Transfering a Virtual Machine to Another Mac

If you need to transfer a virtual machine to another Mac or share it with somebody, you can prepare it for transfer. The virtual machine size will be reduced as much as possible, and you will need less disk space and time for transfer.

Note: This functionality is available in Parallels Desktop for Mac Pro and Business Editions only. Boot Camp-based virtual machines, archived virtual machines, and linked clones cannot be prepared for transfer.

Preparing a Virtual Machine for Transfer

Do the following:

1. Make sure the virtual machine is shut down. If it is running, shut it down. If it is paused or suspended, resume the virtual machine and shut it down.

2. If your virtual machine has snapshots, it is recommended that you remove them. This will significantly reduce the virtual machine size. Moreover, these snapshots may become useless on another Mac because of different hardware.

3. Transferring Windows 11 virtual machines (and other machines with TPM enabled) between Macs signed into the same iCloud account normally works without issues. In all other cases, follow the steps described in this KB article.

4. Open the Parallels Desktop Control Center by clicking the Parallels Desktop icon in the macOS menu bar and choosing Control Center.

5. Right-click the virtual machine that you want to transfer and select Prepare for Transfer. Parallels Desktop starts packing the virtual machine. This process may take some time, depending on the virtual machine size.

6. Once the package is created, you can right-click it and choose to show where it is stored in the Finder. The package has the .pvmp extension.

   If there were no error messages during the process, it means that all the virtual machine data has been packed successfully. If you wish, you can double-check that. You need to compare the checksum for the virtual machine with that for the package. They must coincide.

   To see the checksum for the virtual machine, open the .txt file that was created and saved next to the package. The string in this file is an encoded checksum.

   To get the checksum for the package, open Terminal and execute the following command:

   shasum -a 256 <path to the package>/"<package_name>"

   This command may look as follows:

   shasum -a 256 /Users/<your_user>/Parallels/"Windows 11.pvm"

   The output may look as follows:

   63a90c3c38cc8c358221da339068fc1292b10bf7c00ed8449787b0e6019d706b /Users/parallels/Parallels/Windows 11.pvm

   The string in the beginning must match the string from the .txt file mentioned above. However, there's no need to compare the whole string: merely four symbols in the beginning and four at the end will be enough.

Transferring the Virtual Machine

Once the package is created, you need to transfer it to another Mac. You can do this using cloud storage, network drives, USB storage, etc.

Launching the Virtual Machine on Another Mac

To open the package on another Mac, do the following:

1. Launch Parallels Desktop and click File > Open.

2. Navigate to the folder where the package is stored, select it, and click Open. The package appears in the Parallels Desktop Control Center.

3. Right-click the package and choose Open Package. Parallels Desktop starts unpacking the virtual machine. This process may also take some time, depending on the package size. Once the virtual machine is unpacked, you can start using it.