{"slug": "xcode", "name": "Xcode", "category": "editors", "category_name": "Editors and IDEs", "description": "", "recommenders": 17, "commenters": 98, "warners": 40, "score": -10.817, "rising": -5.56, "first": "2025-11-01", "latest": "2026-10-26", "why": "Start with XCode then use an LLM to design and develop it out from there its great.", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 16, "neutral": 44, "compare": 0, "warn": 44}, "spark": [2, 3, 4, 2, 1, 0, 1, 0, 3, 0, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "Start with XCode then use an LLM to design and develop it out from there its great.", "kind": "", "icon": true, "domain": null, "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://developer.apple.com/xcode/", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["Xcode"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 782774161, "item_id": 48923385, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48923385", "by": "Terretta", "date": "2026-07-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I'd also recommend Xcode 27 beta", "excerpt": "> simple changes to SwiftUI interfaces I\u2019ve one-shot is always a frustrating experience for me 1) Have you exported Apple docs from Xcode and provided those to your LLM and told your CLAUDE.md to read them as applies? 2) Have you added https://github.com/dpearson2699/swift-ios-skills to your agent? I'd also recommend Xcode 27 beta unless you teach your agent the Xcode MCP. Xcode 27 beta works on MacOS 26.x.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "DSLs Enable Reliable Use of LLMs"}, {"id": 781910032, "item_id": 48869377, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48869377", "by": "willtemperley", "date": "2026-07-10", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use Xcode almost exclusively, but with the Vim key bindings which have been integrated very well", "excerpt": "Vim is a bad example to use here. I certainly have no hacker-vibe pretensions, I use Xcode almost exclusively, but with the Vim key bindings which have been integrated very well. The productivity gains with Vim commands are impressive.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Good Tools Are Invisible"}, {"id": 773427856, "item_id": 48339241, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48339241", "by": "guessbest", "date": "2026-05-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Start with XCode then use an LLM to design and develop it out from there its great.", "excerpt": "I just do iOS development and my opinion is this: Start with XCode then use an LLM to design and develop it out from there its great. The newer models work great with project files where they used to struggle. Using the Visual Code development tools alongside XCode, claude skills and 3rd party libraries and frameworks with SwiftUI and Swift 5/6 is really convincing me I should make apps full time again. Coding apps h", "context": "iOS developer", "use_case": "iOS development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What Is the State of App Development in 2026?"}, {"id": 757135937, "item_id": 47320996, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47320996", "by": "nachocoll", "date": "2026-03-10", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "you can see SwiftUI previews alongside generated code", "excerpt": "The IDE integration question is interesting from a broader vibe coding perspective. Having Claude Code natively in Xcode means the feedback loop tightens \u2014 you can see SwiftUI previews alongside generated code, which partly addresses one of the big problems with pure vibe coding: the disconnect between \"what was generated\" and \"what actually behaves correctly.\" The emulator access question is key. Vibe coding for iOS", "context": "", "use_case": "iOS app IDE", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: How is Claude agent experience in Xcode 26.3?"}, {"id": 753711754, "item_id": 47106984, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47106984", "by": "bromuro", "date": "2026-02-21", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "those are a delight to work with", "excerpt": "No, they are also inconsistent: slack, vscode, zed, claude, chatgpt, figma, notion, zoom, docker desktop, to quote some that i use daily. They have all different UI patterns and design. The only thing they have in common is that are slow, laggy, difficult to use and don\u2019t respond quickly to the Window manager. Compare to other software on Mac such as Pages, Xcode, Tower, Transmission, Pixelmator, mp3tag, Table plus, ", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "When Code is Free, Why is Claude is an Electron app?"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 797754816, "item_id": 49859676, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49859676", "by": "platevoltage", "date": "2026-09-26", "stance": "warn", "quote": "You don\u2019t love it when you open a file that is randomly associated with Xcode and you see that icon start to bounce?", "excerpt": "You don\u2019t love it when you open a file that is randomly associated with Xcode and you see that icon start to bounce?", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Why doesn't Apple provide Xcode 27's markdown editor as a separate app?"}, {"id": 797754496, "item_id": 49859656, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49859656", "by": "amichail", "date": "2026-09-26", "stance": "warn", "quote": "loading Xcode is overkill when you just want to edit a markdown file", "excerpt": "It would be mostly the same code. But loading Xcode is overkill when you just want to edit a markdown file.", "context": "", "use_case": "editing markdown", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Why doesn't Apple provide Xcode 27's markdown editor as a separate app?"}, {"id": 796956850, "item_id": 49809803, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49809803", "by": "Kuyawa", "date": "2026-09-22", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It would serve a single purpose much better than xCode does", "excerpt": "Oh nostalgia, dbase, clipper, clarion, foxbase, delphi, I loved VFP so much, not for the language but for the tools, the screen designer, the db browser, the sql queries, all that power and user love was dumped in the trash can for the travesti that was .net at the time I learned VB.net, C# and even F# to see if they surpassed in any sense my beloved VFP but no, I felt so betrayed I decided to migrate to a galaxy far", "context": "", "use_case": "single user desktop apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Microsoft killed FoxPro in 2007. Anyway, here's FoxPro revived"}, {"id": 787734099, "item_id": 49233381, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49233381", "by": "flax", "date": "2026-08-09", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I did have to borrow a mac and use xcode to set up my project, I wish that weren't the case.", "excerpt": "You're right that to deploy an app to Apple's app store you have to pay them. The $100/yr access ransom is unavoidable if you want to have the option of making money there. But I've gone to great lengths to avoid the rest of the stuff that genuinely sucks about building for Apple: I use Flutter to avoid most of the iOS nonsense. I use Android Studio on Linux for the vast majority of my development. I target Android/w", "context": "", "use_case": "project setup", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tech sucks: You have to vote with your wallet, or nothing will change"}]}], "who": [{"by": "gigisfndr", "context": "bootstrapped solopreneur with an iOS game", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48932416", "date": "2026-07-16"}, {"by": "gwking", "context": "fought with Xcode professionally", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48899939", "date": "2026-07-13"}, {"by": "guessbest", "context": "iOS developer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48339241", "date": "2026-05-30"}, {"by": "skyriser", "context": "iOS/macOS developer seeking freelance work", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48008310", "date": "2026-05-04"}, {"by": "Dan1435", "context": "first-time app developer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47675714", "date": "2026-04-07"}, {"by": "tom_", "context": "maintains a couple of niche FOSS macOS projects", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47345350", "date": "2026-03-11"}, {"by": "dewey", "context": "new to Xcode", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47258663", "date": "2026-03-04"}, {"by": "r2vcap", "context": "iOS developer for years", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46875780", "date": "2026-02-03"}, {"by": "3D30497420", "context": "builds personal-use apps instead of paying for subscriptions", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46717634", "date": "2026-01-22"}, {"by": "quux", "context": "iOS app developer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46634891", "date": "2026-01-15"}, {"by": "ModernMech", "context": "uses it for work", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46236384", "date": "2025-12-11"}], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["ios app development", "ide", "apple platform development", "apple app development", "ios development", "debugging"], "compared": [{"slug": "visual-studio-code", "name": "Visual Studio Code", "co": 11, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "claude", "name": "Claude", "co": 10, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "swiftui", "name": "SwiftUI", "co": 6, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "macos", "name": "macOS", "co": 6, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "claude-code", "name": "Claude Code", "co": 5, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "zed", "name": "Zed", "co": 5, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "android-studio", "name": "Android Studio", "co": 4, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "chatgpt", "name": "ChatGPT", "co": 4, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46874619", "title": "Xcode 26.3 unlocks the power of agentic coding", "mentions": 18}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46841374", "title": "Swift is a more convenient Rust (2023)", "mentions": 6}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48896665", "title": "Building and Shipping Mac and iOS Apps Without Ever Opening Xcode", "mentions": 4}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46483023", "title": "Swift on Android: Full Native App Development Now Possible", "mentions": 3}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49859573", "title": "Ask HN: Why doesn't Apple provide Xcode 27's markdown editor as a separate app?", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47840219", "title": "Tim Cook to become Apple Executive Chairman", "mentions": 2}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"recommend": 2, "neutral": 2, "warn": 2}, "2025-12": {"warn": 3, "recommend": 3, "neutral": 2}, "2026-01": {"neutral": 8, "warn": 9, "recommend": 4}, "2026-02": {"warn": 10, "neutral": 5, "recommend": 2}, "2026-03": {"warn": 6, "neutral": 10, "recommend": 1}, "2026-04": {"neutral": 2, "warn": 2}, "2026-05": {"warn": 4, "neutral": 3, "recommend": 1}, "2026-06": {}, "2026-07": {"recommend": 3, "neutral": 5, "warn": 2}, "2026-08": {"neutral": 4, "warn": 2}, "2026-09": {"neutral": 3, "warn": 3}, "2026-10": {"warn": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 803987056, "item_id": 50249191, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50249191", "by": "SiavashB", "date": "2026-10-26", "stance": "warn", "quote": "", "excerpt": "I built a small but polished native mac markdown reader that you can install, and if you set it as the default handler of markdown files, xcode wont highjack it, I just tested that with my update to macos/xcode 27. It's currently waiting review to be published on the app store, but you can download directly from my webpage. it's open source. https://nano.thirdeyeds.com/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "A Markdown File Should Just Open"}, {"id": 798297217, "item_id": 49893576, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49893576", "by": "jnaina", "date": "2026-09-29", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "sideload it to my apple tv via xcode", "excerpt": "damn. sonnet 5.5 pulled it off within 20 mins and sideload it to my apple tv via xcode. fluffy 60 fps to boot. https://n.uguu.se/yAvgVLPw.mp4", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "What reversing, modernising old games tells us about the economic impact of AI"}, {"id": 797754816, "item_id": 49859676, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49859676", "by": "platevoltage", "date": "2026-09-26", "stance": "warn", "quote": "You don\u2019t love it when you open a file that is randomly associated with Xcode and you see that icon start to bounce?", "excerpt": "You don\u2019t love it when you open a file that is randomly associated with Xcode and you see that icon start to bounce?", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Why doesn't Apple provide Xcode 27's markdown editor as a separate app?"}, {"id": 797754496, "item_id": 49859656, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49859656", "by": "amichail", "date": "2026-09-26", "stance": "warn", "quote": "loading Xcode is overkill when you just want to edit a markdown file", "excerpt": "It would be mostly the same code. But loading Xcode is overkill when you just want to edit a markdown file.", "context": "", "use_case": "editing markdown", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Why doesn't Apple provide Xcode 27's markdown editor as a separate app?"}, {"id": 797022592, "item_id": 49813912, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49813912", "by": "NarcisMirandes", "date": "2026-09-23", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Swift and Xcode are my main tools", "excerpt": "I feel very identified with what you explain. It happened the same to me when trying other programs. Swift and Xcode are my main tools, and I feel that AI is especially bad in the Apple environment. That is not related to those programs nor Apple but because in that world we care specially about design and details. There is a \"feeling\" a sensibility, emotion behind the code that I think a machine will never get. That", "context": "", "use_case": "Apple platform development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Should we still learn coding?"}, {"id": 796956850, "item_id": 49809803, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49809803", "by": "Kuyawa", "date": "2026-09-22", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It would serve a single purpose much better than xCode does", "excerpt": "Oh nostalgia, dbase, clipper, clarion, foxbase, delphi, I loved VFP so much, not for the language but for the tools, the screen designer, the db browser, the sql queries, all that power and user love was dumped in the trash can for the travesti that was .net at the time I learned VB.net, C# and even F# to see if they surpassed in any sense my beloved VFP but no, I felt so betrayed I decided to migrate to a galaxy far", "context": "", "use_case": "single user desktop apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Microsoft killed FoxPro in 2007. Anyway, here's FoxPro revived"}, {"id": 796644864, "item_id": 49790304, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49790304", "by": "semidror", "date": "2026-09-21", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "But it is possible to run even the latest Xcode 26.6 by directly executing Xcode.app/Contents/MacOS/Xcode", "excerpt": "It does. The latest officially supported Xcode version runnable on Sequoia is 26.3. See https://developer.apple.com/xcode/system-requirements/ But it is possible to run even the latest Xcode 26.6 by directly executing Xcode.app/Contents/MacOS/Xcode, and Xcode will run. This trick doesn't work with Xcode 27 anymore though. If you try that, you'll see a warning message that says something like \"Xcode requires macOS 26 ", "context": "", "use_case": "Apple app development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Is it impossible to disable Siri on macOS 27?"}, {"id": 789684768, "item_id": 49355298, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49355298", "by": "lapcat", "date": "2026-08-18", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Xcode has always been available for free.", "excerpt": "> Right, and my point is that the technology is already fully paid for by the user. That's your claim. Neither Apple nor the EU appear to agree. Nor do US courts appear to agree in the Epic v. Apple trial. Apple itself has to pay license fees for some technologies in iPhone, and those licenses do not automatically extend to third-party developers via the consumer. It's not a license agreement with the consumer. When ", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple announces changes for apps in the European Union"}, {"id": 787913425, "item_id": 49244589, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49244589", "by": "followercode", "date": "2026-08-10", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Enable the xcode mcp server", "excerpt": "Hey, I work at Docker and my team works on mcp integration with sbx. A solution I've been trying is this: 1) Enable the xcode mcp server: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/xcode/giving-external-agents-access-to-xcode 2) Add the xcode mcp server to sbx: `sbx mcp add xcode --command xcrun --args mcpbridge` 3) When you create the sandbox, use `--static-mcp xcode`. For example: `sbx create --static-mcp xcode clau", "context": "", "use_case": "iOS development toolchain", "switched_from": "", "story": "Docker Sandboxes \u2013 Disposable, isolated sandboxes for AI agents"}, {"id": 787734099, "item_id": 49233381, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49233381", "by": "flax", "date": "2026-08-09", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I did have to borrow a mac and use xcode to set up my project, I wish that weren't the case.", "excerpt": "You're right that to deploy an app to Apple's app store you have to pay them. The $100/yr access ransom is unavoidable if you want to have the option of making money there. But I've gone to great lengths to avoid the rest of the stuff that genuinely sucks about building for Apple: I use Flutter to avoid most of the iOS nonsense. I use Android Studio on Linux for the vast majority of my development. I target Android/w", "context": "", "use_case": "project setup", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tech sucks: You have to vote with your wallet, or nothing will change"}, {"id": 787293200, "item_id": 49205825, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49205825", "by": "spartanatreyu", "date": "2026-08-06", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "This is the first time I've ever heard Xcode be called clever.", "excerpt": "This is the first time I've ever heard Xcode be called clever. Side note: This feature is in vscode: https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/editing/userinterface#_minimap", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Xcode's Clever Minimap"}, {"id": 787160289, "item_id": 49197518, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49197518", "by": "kotaKat", "date": "2026-08-06", "stance": "warn", "quote": "No screwing with Xcode or anything", "excerpt": "> Because you can't just load your app on iOS - this is just not possible (well perhaps there are a few percent of some jailbroken iPhones, but that is neglibile). No, smart normies are sideloading with the 7-day limit and leveraging automation to have their pirated apps automatically re-sign and re-push. If you pay the $99 to Apple for a dev cert (or like $10 to a service that'll sell you a cert off someone's accoun", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "On non-rooted Android 17, ADB uninstall of system apps fails"}, {"id": 786541696, "item_id": 49158856, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49158856", "by": "skyriser", "date": "2026-08-03", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "", "excerpt": "Location: Montreal, Canada | EST timezone Remote: Yes Willing to relocate: No \u2022 Technologies: Swift, Objective-C, AppKit, UIKit, SwiftUI, CoreData, REST, Stock/Forex/Crypto \u2022 Tools: Xcode, Github, Figma, Jira/Linear/Trello, Cursor/ChatGPT/Claude \u2022 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christiancomeau \u2022 Resume/CV: http://chriscomeau.com/resume \u2022 Email: chris.comeau@skyriser.com", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (August 2026)"}, {"id": 784520689, "item_id": 49032543, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49032543", "by": "flohofwoe", "date": "2026-07-24", "stance": "warn", "quote": "more robust and more responsive than debugging native code in Xcode", "excerpt": "> as it's not possible really to debug a WASM application ...as others have said, this is a solved problem and has been for quite a while: https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=ms-vscode.wasm-dwarf-debugging I might even go that far and say that this solution is on average more robust and more responsive than debugging native code in Xcode.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Learn OpenGL, extensive tutorial resource for learning Modern OpenGL"}, {"id": 784420547, "item_id": 49026284, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49026284", "by": "dlcarrier", "date": "2026-07-23", "stance": "warn", "quote": "like the Xcode development environment for iOS", "excerpt": "I used to think EDA tools for FPGAs were the absolute worst development environment, until I wanted to modify an open-source application on my phone, and tried to install and run Android Studio. It manages to out bloat both Vivado and Quartus. At least I wouldn't need to buy a special computer to run it, like the Xcode development environment for iOS. I've ended up using Yosys from a command line, while editing the f", "context": "", "use_case": "iOS development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Write, simulate and synthesize VHDL/Verilog in the browser"}, {"id": 782924656, "item_id": 48932791, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48932791", "by": "willtemperley", "date": "2026-07-16", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Looks like Apple are making an effort to get agents to create decent code with Xcode skills", "excerpt": "Looks like Apple are making an effort to get agents to create decent code with Xcode skills, which someone has extracted here [1] but there is near zero mention of accessibility. Worth a read though I think, I learned a few things. [1] https://github.com/superagents-lab/xcode27-skills/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "If you want to create a button from scratch, you must first create the universe"}, {"id": 782918656, "item_id": 48932416, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48932416", "by": "gigisfndr", "date": "2026-07-16", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I do not turn on AI integration in Xcode.", "excerpt": "I do. I have tried using LLMs ( as a bootstrapped solopreneur tried optimizations via free AI ) it worked out ok for fast prototypes but even so had enough issues to not consider it for my non-throw away serious work (including iOS game in production) except in a limited fashion such as to spin up few shallow SwiftUI views , get typical implementation for stuff like IAP , GDPR regs, etc. for all the non-core code whi", "context": "bootstrapped solopreneur with an iOS game", "use_case": "iOS game development", "switched_from": "", "story": "How many people still write code by hand?"}, {"id": 782774161, "item_id": 48923385, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48923385", "by": "Terretta", "date": "2026-07-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I'd also recommend Xcode 27 beta", "excerpt": "> simple changes to SwiftUI interfaces I\u2019ve one-shot is always a frustrating experience for me 1) Have you exported Apple docs from Xcode and provided those to your LLM and told your CLAUDE.md to read them as applies? 2) Have you added https://github.com/dpearson2699/swift-ios-skills to your agent? I'd also recommend Xcode 27 beta unless you teach your agent the Xcode MCP. Xcode 27 beta works on MacOS 26.x.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "DSLs Enable Reliable Use of LLMs"}, {"id": 782414304, "item_id": 48900894, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48900894", "by": "ChrisMarshallNY", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I usually use Xcode GUI", "excerpt": "Nah. I usually use Xcode GUI, but there's been a lot of discussion about using a CLI workflow, for many years. Should be easy to find. Hope you like long argument lists. xcodebuild has a crazy long parameter list. https://developer.apple.com/documentation/xcode/xcode-command-line-tool-reference", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Building and Shipping Mac and iOS Apps Without Ever Opening Xcode"}, {"id": 782406403, "item_id": 48900400, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48900400", "by": "WhitneyLand", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Everyone will still need to use Xcode for at least some debugging, no way around that.", "excerpt": "Everyone will still need to use Xcode for at least some debugging, no way around that. As for the builds, your agent probably already knows how to do a lot of this from the command line, although explicit suggestions can help it build faster for different situations. As for XcodeGen, you may find it unnecessary overhead if you're already using Xcode file system synced groups. For iOS my biggest suggestion would be to", "context": "", "use_case": "debugging", "switched_from": "", "story": "Building and Shipping Mac and iOS Apps Without Ever Opening Xcode"}, {"id": 782399058, "item_id": 48899941, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48899941", "by": "franze", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "honestly would not even know what to do / click in xcode", "excerpt": "built cable detective like this https://apps.apple.com/at/app/cable-detective/id6765963737?l=en-GB&mt=12 and the soon to come https://aifcc.franzai.com/ which is more ambitious honestly would not even know what to do / click in xcode", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Building and Shipping Mac and iOS Apps Without Ever Opening Xcode"}, {"id": 782399024, "item_id": 48899939, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48899939", "by": "gwking", "date": "2026-07-13", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I went back to Xcode because the debugger UI was better than what I could get out of VS Code at the time", "excerpt": "I have one weird trick for people who are exploring this vein. I last opened an Xcode project about five years ago so I could be way behind the times. Having spent many years fighting with Xcode professionally, I was thrilled when swift build came out, and then appalled at how badly Xcode adopted it. Eventually I realized that you can set up your entire app as a swift package, and then the Xcode project with a single", "context": "fought with Xcode professionally", "use_case": "debugging, Metal debugger", "switched_from": "", "story": "Building and Shipping Mac and iOS Apps Without Ever Opening Xcode"}, {"id": 781910032, "item_id": 48869377, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48869377", "by": "willtemperley", "date": "2026-07-10", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use Xcode almost exclusively, but with the Vim key bindings which have been integrated very well", "excerpt": "Vim is a bad example to use here. I certainly have no hacker-vibe pretensions, I use Xcode almost exclusively, but with the Vim key bindings which have been integrated very well. The productivity gains with Vim commands are impressive.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Good Tools Are Invisible"}, {"id": 781794384, "item_id": 48862149, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48862149", "by": "jpsimons", "date": "2026-07-10", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "", "excerpt": "And I just discovered there's a group in Seattle called XCoders (https://xcoders.org/), I'll drop in on their social next week and maybe learn more about the Swift/Apple ecosystem.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Mojave Paint for macOS, edit images like it's 1999"}, {"id": 773600816, "item_id": 48350051, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48350051", "by": "petercooper", "date": "2026-05-31", "stance": "warn", "quote": "it has a known bug with XCode 24.5", "excerpt": "Can't speak for browser demos, but I just got the ternary model working on my M5 generating images. The 1 bit didn't work, as it has a known bug with XCode 24.5 and I wasn't in the mood for installing 24.4 alongside. Here's a generation in your honor: https://peterc.org/img/johndoe.png", "context": "", "use_case": "macOS app development", "switched_from": "", "story": "1-Bit Bonsai Image 4B Image Generation for Local Devices"}, {"id": 773427856, "item_id": 48339241, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48339241", "by": "guessbest", "date": "2026-05-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Start with XCode then use an LLM to design and develop it out from there its great.", "excerpt": "I just do iOS development and my opinion is this: Start with XCode then use an LLM to design and develop it out from there its great. The newer models work great with project files where they used to struggle. Using the Visual Code development tools alongside XCode, claude skills and 3rd party libraries and frameworks with SwiftUI and Swift 5/6 is really convincing me I should make apps full time again. Coding apps h", "context": "iOS developer", "use_case": "iOS development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What Is the State of App Development in 2026?"}, {"id": 770104067, "item_id": 48131504, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48131504", "by": "crossroadsguy", "date": "2026-05-13", "stance": "warn", "quote": "It's a monstrosity devs have to endure", "excerpt": "this coming to Mac is a little too little and a little too late. Notepad++ void has been successfully filled with many lightweight native editors, some are FOSS, which are quite mature. And with this drama (read: shady, suspicious etc) one would be better served to stay away from it, at least for a while. BBEdit, Sublime, TextMate, TextEdit (yes, it's actually useful in plain-text mode :P), CodeEdit etc. My fav is Su", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Notepad++ Mac Port Renamed Nextpad++ After Trademark Row"}, {"id": 769616785, "item_id": 48101049, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48101049", "by": "stockresearcher", "date": "2026-05-11", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "The version of clang that ships with Xcode", "excerpt": "FYI, The version of clang that ships with Xcode can compile openMP code if you provide the right compiler flags. You have to provide libomp.dylib and a few header files, but the folks that run R compile it and provide it for distribution (they need it). If you trust R, you can probably trust this too: https://mac.r-project.org/openmp/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Training an LLM in Swift, Part 1: Taking matrix mult from Gflop/s to Tflop/s"}, {"id": 769415760, "item_id": 48088485, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48088485", "by": "seydar", "date": "2026-05-10", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Xcode has been truly awful: non-deterministic, crashing all the time, and error messages that tell me absolutely nothing.", "excerpt": "Acoustic diagnosis of electrical problems on the electric grid! I'm building a tool that allows you to determine the health of an electric transformer from only your phone. It tells you: - the loading - the health of the windings and core - and whether the phases are unbalanced I used to be a submariner, so my professional background is in power plants and sonar analysis, so I'm getting to combine the two in this. Ac", "context": "building an iPhone app", "use_case": "iPhone app development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (May 2026)"}, {"id": 768132960, "item_id": 48008310, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48008310", "by": "skyriser", "date": "2026-05-04", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Tools: Xcode, Github, Figma, Jira/Linear/Trello, Cursor/ChatGPT/Claude", "excerpt": "SEEKING WORK | iOS/macOS developer | Worldwide | Remote Location: Montreal, Canada | EST timezone | Remote, no relocate \u2022 Technologies: Swift, Objective-C, AppKit, UIKit, SwiftUI, CoreData, REST, Stock/Forex/Crypto \u2022 Tools: Xcode, Github, Figma, Jira/Linear/Trello, Cursor/ChatGPT/Claude \u2022 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christiancomeau \u2022 Resume/CV: http://chriscomeau.com/resume \u2022 Email: chris.comeau@skyriser.co", "context": "iOS/macOS developer seeking freelance work", "use_case": "iOS/macOS app development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (May 2026)"}, {"id": 768000416, "item_id": 48000026, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48000026", "by": "indemnity", "date": "2026-05-03", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use Xcode, but just to run the app with Command-R", "excerpt": "I use Xcode, but just to run the app with Command-R so I can see log messages or stack traces if I need to drop it into the agent for analysis. Everything else is done by Claude Code / Codex. I even read the source using Zed not Xcode :)", "context": "", "use_case": "running app and viewing logs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Those building Swift apps without touching Xcode, what is your workflow?"}, {"id": 767786243, "item_id": 47986640, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47986640", "by": "jdw64", "date": "2026-05-02", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Xcode and the Apple toolchain are virtually forced upon you. It isn't open in the slightest", "excerpt": "From an open-source perspective, many would say that Linux is the best. I also agree that Linux is the right answer for servers in most cases. However, rather than being a single unified system, there are likely many branches and distributions, starting with Ubuntu. However, from an industrial software perspective, the story changes. In a field intertwined with PLCs, vision equipment, barcode scanners, serial communi", "context": "", "use_case": "Apple platform development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Which is better\u2013macOS/Windows/Linux?"}, {"id": 767290996, "item_id": 47955687, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47955687", "by": "coldtea", "date": "2026-04-29", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Xcode on/off for some Obj-C/Swift dev", "excerpt": "What exactly is phenomenal and novel about Zed? I've tried it a couple of times for a week or so, didn't see the point, and moved on every time. And I'm not luddite swearing by vi or something, I use VSCode and Idea, and have used Sublime for many years, Xcode on/off for some Obj-C/Swift dev, Eclipse for 5-6 years in the 2000s, and vim for everything cli/lightweight since forever. Is the GUI tech what's supposed to b", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Zed is 1.0"}, {"id": 765467552, "item_id": 47841722, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47841722", "by": "spaniard89277", "date": "2026-04-20", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I'd like to get rid of xcode", "excerpt": "I use both Linux and Macos, and I'd like to get rid of xcode or have something like Nautilus. There are many, many things that are completely normal in Linux that are super clunky in MacOS at best. But at least try to match Nautilus or Thunar ffs.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tim Cook to become Apple Executive Chairman"}, {"id": 765459104, "item_id": 47841194, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47841194", "by": "tyleregeto", "date": "2026-04-20", "stance": "warn", "quote": "XCode is my least favourite IDE that I use regularily.", "excerpt": "Opinions vary, but I've never found Apple software to be particularly good. Their hardware is almost always exceptional. I'd go further and say I am constantly frustrated by how difficult their software can make basic tasks. I often find many of their UX patterns unintuitive, or even feel user hostile at times. Small example, I really want to view passwords as I type them in. I constantly miss type passwords on touch", "context": "", "use_case": "IDE", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tim Cook to become Apple Executive Chairman"}, {"id": 762811425, "item_id": 47675714, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47675714", "by": "Dan1435", "date": "2026-04-07", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I knew that to run my build, I needed to use Xcode", "excerpt": "Hi HN, I finally got my first app, \"Brighten Up\", up on the App Store. It's a simple arcade game inspired by an old Flash game I used to play as a kid called \"Light it Right\". In Brighten Up, you tap the rooms to turn the lights on or off before the timer runs out, but be careful around the dog. So far the highest score reached has been 1798, but I'm curious to see if anyone can get to 2000. Having built websites, wr", "context": "first-time app developer", "use_case": "building and submitting iOS app", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Brighten Up \u2013 My First App. Lessons on Unity and Renting a Mac"}, {"id": 760761264, "item_id": 47547579, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47547579", "by": "ryandrake", "date": "2026-03-27", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "things like Xcode, VSCode, web browsers, mail, Quicken, Spreadsheets and Word Processing", "excerpt": "I have three 27\" screens (iMac in the center and two thunderbolt displays on each side) and I use most of my \"daily driver\" applications fullscreen (single monitor). So, things like Xcode, VSCode, web browsers, mail, Quicken, Spreadsheets and Word Processing, and so on. This gives me usually at most 3 things to do at once. Occasionally, for smaller apps, like calculator, messages and so on, I won't fullscreen them. B", "context": "", "use_case": "Daily development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Make macOS consistently bad (unironically)"}, {"id": 760160320, "item_id": 47510020, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47510020", "by": "charcircuit", "date": "2026-03-24", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "The latest Xcode supports targeting back to macOS 11.", "excerpt": "The latest Xcode supports targeting back to macOS 11. This covers >99% of macs which is acceptable for most developers. https://developer.apple.com/support/xcode/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Wine 11 rewrites how Linux runs Windows games at kernel with massive speed gains"}, {"id": 759981393, "item_id": 47498837, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47498837", "by": "smallstepforman", "date": "2026-03-23", "stance": "warn", "quote": "nothing similar (Xcode slow, QtCreator slow, etc)", "excerpt": "There is always the one App which isnt available elsewhere that prevents migration. I\u2019ve been a full time Amiga user, BeOS user, OSX, user, currently I multiboot with Win11, Linux Mint and Haiku nightly, and Windows 11 still gets 99% screen time due to the one App. All other apps I use daily are cross platform. For everyone its a different App. For me, Visual Studio 2022 and its world class visual debugger that inspe", "context": "", "use_case": "debugging", "switched_from": "", "story": "Scott Hanselman says he's working on Windows local accounts"}, {"id": 758446305, "item_id": 47402894, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47402894", "by": "EagnaIonat", "date": "2026-03-16", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I created a mindmap App in XCode", "excerpt": "> If I wanted to become a project manager I would have become one. It's not so much a project manager. I have something I want to build, I create the plan and work slowly through it with Claude. Stopping at every piece and reviewing as I go. I can confirm the code is good, but also when it takes a different approach I question why it took that approach. Occasionally I learn something. > who just wants the end result ", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "I'm 60 years old. Claude Code killed a passion"}]}