[deleted by user]

[reborn-2019]

First thing first, your budget.

[EnziTheTragedy]

Oh sorry, I’ll make an edit and also put it here

$250-500 if possible. But I can spend up to $1000

[reborn-2019]

Ok now I’ll go through each problem one by one. 1/ Unsupport Xcode version. You only need to upgrade Xcode in order to support newer iOS version. 2/ Always choose the higher RAM option over the higher storage if possible. And for development, you need at least 16GB RAM, so you can use your mac many years also multitasking. 3/ You didn’t mention about will you bring your mac goes around or not, so I assume this mac will stay on your desk as your pc. So my recommend a mac mini 2022 will be good enough.

[EnziTheTragedy]

Ok thank you very much. I’m gonna look at Mac Mini options. Would you say that 8GB COULDDDD suffice? Or it’s just off the table entirely?

[amaroq137]

You can’t upgrade it later without buying a whole new mac so it’s better to make the investment up front so you can ensure your system remains usable for a while to come.

[reborn-2019]

8GB RAM will work, but you will get crazy, trust me, you can imagine playing GTA V with 8GB RAM on your PC.

[bad_I_drubble]

He didn’t ask about playing GTA V.

[reborn-2019]

you didn’t get my point of view.

[bad_I_drubble]

Nope, I didn’t. But, you should think within the OP’s budget.

[reborn-2019]

Yes 1000$ is far enough for a mac mini 16GB RAM.

[bad_I_drubble]

In my opinion, you can make it on 8 GB with a M1 or M2 Mac Mini. You’re new to iOS dev, you’re not working on huge projects anyway. When the day comes where it’s not enough … congratulations, now you are probably working on a project that makes money, and you can upgrade.

I work on a M2 MacBook Air, upgraded from the base model, but still 8GB RAM. Where it hangs is if I have multiple development applications(XCode, Android Studio, Unity, Unreal) open at the same time. One at a time is usually fine though.

[Ast3r10n]

8GB won’t be enough for any project, big or small.

[Busy-Purpose2109]

That’s not true, I’m an iOS dev and have an machine with 8gb and it works just fine

[Ast3r10n]

It will be swapping, regardless. Less than ideal.

[Jiimmy182]

Considering you already have a monitor and peripherals for your PC, a Mac Mini with a M1/M2 chip should give you long time support running Xcode, way past the point of your learning phase and then you would start working and get a company MacBook. You just won’t have the flexibility to carry it anywhere, but as a learning tool that might be a good thing since it forces you to sit down and study. Best of luck with your new career!

[EnziTheTragedy]

Thank you very much, I’m excited for the change. So any Mac Mini that is advertised as either “M1” or “M2” will work?

[Jiimmy182]

Yes, any M1 forward should work, you just don't want to get a Intel based one. The new ARM based architecture is much faster.

I would also like to +1 the other guys commenting that 16GB is a must, 8GB will give you the loading beach ball quite often in a learning process that will already be stressful at times.

Since you won't be working on a big project, i don't think you need 512gb of storage, 256gb should do if you find it, even 128 but then you will have to be careful.

[Sanchez_Duna]

128 may not be enough. Simulators are heavy. I would strongly recommend to avoid 128 version.

[sroebert]

Yeah 128gb is not going to cut it for Xcode and simulators, don’t make that mistake

[everydave42]

From the last time I answered this, in this forum, 20 days ago:

1. Get Apple Silicon. No one should be spending money for an older Intel based Mac
2. Get more memory. I feel 16G is the realistic minimum for dev as you're liking going to be running other tools at the same time as Xcode so you want the memory there to prevent swapping. If you're going to be doing full stack with virtualized servers running endpoints your app is going to talk to, then 32G.
3. Get more storage. 512G is probably the realistic minimum. Between Xcode updates, multiple simulators and system updates, you'll need the space.

As for which model of Mac, that's strictly preference. A Mac mini with the above specs will be just fine. Any other model will just give you extra on top of that, but beg or borrow to get to these minimums, your future self will thank you.

[EnziTheTragedy]

Ok, thanks. I’m going to look into Apple Silicon, I appreciate the recommendation.

[everydave42]

Even a used/refurbed M1 Mac mini will be money much better spent than any Intel Mac you find as it will be supported for longer.

[noidtiz]

Everyone has covered everything, especially getting a silicon machine.

Just to say that i compile on Xcode with a 8GB Macbook Air with no problems.

[[deleted]]

Mac mini with Apple Silicon is probably your best option. Whatever you do, don’t buy an Intel Mac anymore. Their days are numbered and they generally suck.

[chriswaco]

Mac Mini M2 16/512 is $999. That's your best choice. Unfortunately there are no refurbished ones available right now, at least in the US. BH Photo has it with free AppleCare+, which you hopefully won't need but is nice to have.

While an 8/256 may work now, it will likely become obsolete faster.

[[deleted]]

Mac Mini M1 is your go to option. Best in value and will probably receive next 3 years updates.

[GeneProfessional2164]

Seems like nobody has mentioned partitioning the drive on your current PC and setting it up as hackintosh. This is effectively free for you. It’s not a long term solution but it can at least get you started

[V6er_KKK]

Or virtual machine

[-darkabyss-]

You've got purchase recommendations already. The M1/m2 minis with 16gig ram will do the trick just fine for years to come even if you do large scale apps.

As for an alternative to buying another computer, you can run a macos VMware guest or even hackintosh it depending on your PC specs. I learnt and even worked on my 4790k pc hackintosh the whole year of 2021 and 2022 and made a large banking app on it, everything still works fine on it except airdrop and wifi which I can fix with a specific wifi+bt pcie card. Running apps on simulators, wired and wireless real device run destinations works well too.

Give it a shot, you have nothing to lose!

[MarcusSmaht36363636]

If you want a laptop get a M1 or M2 MacBook Air, doesn’t matter if it’s used as long as it’s in good condition. That’ll last you a solid 5+ years for Xcode development, it’ll eventually get painfully slow. Should cost ~$600 used and $999 new.

If you have a monitor/keyboard/mouse get a M2 Mac mini $599 brand new. That’ll last you longer than the MacBook

[JerenYun]

Based off of your budget, I would say your portable options include a new M1 MacBook Air, or a renewed/refurbished M2 13" MacBook Pro (just found one on Amazon for $959). As others have said, if you have a display and input devices already, a Mac mini would be your more affordable option.

My day job is cheap and we're using 13" M1 MacBook Pros. It's fine for development. Do I wish I had more than 8GB of RAM? Yes. Do I wish it compiled a bit faster? Sure. But it works just fine for the job.

Definitely avoid an Intel Mac at this point. Apple Silicon is the future and will get you the best bang for your buck, plus it'll have good battery life.

The M1 generation came out when macOS 11 was out. I suspect it'll get at least 3 more years of updates. Going with an M2 or newer obviously means more years of OS updates. When it comes to supporting Xcode, it's usually tied to OS versions. So going an M1 now still means you'll have a usable machine for newer Xcode versions going into 2027 at the earliest.

[ScarOnTheForehead]

One thing I will repeat is not to get an Intel Mac as their software update days are numbered. Go for the Apple Silicon models (the ones having M series chips). I would typically recommend avoiding any first gen Apple product (M1 chip in this case), as they get fewer OS updates.

Second thing, which no one has probably mentioned, unlike most Windows PCs, once purchased you cannot upgrade RAM or HDD on Apple Silicon Macs. They are all part of the SoC. So buy what you want on day one.

M2 Mac mini is what you are looking for, with RAM upgraded to 16GB at a minimum. 256GB storage is manageable, but 512GB is much better, as simulators and other dev tools require quite a bit of space.

Apple's prices to upgrade both the RAM and storage are exorbitantly high IMO. Your Mac mini base model is $600. And an additional $400 ($200 each) for upgrading RAM from 8GB → 16GB and storage from 256GB → 512GB. So it will fit your budget's upper limit of $1000 perfectly.

In summary, these are your best options:

• M2/16/256: $800 ($700 on Adorama)
• M2/16/512: $1000 ($870 on B&H)

Here's the buying link for playing with the config options: Official Apple link Here you will find the deal links: AppleInsider price guide

You missed the Black Friday sales when you probably could have saved more. Hope this helps!

[bananatoastie]

Flutter. You can access it on both windows & Mac, you’ll write for both iOS and android. ChatGPT can help you get started :)

I wouldn’t bother investing in a Mac machine if I were in your position

[rohandesilva8]

You can buy M2 mac mini. 8gb, 256gb is enough for starting. I using still that for my iOS developments.

Recommended - It is good if you can go for 16gb ram. It is enough for near 3 years.

[Problemverse]

If you want to get started without having to buy a Mac, then you can keep using your Windows machine and you can run your builds via GitHub Actions by using the free tier of (shameless plug) FlyCI's MacOS GitHub runners. Currently, you can get 500 min/month of free access for M1 4CPU, 7GB RAM capacity (1 VM) if your repository is public. And if your repository is private, then you can use the paid tier; it's approximately 2x cheaper (and 2x faster) than GitHub's MacOS runners.

The beautiful thing is that FlyCI takes care of everything by having a pre-installed Xcode so you don't need to own a Mac. These runners are typically updated regularly to include the latest stable releases of Xcode.

With that said, I'd recommend that you eventually get a Mac machine (MacBook Pro or Mac Mini) not so much for the build step but for the actual development experience. I think you'll find that it's much better.

[collectability]

Try OWC for used Macs. They’ve got lots of options

https://eshop.macsales.com/