I don't think chip architecture was the main issue that the parent was alluding to. The same issues would arise if it was Docker running an x86 image on an x86 chip on a Mac.

Docker doesn't run natively on OSX, unlike Linux where it does. As a result, Docker Desktop for Mac spins up a linux VM, and this is where penalties begin to be payed.

I do wonder if Docker Desktop is smart enough to tailor the VM's architecture to the image's architecture? Moreover, is it smart enough to tailor both the VM's architecture and images architecture to the host's hardware architecture?

I'd be interested to see how these soft and hard architecture combinations actually change the performance characteristics:

    M1/ARM -> x86-VM -> ARM-image
 vs 
    M1/ARM -> ARM-VM -> ARM-image

I wonder how difficult it would be to support docker natively on OSX (BSD?) or if Apple has any intention on providing that support?

> I wonder how difficult it would be to support docker natively on OSX (BSD?) or if Apple has any intention on providing that support?

I think it would be pretty difficult. Mac would effectively have to provide a fully compatible Linux interface in its kernel. It would probably be more likely to build a better fs-event bridge to guest systems, but considering MacOS still doesn’t have ext4 support, I’m not counting on it.

It’s supported pretty well. I’m running a Kubernetes cluster on Raspberry Pis and these days most popular images have ARM64 support.