In 2014, Apple introduced a new, simpler way to build its iOS app, Swift. In 2020, however, IT managers and Ctos still struggle to choose between Objective-C and Swift. To remove any doubt, we compared them and prepared this guide.
What is Objective-C?
Objective-c is an object-oriented programming language used by Apple since the 1990s. It combines the best of two early languages C and Smalltalk.
In 1996, Apple passed NeXT, whose development tools would use Objective-C. These tools were later included in Xcode. That’s how Apple started using Objective-C for Mac OS X development. As a result, Objective-C has become the language of choice for everyone who wants to create applications for OS X and iOS.
What is Swift?
Swift’s history is much simpler and shorter. It was created by Apple and launched at its Worldwide Developers Conference in 2014. It is an entirely new language designed to develop software for Apple’s operating system. Since then, the language has developed greatly. The latest stable release was released on 29 April 2020 as 5.2.4.
What does objective-C compare to Swift mean?
There are at least two reasons for this dilemma.
First, they are all supported by Apple and used in their products. If you consider native iOS apps, these two would be the “most native”.
Second, Swift is not a direct successor to Objective-C. The two languages have different features and are used simultaneously for iOS mobile application development.
Developers and product managers want to know which of them is the best. Which ones will meet their needs without breaking their budget?
If you don’t know whether to choose Swift or Objective-C for the iOS application you plan to develop, you’ll find out when you read this article.
How do you compare Swift to Objective-C?
We often compare technology and programming languages. Partly to meet our needs and partly because we are eager to share this knowledge with you.
While you can almost think of dozens of features to compare, we decided to focus on the ten most important ones. They all affect the cost, quality, and convenience of iOS application development. The following list and comparison will help you figure out which techniques are best for your project.
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The development environment
The development environment is where magic happens. It’s important to have an easy-to-use environment, how expensive it is, and whether there are any alternative solutions on the market.
If you are developing iOS or OS X applications using Objective-C, you will most likely use the Xcode IDE. There are other environments available, such as AppCode or Visual Studio Code from Microsoft, but they require the following Xcode to work properly.
Xcode provides you with a software development kit that provides almost everything you need to develop iOS applications. Tools, compilers, apis, and frameworks — they’re all there. In addition, you can use customizable pre-built elements in your application.
Xcode is integrated with Cocoa, and more importantly here is Cocoa Touch — the application development environment that you will use on iOS. But if you decide to use Swift, Cocoa Touch also lets you create apps for the Apple Watch and Apple TV.
However, this is not the only difference in the development environment. There’s also something called Swift Playgrounds. You can use it to learn to code in Swift, or as an environment to test a small piece of code without having to compile all the code and create the entire application. Simply put, when you have an idea for a solution, you can write code in Playgrounds and immediately check how it works.
With Swift, you can still work in the same environment as Objective-C, but you also have access to newer solutions to increase the possibilities. This round is Swift.
2. APP user interface
They are both native iOS languages, so you don’t have to worry about whether your application will run perfectly. Whichever one you choose, it will. The biggest difference is iOS compatibility and ease of UI development.
Objective-c is almost as old as the mountains, so your application can run on any available iOS version. Swift, on the other hand, requires at least iOS 7. That means you need to analyze what devices your audience has and decide if you can limit yourself to iphones and ipads released after 2013. To be honest, not many people have devices that are still 7 years old, so this shouldn’t be a problem.
For ease of use in UI development, Apple introduced SwiftUI. This UI design tool built into Xcode 11 runs on iOS 13 (or later, when it comes out). It makes it very easy to build native UIs for all Apple platforms. You can assemble your UI by writing code or tweaking previews. Changes are visible in both code and preview.
It’s a tie. Still, Swift’s advantage is likely to grow in the future.
- The encoding speed
Coding speed affects the overall cost of creating an application and reduces time to market. Although objective-C and Swift are both native languages for iOS, they are not the same. Swift is a more modern language. It is also human, thanks to the simpler syntax. That means it’s also easier to learn.
More importantly, it is said that the same application written in Swift will have only 30% of the lines of code compared to an application written in Objective-C. A popular example is Lyft, which converts Objective-C to Swift and loses over 60% of its code. Reducing the amount of code not only speeds up the development process, it also leads to fewer errors and faster, cheaper testing.
Swift won again.
Performance of 4.
The better and more appropriate the technology you choose, the higher the performance. Higher performance leads to better user experience, easier refactoring and maintenance, and more.
Apple claims Swift is 2.6 times faster than Objective-C. This is probably due to Swift being created as a completely new language for the purpose of…… Quickly.
Even though Apple has a garbage collector for Objective-C, it’s still not as efficient as the code written for Swift. Simpler syntax and type checking at compile time helped Swift move beyond Objective-C. To optimize memory management, Swift uses ARC (Automatic reference Counting). In addition, Swift supports dynamic libraries, which also improves application performance.
Swift wins, and its advantage over Objective-C grows.
5. Community and support
The right support reassures you that you will have the expertise you need for successful development. In addition to professional support, it is helpful to be part of a community of experts who will support you with their experience and knowledge.
Although Apple still supports Objective-C, it has never been an open source language. Swift, by contrast, is open source, so you can see how it works in detail and understand its fundamentals more thoroughly. But there’s more. Openness means more people working on more projects and more resources available to Swift developers.
While Objective-C has had a community for over 30 years, its population will shrink. Newcomers tend to learn Swift, and each year fewer programmers are available to support you with their expertise. Even today, about 3500 StackShare users claim objective-C and over 6000 use Swift. Also, the Swift developer community is very important. What’s more, even other companies have developed their Swift frameworks (such as IBM).
Again, Swift clearly won this round.
6. Kit
For complex development, standard ides are often insufficient. To ensure adequate convenience, developers use additional toolkits. Objective-c or Swift programmers are no exception. The supply is different.
Because of objective-C’s long history, you’ll find many tools available from Apple and some third-party companies. However, I wouldn’t expect to build new tools for Objective-C development.
On the other hand, because Swift is an open source language, it is easy to find tools from third-party companies and contributors for the language. In addition, Apple provides you with a wide range of tools to improve your development performance. Recently they have released tools such as PencilKit for Apple Pencil, SiriKit for third-party apps and Apple assistant, or MapKit to increase the possibility of UI tweaks.
Swift also won here, though not by quite as much. However, Swift environments will evolve faster than Objective-C environments in the future.
Stability of 7.
Objective-c has been around for over 30 years. The final release was 2.0, which has been in existence since 2016. It’s not more stable than that. If there were any mistakes, we already know about them.
Swift is only six years old now, and Swift 5 was released a year ago in March 2019. Today we can use version 5.2.4. This shows that Swift is not as stable as Objective-C, but this is due to constant improvement and evolution.
Despite the age difference, I would call for a draw here.
8. The file
You can’t overestimate the importance of documentation. The more you know about the language and its tools, the easier it will be to avoid errors.
There is a lot of documentation in both languages. Objective-c is mainly because it’s been around for over 30 years. You can find its documentation in the Apple archive. However, Swift documentation is constantly updated. You’ll find new resources on the language. Also, keep in mind that it’s open source, so you can find more third-party resources. You should start with Apple Developer services and a dedicated Swift web page. There is also a GitHub repository for Swift.
Swift also won this round thanks to repeated implementations.
9. Platform maturity
Objective-c is much older than Swift. But does that mean it’s more mature? Swift was also designed with Apple’s experience in Objective-C in mind.
So even though its history is much shorter, Swift is not mature because it comes from a long tradition. Also, we have used version 5.2.4, which only shows that Swift is growing faster.
Apple has worked hard to make Swift your first choice. The environment around Swift is growing, and while Objective-C may be more mature,
Swift is also an “adult.” So, we’re tied here.
The talent pool
Your dream solution may be the best solution ever, but it’s futile without experts who know how to use it. It’s critical for a company to know how much it costs and how easy it is to find their developers.
Swift is the 11th most popular language, according to the most recent Tiobe index released in May 2020, with nearly three times as many votes as the previous year. Objective-c only got 50% of the Swift vote. The number of Objective-C developers will decrease and the number of Swift developers will increase.
There are several reasons for this. First, Apple is likely to steadily retreat from Objective-C. You can observe how Swift is developed and promoted. Second, Swift is easier to learn and start coding. Third, Swift is an open source language that always promotes the community.
Swift won the final round by nose.
Example iOS application encoded using Swift and Objective-C
Another factor you might want to consider is who and how to use a particular language. Only this time you need to be careful with the conclusions. IOS apps created before 2014 were most likely written in Objective-C, mainly because Swift didn’t exist before that year.
Today, many companies are looking into the possibility of converting Objective-C to Swift. Also, we haven’t heard of anyone trying to convert their code backwards. In addition, because both languages can be used in the same application, you will often encounter software written in both Objective-C and Swift.
Uber, for example, uses both Objective-C and Swift. Lyft, on the other hand, has switched entirely to Swift. The same is true of LinkedIn and its app. It’s hard to find a company that wants to stay in Objective-C. No wonder.
The last
In this Swift vs Objective-C comparison, hopefully this will help you to choose exactly what you need.
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