Can't get Anchor to work on macos-latest runner

[smoelius]

This workflow passes on ubuntu-latest but fails on macos-latest: https://github.com/smoelius/anchor-test/blob/main/.github/workflows/ci.yml

Here is its most recent run: https://github.com/smoelius/anchor-test/actions/runs/17711922650

Can anyone see what I am doing wrong?

I have not had any problems running Anchor locally on a Mac, only in CI.

[For8stt]

I think this is likely caused by the GitHub Actions macOS runner, not by Anchor itself.

macos-latest currently resolves to a macOS arm64 / Apple Silicon runner. If your local Mac is Intel, or if the Solana/Anchor toolchain behaves differently on arm64 CI, that would explain why it works locally and on ubuntu-latest, but fails only on macos-latest.

As a quick check, I would add this before installing/running Anchor:

uname -m
sw_vers
solana --version
anchor --version

The first thing I would try is pinning the macOS job to an Intel runner:

- environment: [ubuntu-latest, macos-latest]
+ environment: [ubuntu-latest, macos-15-intel]

or directly:

runs-on: macos-15-intel

I would also avoid installing Solana from stable in CI, because that can change over time. Pinning the Solana/Agave version used together with Anchor v0.32.1 should make the workflow more reproducible.

So the likely issue is:

1. macos-latest is not the same environment as your local Mac.
2. It may be running on arm64.
3. Solana is installed from stable, so the actual version can drift.

I would first try macos-15-intel + a pinned Solana version and then compare the logs.

[smoelius]

Thanks, @For8stt.

[For8stt]

Glad it helped! If this answers the question, could you please mark it as the accepted answer? 🙂