Apple releases OS X 10.11 El Capitan to the App Store

Apple has just released the final public version of OS X El Capitan, version 10.11 of the Mac's operating system. As with all recent OS X releases, you'll need to download El Capitan from the Mac App Store on a Mac running OS X 10.6.8 or higher.

El Capitan isn't the most exciting update Apple has ever released, but there are enough changes above and under the hood to make it worth an upgrade: an improved Mission Control with a Split View mode for full screen apps, updates to Spotlight and several of Apple's apps, the Metal graphics API, System Integrity Protection, networking improvements, and other small tweaks. We cover the important stuff in our full review.

For more on system requirements for El Capitan (and for more specific requirements for features like AirDrop, Handoff, Metal, and more), we have that information for you here. The short version is that if your Mac is running 10.8, 10.9, or 10.10, you can install El Capitan. We also have an updated guide for creating an El Capitan USB install drive.