Swift Assist: Apple's AI tool for programming is still missing today
It is not only the more personal Siri with AI that has not yet been delivered. There is also still no sign of a developer tool that Apple has been touting.
According to Apple's announcement, the Swift Assist AI tool in Xcode will look like this
(Image: Apple)
It may be niche compared to voice assistant Siri, but Apple has yet to release another major AI tool from its announcements in June 2024. The Swift Assist developer tool was supposed to make it child's play to develop app prototypes in the Xcode 16 programming environment and experiment with Apple's latest software development kits – However, there is still no trace of it today, in March 2025.
In contrast to the major language models from OpenAI, Google and Anthropic, Apple's Swift Assist should score points with two features, according to the iPhone manufacturer: One is Apple's knowledge advantage in its own programming language and design with SwiftUI. Apple promised to incorporate all of its know-how here, something that other LLMs, which are fed from sources on the web, could not do.
No trace to date
The second point that met with approval from developers after its introduction was the promise of data protection. Apple promised that user input – and therefore also their ideas for apps – would not be used to train machine learning models and would not be stored on servers. The same rigid data protection approach should apply here as with the rest of Apple Intelligence.
According to the videos shown by Apple, Swift Assist should be able to be used via an input line at the bottom of Xcode. Developers can formulate their wishes there and the AI implements them directly in the code.
Unlike code completion, however, Swift Assist has not yet found its way into Xcode, although the software is already at version 16.3. So far, there are also no signs that the function, which requires more extensive AI capabilities than many other tools in Apple Intelligence, could be coming any time soon.
Developers ask for it
Developers in Apple's support forums show little understanding for the delay. One criticizes that code completion alone is a joke compared to the possibilities that Microsoft now offers with its AI tool Copilot. Another complained that other LLMs could not really help with SwiftUI problems and that Apple was the only company with the data to improve the situation for developers.
In its developer keynote at the WWDC 2024 developer conference, the Platforms State of the Union, Apple dedicated a segment of several minutes to the Swift Assist function. If there is no sign of life regarding the AI tool before the next developer conference, which is expected to take place next June, this will certainly lead to some demand from developers.
(mki)
