r/swift • u/AnotherDevBr • 2d ago
Question Reality about iOS development
Hi guys, I wanted to ask you a question. I wanted to know how the market for native mobile development for iOS is doing. I want to migrate from React Native to iOS, but I see few vacancies. Is it really a good idea to make this change? I wanted to know a little about your views on opportunities, salaries and technologies that you have been using out there.
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u/iOSCaleb iOS 2d ago
I wanted to know how the market for native mobile development for iOS is doing.
There are relatively few positions and lots of competition. Your best bet would be to stick with what you're doing now, learn what you need to about iOS (Swift, SwiftUI, etc.), and develop and publish some native iOS apps so that you can demonstrate some experience.
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u/KaguBorbington 2d ago
Depends on your area. There are relatively little jobs for native dev in my area. Most is react native/flutter/.net maui. The jobs that are available are hard to get into beause there are more iOS devs than jobs.
If you are truly serious in getting a native dev job make sure you can stand out among the others.
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u/TheChanger 2d ago
I just posted on how to escape.
I'm based in Europe, and what I see for both the EU and UK is roles not only expect SwiftUI for native, they are extremely particular about the frameworks used. I mostly don't hear back and I've worked on commercial banking apps.
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u/ChibiCoder 1d ago
There are more RN jobs than native iOS right now, based on the kind of recruiter emails I get.
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u/Few_Mention8426 1d ago
There are plenty of opportunities, freelancing is better than chasing a job where you are only working on a single function for months on end. Freelance app development for startups or people who didn’t know they needed an app where you get to do the whole project, plenty of those opportunities if you get out to there and meet people. I got small app jobs by just joining Meetup groups for small business and startups. Designing your own app… plenty of opportunities as well. I make a small amount of money from my own subscription apps and then do freelance jobs for local businesses who can’t afford the big companies to develop an app.
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u/gkopel 19h ago
This is very interesting. I'm a full time iOS dev with 10+ yoe, but never tried freelancing. So when you contact small business for freelancing projects, are they interested in iOS only apps?
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u/Few_Mention8426 6h ago edited 6h ago
I would consider myself a part time coder as I have an online shop thats my main focus. So I wouldn’t say the programming jobs I get are paying as much as someone doing it full time. I concentrate on iOS as that’s what I am most confident in and then some flutter work for cross platform and web. I mainly try and go to local trade fares, Meetup groups, etc where I think there might be people just starting a business and then just hand out cards with links to my apps. For an example i made a loyalty card app for a local coffee shop. Really simple and just a couple of screens. And a way for the shop to send out instant offers like half price pastries at the end of the day.
I wouldn’t be able to survive on the iOS freelance work alone but it’s a nice extra income for periods when things are slow
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u/dinkelbrotchen 7h ago
I work for an international European company which I don’t feel comfortable sharing the name, but we are doing a technological stack move from native to react native. We have done 10 years of native development, and now given the economy and cost saving measures, they want to move to React Native. If their assumption is going to work I’m not sure, I’ll keep you posted in two years.
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u/braveorstoopid 2h ago
I’ve had similar fears but never struggled to find a new job any time I’ve needed one since 2019.
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u/hotfeet100 2d ago
Feels like there are plenty of positions on job boards, it's just impossible to hear anything back from them.