Installing Teleport on macOS
This guide explains how to install Teleport on macOS, including client tools for connecting to an existing Teleport cluster and the Teleport service for running agents.
For an overview of Teleport installation methods and supported platforms, see Installation.
Operating system support
Teleport supports macOS 12 (Monterey) and later for both Intel and Apple Silicon Macs.
Install client tools
Most macOS users install Teleport to connect to an existing cluster. Teleport provides several client tools:
| Tool | Description |
|---|---|
tsh | Command-line client for SSH, database access, Kubernetes, and application access |
tctl | Administrative CLI for managing Teleport clusters (cluster administrators only) |
| Teleport Connect | Desktop application with a graphical interface for accessing resources |
Choose one of the following methods to install the Teleport client tools.
Teleport Connect
Teleport Connect is a desktop application that provides a graphical interface for connecting to SSH servers, databases, Kubernetes clusters, and web applications.
Download Teleport Connect from the Downloads page or directly:
Open the .dmg file and drag Teleport Connect to your Applications folder.
To install tsh from Teleport Connect, click the three-dot menu in the upper-right corner of the Teleport Connect window
and select Install tsh in PATH.
Checkpoint: Verify Teleport Connect installation
Confirm that Teleport Connect is installed and can connect to your cluster.
Command-line tools only
If you prefer to use tsh and tctl without the desktop application, download the PKG installer:
This universal installer works on both Intel and Apple Silicon Macs.
You can also fetch and run the installer via the command line:
curl -O https://cdn.teleport.dev/teleport-19.0.0-dev.pkgsudo installer -pkg teleport-19.0.0-dev.pkg -target /installer: Package name is teleport-19.0.0-dev
installer: Upgrading at base path /
installer: The upgrade was successful.
Checkpoint: Verify tsh installation
Confirm that the Teleport client tools are installed and you can log in to your cluster.
For more information on using tsh, see the tsh reference.
For more information on Teleport Connect, see Using Teleport Connect.
Running Teleport services on macOS
The client tools above (tsh, tctl, Teleport Connect) are used to connect to a Teleport cluster on demand—you run them when you want to access a resource,
then they exit when you're done.
Teleport services are different: they run continuously as background daemons. The teleport daemon can run cluster components (Auth Service, Proxy Service)
or agent services that enroll resources like servers, databases, or applications into your cluster. The tbot daemon provides machine identity for automated workloads.
Most macOS users only need the client tools. You would install Teleport services on macOS primarily for:
- Local development and testing of Teleport configurations
- Running a Teleport Agent to enroll your Mac as a resource in a cluster
| Binary | Description |
|---|---|
teleport | The Teleport daemon for running cluster services or agents |
tbot | Teleport Machine & Workload Identity issues and renews short-lived certificates so your machines can access Teleport protected resources in the same way your engineers do. |
Install Teleport services
If you haven't already, download and run the PKG installer:
curl -O https://cdn.teleport.dev/teleport-19.0.0-dev.pkgsudo installer -pkg teleport-19.0.0-dev.pkg -target /Password
installer: Package name is teleport-19.0.0-dev
installer: Upgrading at base path /
installer: The upgrade was successful.
which teleport/usr/local/bin/teleport
Verify Teleport is installed
teleport version
Running Teleport services in production is typically done on Linux servers. macOS is primarily used for client access and local development. For production deployments, see Installing Teleport on Linux.
For guidance on configuring and running Teleport, see:
- Teleport daemon on macOS via launchd
- Deploy a Cluster for self-hosted deployments
- Machine ID Getting Started for workload identity
We do not recommend using Homebrew to install Teleport. The Teleport package in Homebrew is not maintained by Teleport and we can't guarantee its reliability or security.