Restore your keychain permissions for Office for Mac. If the above did not work, Office may have trouble accessing the keychain and you'll need to restore keychain permissions for Office for Mac. In these cases, you may see: The keychain access prompt every time you launch any Office application, even though you previously selected Always Allow.

File Maker Pro

FileMaker is probably the best known database application for the Mac. It has a feature set comparable to Microsoft Access, but with a strong focus on forms (layouts) as the primary way of accessing databases. Similar to Access, FileMaker stores your database logic and all the data in a single file. It also has some support for scripting, and offers options for publishing databases on the web.

However, it's also necessary to note that FileMaker is very different from Access. There is a strict distinction between application logic and the underlying tables in Access. In FileMaker, logic and data are more closely linked. The underlying tables are more or less hidden from the user, and not as easily accessible via SQL as in Access.

Bento

Bento was the entry level database application from the makers of Filemaker. Unfortunately it has been discontinued in July 2013 and is no longer available for purchase.

Open Office / Libre Office

Open Office and Libre office include a database application that tries to mimic Microsoft Access. It is difficult to use and misses many important features, such as simple import/export tools.

SQLite (using Base)

SQLite is not a full database application like Access. There are no forms or reports in SQLite, there's only your data and a simple, fast SQL engine. SQLite is used by many applications under the hood as an internal format and therefore most interesting to application developers.

A command line utility for SQLite 3 is included with every Mac, aptly named sqlite3. Most people will however prefer working with a graphical application like the excellent Base from Menial (available on the Mac App Store). Base offers a simple interface for viewing tables (with support for images) and creating custom SQL queries.

Apple Numbers and Microsoft Excel

Numbers and Excel are spreadsheet applications and thus not a replacement for Microsoft Access. However, they have good support for working with tables. If your database consists of only few tables and no forms, these apps might just do the trick. You can at least sort and filter your tables.

Converting Access Databases to Apple Numbers with MDB Viewer
Converting Access Databases to Microsoft Excel with MDB Viewer

Microsoft Access in Parallels / VMWare

If none of the above are suitable, you can always ressort to actually running Microsoft Access on your Mac using virtualisation software like Parallels Desktop or VMWare Fusion.

Mac users have several options for using Microsoft Access on their Macs.

Microsoft Office for Mac can do the following with Microsoft Access ACCDB and MDB files:

• 2011 and 2016: Get data from an Access file into an Excel Table or Excel PivotTable
• 2011 and 2016: Use Structured Query Language (SQL) in VBA (Visual Basic for Applications) and AppleScript automation
• 2011 and 2016: Use the macro recorder to get started with code
  
• 2011 only: Use a graphical user interface (Microsoft Query) to generate queries and reports from Microsoft Access
  
• Excel 2016 users can only vote here and hope someday Microsoft will restore this essential functionality lost to cost cutting
  

Limitations of Office for Mac with Microsoft Access

• Interaction with Access is Read-Only. Excel for Mac can not add, delete or modify records, fields, queries, views, tables or create anything new within Access.
  
• Only tables and views are available from Access databases. Forms and reports in an Access database are not available to Excel for Mac.
  

I need all Access features. Can I run Microsoft Access on my Mac? Yes!

Microsoft Access 2016 is available as a stand-alone product. You will need to have Microsoft Windows installed on your Mac either in Apple's Boot-Camp or in a virtual machine (Parallels or VMware). Using a virtual machine allows you to run Wndows and Windows applications simultaneously with your Mac OS apps. I recommend at least 16 gigabytes of RAM for running a virtual machine on your Mac.
Click here to purchase Microsoft Access 2016 stand-alone edition from the Microsoft store
Click here to purchase Microsoft Windows 10 from Amazon.com
Click here to purchase Parallels Desktop virtual machine from Amazon.com.

Tutorial

This tutorial explains how to query Microsoft Access tables using Excel for Mac.

Why Does The

• Part 1 - Overview (Current page)
  
• Part 2 - Connecting to Access (Next page)
  
• Part 4 - Getting your data in Excel 2011
  
• Part 4 - Getting your data in Excel 2016
  

Why Does Mac Not Have Microsoft Access Work