Best practice: dedicated admin account for nothing but admin tasks?

[Chateaunole-du-Pape]

My M2 Air is arriving tomorrow, and I am quite excited about the prospect of setting it up!

My current Mac dates to mid-2009 and is still on El Capitan; it's pretty useless at this point, and I have been using an iPad Pro almost exclusively for 5 years or so, so I'm a bit out of touch with regard to daily use of Mac OS.

When I got my first Mac, it seemed like a pretty commonly suggested best practice, for security purposes, was to first set up an admin account for doing nothing but installing applications, performing maintenance and whatnot, and then add non-admin accounts for individual users' daily use, even if there's only one user.

I went with that strategy and have lived with it ever since. It does make things a little bit inconvenient from time to time, but if it provides significant security upside, I'm willing to go this route again with my new machine.

What's the general approach these days? Is this still a common practice, or is it outdated and unnecessary?

Thanks!

 

[Madhatter32]

I never could be bothered with this approach -- although I do remember people recommending it many years ago. My sense is that with new T2 technology, FireVault and the dedicated, isolated and sealed system volume that is verified by Apple all probably renders this practice as overkill and unnecessary.

 

[Fishrrman]

Since my first venture into OS X back in 2004, I've just used my "main" account as my "administrative" account.

18 years, no problems AT ALL doing it this way.

 

[Madhatter32]

I would add that separating the user accounts from the admin account is a good practice if you intend the device to be used by anyone other than you. As for other security purposes ... not really.

 

[Chateaunole-du-Pape]

Thanks, all, for the replies and reassurance. I'll run my own personal account as an administrator, and set up a regular user account for my wife, who will be using the machine rarely, if at all.