Big Sur’s missing updaters

UNTIL APPLE RELEASED Big Sur, it had always provided standalone installer packages for macOS updates and Security Updates. While those continue for Mojave and Catalina, Big Sur’s new Sealed System Volume requires a different kind of installer. The choice now is Software Update when it’s available and works, or the full installer app.

If you just want to update macOS and preserve your existing Data volume, that seems a gamble. In early releases of Catalina, full installers had a habit of trashing or duplicating any existing Data volume — do you remember getting ‘Macintosh HD — Data —

Data volumes’?

Thankfully, Big Sur’s installers are behaving better, but they’re still less friendly than standalone updaters. Maybe Apple will bring back updaters.