mode features. And for some features, like just in time (JIT) compilation, it requires a tethered connection to a computer. This is a requirement to run DolphiniOS (Nintendo GameCube and Wii emulator) and UTM (a frontend for QEMU general purpose emulation and virtualization tool). But AltStore PAL, requires no config changes to your device (good news for the security conscious), and can be installed directly from its website. Apple isn’t keen to advertise the existence of alternate app stores, but it does provide instructions.
AltStore was created by Riley Tstut as a way to distribute Delta (a Nintendo 64, Game Boy Advance and DS emulator) after Apple rejected it in the App store. It uses .ipa files, requires a computer, apps expire after seven days, there’s a limit of three apps, apps do not have full iOS capabilities and it requires an Apple ID and password. AltStore PAL has none of those limitations and only installs notarized apps (good news for the security conscious) but it doesn’t support JIT and it’s only available in the EU. Both versions of the store are decentralized, and anyone can provide sources that can be added to the store app. Although Epic Games has its own third-party app store, it can also be added as a source to AltStore PAL, which keeps everything non-Apple in one place. And this means EU-based iPad owners can install Fortnite (outside the EU the alternative option is to play it using Xbox Cloud Gaming).
This is a new retro computer from David “The 8-bit Guy” Murray that I had a small part in developing. Roger Boesch’s Commander X16 emulator is typical of emulators before Apple’s policy change in that it cannot load programs. You’re limited to programming in BASIC, although you can SAVE and reLOAD your programs between sessions. It’s not clear if it would fall foul of Apple’s policy because it’s a new machine, but being 8/16-bit, I hope that full program support will eventually be possible.
Chaoji Li’s iOS version of DOSbox (which enables you to run old PC software) has been in and out of the App store over the years. The first version was released in 2010, but was pulled soon after. The second version was released in 2014 and pulled in 2021. The third version was released in September 2024 after Apple’s policy change on emulating retro computers, and is still available as iDOS 3 as of the time of writing. Out of the box it will run software written for MS-DOS, a vast collection of which can be legally obtained for a reasonable price (sometimes free), without DRM from Good Old Games. If you know what you’re doing, it’s even possible to get it to run older versions of Windows (XP is possible, but you’re generally better sticking with 3.1).
Craig Smith’s port of Stefan Jokisch’s Z-machine interpreter, also called Frotz, has been around since 2009 and somehow never fell foul of Apple’s anti-emulation policy. It enables you to play the classic Infocom text adventures, and new games written with Inform. A few of the games are available from Good Old Games, but if you can, track down the CD-ROM copies of the two volume “Lost Treasures of Infocom” (assuming you still have a CD-ROM drive).
On iPad, the mother lode of emulation is RetroArch. Rather than an emulator in its own right, it’s a frontend for Libretro cores (third-party emulators packaged as dynamic libraries). It supports a plethora of 8- and 16-bit computers and consoles from companies including Atari, Commodore, NEC, Nintendo, Sega, Sharp, Sinclair, SNK and Sony. It also supports DOS and SCUMM games, but I’d recommend using iDOS and ScummVM for those. Console games are easy enough to configure, but getting the keyboard working on computers is more of a pain. You need to enable Game Focus mode to override the hotkeys, and any time you go to a menu it will switch itself off again. However, because it fully supports the Fuse ZX Spectrum emulator, it can run the .szx devkit files generated by my computer role-playing game engine (perhaps more on that in a future article).
Although RetroArch supports many classic systems, legally getting hold of the games can be a challenge. For SEGA games, one alternative is SEGA’s own iOS releases. Genesis (MegaDrive) titles include Golden Axe (1 to 3), Sonic (1, 2 and CD) and Streets of Rage (1 and 2). Dreamcast titles include Crazy Taxi and Super Monkey Ball. Many are free to download (with optional in-app purchases).
The Script Creation Utility for Maniac Mansion (SCUMM) has a long history at Lucasfilm Games and beyond. Just as the Z-machine is a portable virtual machine for text adventures, ScummVM was initially a portable virtual machine for point-and-click adventures. At the beginning, it supported games using SCUMM, such as “The Secret of Monkey Island”. But over time, it was expanded to support other point-and-click adventures and then other types of games, such as graphical text adventures. Crucially for me, it supports Westwood’s “Blade Runner”. Most of the games it supports are available to purchase, DRM-free, from Good Old Games.
UTM (Universal Turing Machine?) is now available in the official App store, but there’s a big caveat: just in time (JIT) compilation is not supported, which means it’s almost unusably slow for all but the simplest of systems. However, the older the system you’re trying to emulate, the better it will run. If you want to give it a try, I would recommend configuring the virtual machine in advance on another device, such as a Mac. I attempted this with various Linux distributions, but I didn’t get very far. In the end, I used one of the pre-built Debian ARM images. Even then, it wasn’t a great experience. But I was running on an A12X CPU. If you have a recent M4 device, you may get better results.
Kevin Palser’s free Sinclair ZX81 (and ZX80) emulator was initially restricted to a set of bundled titles. But since Apple’s easing of its emulation policy, it is now possible to load your own programs. The experience of using the onscreen keyboard in portrait mode is uncannily like the original keyboard experience. It also supports more recent community developments, including color.