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Xcode 12 Logo

Integrated development environment and app-building software

(3)

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Xcode 12 Reviews

Overall rating

4.5

/5

45

Rating criteria

  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend8.53/10

Reviews by rating

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Pros and cons

It has a ton of useful features and is really nicely integrated with Swift as well as Git. The UI is pretty appealing and overall has friendly interface.
XCode is a solid IDE and probably the best choice for Swift development. I personally used it to start learning C++ (mostly because it's free on Mac and that's what I had).
It has very good code completion. It has very good community and proper documentation.
The lack of tab autocomplete makes me sad, but honestly, it's not the end of the world. It will, however, let you know if something is missing and the exact line where the error is being noticed.
Also, while exporting archives and app packages, it raises errors after a substantial amount of time instead of warning about it earlier on.
Code inspections and auto recognition is bad. The performance for these functions is also bad.
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45 reviews

Recommended

RS
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Ryan S.

Sports, 1-10 employees

Used monthly for 1-2 years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend5/10

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Xcode is great but be prepared to Youtube or research alot

Reviewed 2 months ago

Overall was an awesome experience but wasn't for us in the end as it was too hard to implement in-app purchasing and subscriptions to our app. Also was very tedious having to resubmit the app to be published every time we made small changes.

Pros

Xcode offered a great amount of endless design options. Loved the way you can do a simulation of your app in a sandbox environment on different Apple devices from iPad Air to the latest iPhone or Apple Watch. Great library for filing media items too.

Cons

You can build any app you are after, given that you either know Swift (coding language) back to front or have plenty of time to research how to build your app. Cons are that it is very code intensive and difficult to wrap your head around some trickier concepts to bring them to life. Another con is the difficulty with publishing apps not always displaying why they got rejected from the app store and also adding in-app purchase functionality is difficult.

VT
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Viktor T.

Information Technology and Services, 10,001+ employees

Used daily for 2+ years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend8/10

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Xcode user as QA

Reviewed 2 years ago

It is a usable development environment with many great features, at the same time a sometimes less user friendly user interface

Pros

Xcode is essentially the only tool with which it is relatively convenient to develop applications on Apple devices. It has a lot of features, but from the QA positions I like the source code debugger the most, it's top quality

Cons

Unfortunately, Xcode has several bugs, the app often crashes when it is committed to other branches. The application does not compile, but the exact error is not reported. It has less user friendly user interface.

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Princely O.

Information Technology and Services, 1-10 employees

Used weekly for 1-2 years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend8/10

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An App Builder with a Superior Class

Reviewed 2 years ago
Pros

When it comes to competition with other app builders, Xcode Apps displays a touch of seniority over others with a superior user interface, a robust system and user experience, and a multifaceted design layout.very unique in terms of features, functionalities, and deployment.After code assembly, you can upload your IPA apps directly to the Apple IOS store, with instant support from the Apple team and a massive community to gain insight from and learn from.

Cons

It takes a long time to load.Why does this only work for the deployment of an iOS app?I'll suggest making it a bit faster to load. Keeping up with all of the updates can be difficult due to unexpected emulator stoppages, builder interruptions, and stoppages. 

AN
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Alessio N.

Computer Software, 51-200 employees

Used daily for 2+ years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend8/10

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Best IDE for developing iOS apps

Reviewed 2 years ago
Pros

Xcode is the best tool for developing iOS apps in Swift: it's very well integrated with the language, the compiler and the source control (Git). You can easily start developing your first mobile app for iPhone or you can use it for huge and professional products.

Cons

It’s not rare that the program crashes or is unresponsive, especially with big projects. The issue is easily fixed restarting the program.

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Verified reviewer

Information Technology and Services, 10,001+ employees

Used daily for 2+ years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend8/10

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Best tool for IOS Application Development

Reviewed 2 years ago

It is very good experience as it is only option to develop the mobile application for IOS. Sometimes I face the challenge related to the developer certificate and provisioning file but rest it is good. Good tool to develop mobile applications.

Pros

1. Best tool for mobile and web application development. 2. Setting application metadata like media is very easy. 3. Code, test, deploy at one place only. 4. Setting up an team and developer certificate easily. 5. Build time is very fast. 6. Deployment feature is really intelligent as it will assist you till the app is getting deployed on the app store.

Cons

1. Profile and developer certificate maintenance is one of the great challenge while deploying the application on the app store but once it is setup it is very easy to deploy. 2. Initial setup is requires some extra efforts. 3. It consumes a lot of memory and CPU and requires to wait sometime.

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Giuseppe N.

Information Technology and Services, 1-10 employees

Used daily for 2+ years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend10/10

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Great update

Reviewed 2 years ago
Pros

I've been an iOS developer for 10 years and I can tell Apple has done a great job. The management of the devices on which to debug is excellent, and the creation of the builds for the deployment on the store is equally excellent.

Cons

sometimes there is some slowdown when viewing complex storyboards, but completely manageable.

TB
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Tim B.

Financial Services, 11-50 employees

Used daily for 2+ years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend10/10

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The only real tool for Swift development for iOS

Reviewed 2 years ago
Pros

XCode is packed with development features for iPhones and iPads. Ranging from the best code auto-completion tools in the industry (in my opinion) to its very accurate and fast simulators it is simply the best place to start with native iOS app development.

Cons

Theres constantly bugs in the software - particularly around a major release. These bugs tend to be removed or fade over the next year before a whole new set of bugs get introduced again. Some confounding bugs recently were released in XCode 13.2 in which the Mac App store version of the app didn't work and required a fresh install. Quality control isn't always there.

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Verified reviewer

Computer Software, 1-10 employees

Used daily for 2+ years

Review source

Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend8/10

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Best tool for iOS app developer

Reviewed 3 years ago

Developed 20 applications, using Xcode.

Pros

Ease of use, Speed, Performance. Graphical UI of designs, Auto correcting, Syntax support, Packages, Plugins

Cons

Keep crashing, consumes more memory, a lot of memory in the cache, derived data consumes whole mac space

PP
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Phanit P.

Financial Services, 11-50 employees

Used daily for 2+ years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend9/10

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Standard IDE for iOS Development

Reviewed 3 years ago

I've been using Xcode for a while (over 10 years). Xcode 12 adds a lot of features to existing features to include a lot of support for SwiftUI. Overall, it's a must-have tool for Apple Development.

Pros

The autocompletion feature is nice for Swift and Objective-C. Xcode 12 can be used to submit the app directly into the app store. Xcode 12 has a lot of great documentation since it has been the standard tool for iOS development for a while. The simulator can be used to simulate different devices with different Operating Systems.

Cons

Xcode provides a lot of advanced options in their User Interface, but a lot of options can be overwhelming. Storyboard merges can be nearly impossible to resolve. Sometimes, an error message can be difficult to debug. Frequent updates. Requires 40GB of free space to update on the latest versions.

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Nirmal R.

Telecommunications, 10,001+ employees

Used daily for 2+ years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend9/10

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Best iOS app Development tool

Reviewed 3 years ago

It is good for iOS app development. till now not faced any issue.

Pros

OverAll Looks of IDE is very good. it is more user friendly by using their tabs and navigation system.

Cons

storyboard are always get conflict when more developers are working on same project.

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Nabin P.

Computer Software, 51-200 employees

Used daily for 2+ years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend10/10

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Must have tool for Apple developers

Reviewed 3 years ago

It's a great IDE for the Apple ecosystem.

Pros

Xcode is the only IDE for developing apps for Apple devices. Supports Objective C and Swift programming languages. The excellent user interface, code auto-completion, great documentation, team collaboration features, and app store deployment, all in one single software.

Cons

Xcode requires macOS. Must have a credit card to deploy apps.

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Manthan P.

Computer Software, 501-1,000 employees

Used daily for 2+ years

Review source

Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend9/10

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Xcode 12 - With all New Design

Reviewed 3 years ago

Now Apple has made mandatory to submit the application using iOS14 SDK only so that is only provided by Xcode 12 only.

Pros

It has all new design that certainly look great on macOS Big Sur. It has customisable font size for the navigator. It has the next swift update which means more features, resulting better, cleaner and safer. The new Swift UI App Life Cycle brings a new addition to the initial configuration.

Cons

Hardly any information found to solve problems.

AW
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Ali W.

Computer Software, 51-200 employees

Used daily for 1-2 years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend8/10

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Compiler for a iOS Development

Reviewed 3 years ago

Overall my experience is good but as it has a lot of problems that needs to be addressed and resolved

Pros

Its a great compiler user as a QA Engineer i can easily compile the builds and test them. Overall it's a good tool

Cons

Xcode has a lot of problems - First of all, it's very heavy, you have to wait a whole day if any update comes up. sometimes the user has to clean up some memory because of its memory consumption. - If you have MAC 2015 or 16 your laptop will come near to crash because it too heavy - On the old model of mac as I mentioned earlier the build-making takes too much time - If the user needs to make an .IPA file you have to go through a look process unlike in android studio - Xcode should be release for windows as well currently its not for windows

AC
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Andrei C.

Information Technology and Services, 11-50 employees

Used daily for 2+ years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend10/10

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Your (only) go-to IDE for developing on Apple platforms

Reviewed 3 years ago

It's a love and hate relationship, but mostly it's love!

Pros

- It has tons of small features that can boost your productivity (ex. behaviors); - Has support for building apps for all Apple operating systems (ex. tvOS, watchOS, iOS, etc.); - PLAYGROUNDS; - Very fast and good simulator (compared to Android);

Cons

- INDEXING... On large projects, the performance starts to drop drastically. Features like "jump to definition", "find call hierarchy" or other refactoring tools stop working; - It can be painful to work with SwiftUI due to Xcode bugs.

MT
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Md. Tohedul I.

Computer Software, 51-200 employees

Used daily for 6-12 months

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend10/10

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Best all in one programming tool

Reviewed 3 years ago

I like the debugging and inspection feature. It's the all-in-one complete app, game, and software development software for me. It's recommended for ios apps and games also recommended for any other software development.

Pros

I like the most about this software: ease of use and all-in-one tool feature. So I can do all programming-related work in my Xcode 12. So I don't have to use multiple tools to complete my tasks like app development, software development, and other stuff. Also, like the auto-suggestion tooltips feature. I like to use this software to develop enterprise applications, android, and ios apps and games.

Cons

If I have to build an ios app or game then I must have to use Xcode, I don't like this thing. It shouldn't be bound.

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Verified reviewer

Computer Software, 11-50 employees

Used daily for 1-2 years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend10/10

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Excellent for Swift Development

Reviewed 3 years ago

Working on iOS App development, XCode has really upped the game for an IDE using the native languages. Compared to Android Development with Android Studio, or even something like React-Native, XCode was miles ahead in terms of features, ease of use and reliability.

Pros

This product is THE way to handle Swift development for macOS and iOS. I've never had it crash on me, the built-in compiler is top notch and it is incredibly easy to send an application over to your mobile device

Cons

This software CAN be used for things like C++ development. Don't use it for that, there are better options out there. Its handling of anything NOT native Apple-developed Swift is very hit or miss for usability.

BD
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Binigya D.

Computer Games, 11-50 employees

Used daily for 1-2 years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend8/10

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The only option for iOS development

Reviewed 4 years ago

It is the only option for iOS app development, so you are stuck with it if you want to make any iOS apps or games. I did have a good experience using it, as it does have a slick UI and some nifty features going for it, but I found my experience to also be mildly frustrating at times.

Pros

As with any Apple product, I love the Slick UI and the UX of XCode. It is a daunting and a complex beast of an IDE, but it does look good and you can access stuff you want easily. It also has such an easy connection for releasing TestFlight apps and making archives for the App store, which does compensate for some of its frustrations and quirks. I also loved the emulators, which are pretty light on the system and do work so smoothly to test out your apps.

Cons

I really dislike the way debugging works on Xcode, it is a cumbersome process. Also, while exporting archives and app packages, it raises errors after a substantial amount of time instead of warning about it earlier on. And, the permission settings are pretty confusing and the countless amounts of errors I have gotten due it is a painful experience to have. Finally, it is really slow at times. I've used it on a Mac mini and a Macbook pro and the plodding performance has always been an issue for me.

TE
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Trent E.

Computer Software, 11-50 employees

Used weekly for 1-2 years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend8/10

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Pretty solid IDE, though the C++ support could be better

Reviewed 4 years ago

XCode is a solid IDE and probably the best choice for Swift development. I personally used it to start learning C++ (mostly because it's free on Mac and that's what I had). It's a solid IDE, and super easy to get started with. If you're doing something more complicated, it's useable, though I would personally probably use an IDE designed for C/C++ (like CLion). The lack of tab autocomplete makes me sad, but honestly, it's not the end of the world. It will, however, let you know if something is missing and the exact line where the error is being noticed. Altogether, it's a pretty solid IDE. It's not the best for C++, though it's probably the best for Swift (though I haven't personally used it for Swift. My buddy has though and I trust his judgement).

Pros

- Super easy to use and set up - Dark mode is an option - Provides amazing support for Swift development (i.e. all Apple development) - Easy to run/test your code

Cons

- No tab autocomplete for C++ - Error messages aren't always completely clear in C++ development (like kind of terribly bad)

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Verified reviewer

Marketing and Advertising, 11-50 employees

Used weekly for 6-12 months

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend10/10

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The Source for All Mobile Application Development!

Reviewed 4 years ago

If you're considering becoming an IOS developer, then there is no where to start other than Xcode. The vast variety of features linked to direct deployment to the app store being a product made by Apple is tremendously convenient relative to any of its competitors such as PhoneGap and Ionic.

Pros

Xcode 12 offers extensive features with the key addition of Swift 5.3 for IOS 14 users, a crucial aspect in development for the new IOS User Interface. My personal favourite usage of Xcode 12 is the feature enabling application creation for the Apple TV as being capable of creating a software and projecting it onto my large-screen TV is an amazing feeling! I also use App Thinning to optimize my applications, and I would highly recommend it.

Cons

The application size for Xcode 12 is very storage consuming and may slow-down your computer, yet such a result is expected when running a large-scale software.

BA
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Beebek A.

Education Management, 51-200 employees

Used daily for 2+ years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend8/10

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Xcode 12 review

Reviewed 4 years ago

Satisfactory overall experience with XCode 12

Pros

XCode has a very good developer community. It's code completion feature is what i like most. It is the most preferred IDE to develop iOS apps.

Cons

Working with multiple projects on XCode is a bit of a headache. The load time is very high.

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Verified reviewer

Computer Software, 201-500 employees

Used daily for 2+ years

Review source

Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend8/10

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Why XCode

Reviewed 4 years ago

My overall experience with Xcode 12 is very good. I use it daily for developing cool applications.

Pros

There are many great features in XCode that I like.XCode 12 performs very well on code completion. We can learn profiling in a very natural way using XCode 12. Also, the app store has a very large audience.

Cons

The app store approval process is very frustrating and lengthy. XCode does not support tabbed work environments.

HB
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Hiren B.

Telecommunications, 1,001-5,000 employees

Used daily for 2+ years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend5/10

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Heavy tool which can lead to your system hang

Reviewed 4 years ago

Overall it's good tool and updated feature compare to previous XCode. The only conern is the tool size and the memory it takes to run.

Pros

Xcode is good to develop iOS apps. New Xcode features Swift UI is much easier to use for creating UI for iOS apps. The code completion suggestion is very powerful

Cons

when you start opening multiple tabs, it will hit your computer memory very hard and you will face system crash or hang several times.

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Verified reviewer

Information Technology and Services, 1-10 employees

Used daily for 2+ years

Review source

Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend7/10

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Un IDE fondamentale ma pieno di bug e lento

Reviewed 2 years ago

Non si può prescindere da Xcode se si vuole programmare per dispositivi iOS ma l'IDE presenta numerosi difetti che rendono difficile e lenta la programmazione.

Pros

Xcode è un scelta obbligata per chi si accinge allo sviluppo di applicazioni iOS e macOS. Ho trovato l' interfaccia utente abbastanza intuitiva anche se può all'inizio disorientare un nuovo utente ma a mio avviso l'unico vero pregio di questo IDE è l'emulatore integrato che permette di debuggare le applicazioni anche senza avere un dispositivo apple fisico (permettendo di risparmiare parecchio)

Cons

I difetti purtroppo superano i pregi. Innanzitutto per utilizzare Xcode è necessario avere un Mac (molto oneroso) ma il problema principale è che l'IDE soprattutto nelle ultime versioni presenta numerosi bug. inoltre è molto lento in fase di compilazione e di segnalazione degli errori. Infine scaricare xcode e gli sdk necessari alla programmazione di app mobile occupa molto spazio sull'hardisk

Showing original review in Italian. See translation

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Fabiano A.

Information Technology and Services, 501-1,000 employees

Used daily for 2+ years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend9/10

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Indispensabile per lo sviluppo su iOS

Reviewed 2 years ago

Lo utilizzo quasi ogni giorno a lavoro poiché le app che sviluppiamo hanno sia il target Android che iOS. Indispensabile poiché non è possibile produrre build iOS in nessun altro modo.

Pros

Facilità di utilizzo. Ottimo IDE. Utilissimo la funzionalità ad alto livello che permette di collegare codice e UI.

Cons

Durante il debugging capita a volte di perdere il collegamento con il device.

Showing original review in Italian. See translation

RR
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Roger R.

Internet, 1-10 employees

Used daily for 1-2 years

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Overall Rating
  • Value for money
  • Ease of use
  • Features
  • Customer support
  • Likelihood to recommend10/10

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El mejor software para desarrollar para iOS

Reviewed 2 years ago

Me ha gustado bastante la experiencia de UI que tiene Xcode,

Pros

El ambiente grafico, tengo el código y la vista previa con su emulador para poder probar en tiempo real las funciones que estoy programando.

Cons

No hay algo que pueda decir, para mi el software esta perfecto.

Showing original review in Spanish. See translation