Best Tutorials For Learning Swift & iOS Development

The Internet is a big place, and learning Swift and iOS development is a big task. There is a huge volume of material out there for beginners to get their feet wet, but it can be tough finding a good place to start. This project began as an additional learning resource for our own iOS students, but it's my hope that other readers will find it useful as well. This list of iOS app development tutorials will remain on on-going project (for now), so if you know of a must-have tutorial that I missed, please don't hesitate to reach out to max@digitalcrafts.com and let me know.

Remember, teaching yourself to program is a daunting task that takes motivation, persistence, and repetition above all else. And if you're having trouble getting the ball rolling, let us know - it's what we do!

This shouldn't come as a surprise, but to start building your own iOS apps, you'll need to first learn Swift, Apple's new programming language that was released in 2014 as a replacement for Objective-C. While Objective-C is still very prevalent on the job market due to legacy code, Swift is the language of the future for all Apple platforms and it's time to embrace it! Here are some great tutorials and resources to get started with the syntax, which you may find reads somewhat like JavaScript.

Apple Swift Documentation - the end of the line when it comes to Swift. While it's not always the most beginner-friendly resource, it is certainly exhaustive and useful for developers at any skill level.

Swift Cheat sheet - Just a quick Swift cheat sheet that has been updated for Swift 2.0. Definitely useful as a desktop PDF reference when you're coding away and can't quite remember how that switch statement looks.

Another List of Swift Resources - This might be a bit of an overload (of course, we're biased and prefer our list), but we wouldn't be doing our job if we didn't include this exhaustive collection of links.

Ray Wenderlich Swift Tutorials - As you start searching around the Web for iOS and Swift resources, you'll quickly find that Ray has more than a handful, and they're all good. If you already have some experience programming, you could also try their quick-start guide.

On to Xcode, Tutorials, and Beginner Projects

"Intro to Xcode" Video Series - About a year old, so not the most up-to-date, but there are 14 videos in this series and most of the concepts haven't changed.

Xcode Tutorial and Introduction - "Code With Chris" does a good job here of de-mystifying Xcode and its many panels, buttons, windows, etc. Long article but worth a read before really diving in.

Familiarize Yourself With Storyboards (Part 1 and Par t 2) - Storyboards are an iOS developer's best friend, and it's important to learn your way around. You'll be glad you did! (Just interested in what's new with Storyboards in iOS 9?)

Almost Every App Uses TableViews - Learn it. Something you can also do here.

Make a Gesture-Driven To-Do List (Part 1 and Part 2) - If you haven't noticed, we're big fans of the Wenderlich tutorials here at DigitalCrafts, and here's a full list of them.

Lastly, a Simple Drawing App Using UIKit and Swift - Enjoy!

In addition to all the great tutorials and resources listed above, you should also check out Stanford's iOS Program through iTunesU. It moves quickly, but goes into great depth and even has the opportunity to earn a certificate for a small fee.

If online learning isn't for you, or if you're having trouble getting past that "beginner hurdle", consider a coding bootcamp that offers an iOS class. DigitalCrafts offers an iOS Evening Class in Atlanta that covers Swift, Xcode, and all the basics of iOS app development, as taught by our expert instructor, Joe DeCarlo. Give us a holler at (770) 858 - 5806 if interested!

All the best,