SwiftTweaks
A library for iOS developers to adjust app constants like colors, animations, and layouts in real-time without recompiling.
What is SwiftTweaks?
SwiftTweaks is an iOS debugging library that lets developers adjust app constants like colors, layout margins, animation timings, and feature flags in real-time without recompiling. It solves the problem of tedious rebuild cycles when fine-tuning UI/UX elements on actual devices.
iOS developers working in Swift who need to iterate quickly on UI designs, animations, and layout constants during the debugging and polishing phases of app development.
Developers choose SwiftTweaks for its Swift-native design, type-safe tweaks, and live editing capabilities, offering a more integrated experience than Objective-C-based alternatives like FBTweaks.
Overview
Tweak your iOS app without recompiling!
Use Cases
Best For
- Fine-tuning animation timings and easing curves on a real device
- Adjusting color palettes and typography sizes without Xcode rebuilds
- Toggling feature flags during development or testing
- Experimenting with layout constants like margins and padding live
- Debugging shadow properties and edge insets interactively
- Creating custom debug actions that execute without recompilation
Not Ideal For
- Projects built entirely in Objective-C that benefit from FBTweaks' macro-based approach
- Apps requiring over-the-air configuration updates without app redeployment
- Teams prioritizing minimal code changes and zero runtime overhead in debug builds
- Developers needing to tweak complex custom types like dictionaries or closures not supported by TweakableType
Pros & Cons
Pros
Enables immediate changes to tweaks like colors and animations without recompiling, as demonstrated in the README's demo GIF where UI updates on the fly.
Includes templates for common tasks such as spring animations and shadows, simplifying setup for standard debugging scenarios with sensible defaults.
Allows execution of debug closures via TweakAction, enabling trigger-based debugging without app restarts, as shown in the Actions section.
Tweaks are disabled in production builds unless explicitly enabled via the TweakStore's enabled flag, preventing accidental exposure to end-users.
Cons
Only specific types like Bool, Int, and UIColor are tweakable; the README admits adding new types requires extending internal components like TweakViewData, which is complex.
Requires replacing hard-coded constants with tweak references throughout the codebase and setting up TweakWindow or custom presentation, adding significant setup complexity.
Relies on shake gesture or custom setup to bring up the tweaks UI, which might conflict with other app gestures or not suit accessibility needs.
Open Source Alternative To
SwiftTweaks is an open-source alternative to the following products:
Frequently Asked Questions
Related Projects
SwifterSwiftA handy collection of more than 500 native Swift extensions to boost your productivity.
BlocksKitThe Objective-C block utilities you always wish you had.
libextobjcA Cocoa library to extend the Objective-C programming language.
Then✨ Super sweet syntactic sugar for Swift initializers
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