Swift vs Objective C | Know Their Differences and Which Should You Learn?

• In this article you will get
• Difference Between Swift and Objective C
• Swift vs Objective C: Detailed Differences
• Pros and Cons of Swift
• Pros and Cons of Objective C
• Conclusion

Difference Between Swift and Objective C

Basis of comparison	Swift	Objective C
Design	Designed by an Apple to develop robust Apple operating systems	It was designed for keeping C++ in mind and the objective of being Object Oriented.
Paradigm	It declares a type-level methods to call an implemented functionalities	It uses a messages to call the implemented functionalities as it was implemented based on Smalltalk messaging
Type	It is a static and strongly typing	It is a dynamic typing
Polymorphism	Polymorphism can be implemented by a typecasting, but it does not exist directly.	Parametric polymorphism in Objective C is be checked at compile time
Boolean Operators	Swift uses are true and false values	An Objective C uses YES, NO values
Templates & Libraries	Swift has a multiple library supports along with a Objective C	Objective C lacks be template libraries

Swift vs Objective C: Detailed differences

Swift: Overview

Starting with a Swift, it is a programming language developed by the Apple in 2014 for the development of the iOS app development. It is an open-source language and emphasizes the modern programming methodology. Being apple supported language, swift has gained popularity quickly and comes with more native development in an OS platforms. The main features of a Swift programming language are:

1.Memory Efficient : Swift supports an Automatic Reference Counting (ARC) which is one of most powerful features a programming language can have. With the ARC, developers don’t have to sweat out memory management as Swift handles it.

2.Easier to read : Swift is beginner friendly, easy-to-read, easy-to-use language that are enables a developers to develop with least coding experience. It is one of the best languages for the beginners.

3.A Safety management : Swift throws out an errors on a basic programming mistakes/bad code that is being written. Though It might mean that are getting a lot of errors as developers, it also accounts for the short feedback loop and better understanding of the code for developers.

These features make Swift popular among the developers.

Objective C: Overview

Objective C was released in 1980s by a Stepstone Company and as the name suggests, it has based on a C programming language. As it has the base of C, C concepts like the pointers are applicable in objective C and it is closer to an Operating Systems than modern languages. Even now, Computer Programming course in C or C++ does well and that mostly accounts for t popularity of C and the love of developers for being closer to an operating systems. An Objective C has dynamic nature and also supports Object Oriented programming making it even more universal to use.

Object-Oriented concepts : Objective C supports all Object-Oriented concepts, making it an even more compatible with a C++. Usage of Object-Oriented concepts makes the Objective C more secure and powerful as a programing language.

Fast : Objective C is a more fast programming language due to being so core to operating system. The fast-performing modules make objective C very famous Though it remains slower than a Swift, its core speed is faster.

Let’s have a comparison between them to settle a debates like swift vs objective c performance, speed and other parameters. Here point-to-point comparison:

Basic Difference:Swift allows to write a variables without specifying the data types while have to mention the data types in an Objective C. Moreover, an ability of a Swift program to behave as per situation makes it more robust as a compared to Objective C. Objective C allows variables to hold the value of any type while Swift has a some fixed data types that it supports. An Objective C supports pointers, it also supports referencing of variables while swift handles a variables by values.

Speed of Coding:The speed of coding is faster in Swift than in an Objective C. Due to syntactical complexities of an Objective C, it is hard to write code in Objective C making it slower for a developer to write code in a Objective C. Lesser imports and strict the rules for writing code in a Swift make it a very fast programming language to write and learn.

Performance:Speed of performance is faster in a Swift than in Objective C. Swift, due to its more efficient structures and tools are 2.6x times more rapid than Objective C. Objective C, on other hand, is also quite fast but is slower by margin than Swift.

Community and Support:Objective C seems to be better programming language than a Swift and Objective C. With the legacy of over 30 years, Objective C has grown a community of more developers and experts. Almost all the answers of Objective C have been answered to date and it gives a huge amount of support and free resources for new and upcoming developers. Swift, being new language seems to lack on this front.

Stability:Objective C is much more stable in its usage across the platforms. It is compatible with all versions of iOS and doesn’t need constant changes with each new version. Swift on a other hand is not stable as it jumps from a one version to other as it doesn’t support backward compatibility.

Maturity:Objective C is more mature than a Swift due to amount of time it has been in the industry.

Salary / Pay:There is almost equal pay for a Swift developers and Objective C developers as of now. But, as a market of Swift is growing, the demand skill disparity is going to improve the salary of Swit developer more than Objective C developer.

Pros and Cons of Swift

Pros of Swift

1. 1.Swift is faster than a most programming languages. It is almost a 2.6x faster than objective C and 8.4x faster than Python which gives a seamless experience to a developers.
2. 2.Swift’s syntax is similar to the programming languages like Javascript making it simpler to write and read even for beginners. It also increases the beginning familiarity of already-coders with a new language.
3. 3.The open source nature of a swift means that it has a big community surrounding its use that opens to the collaboration and newer ideas. It also made it even more customizable as per needs.
4. 4.Swift is safer and less prone to errors due to nature to eliminate the unsafe codes. Safety has always been a specialty of an Apple products and it’s not a surprise that swift is designed in a way to be much safer than its counterparts.

Cons of Swift

1. 1.Swift is very new to the programming languages. Despite beings of its more features, it is around 30 years later in a market than Objective C. It means that most of industry code is in a Objective C and it will take time for industry to resolve the legacy issues and move to a brand new code base of Swift. It also means that problems will be reported for a long time as use cases arise.
2. 2.No backward compatibility of Swift is a major issue and a hindrance in Swift’s growth as programming language. Swift is not compatible with previous version’s code bases and doesn’t support it. It means that with each new version of swift, related changes are must be incorporated.
3. 3.Due to lack of backward compatibility, swift is restricted to be compatible with a third-party tools and integrations as integrations will falter as soon as a version changes.

Pros and Cons of Objective C

Pros of Objective C

1. 1.Objective C has more libraries and built-in tools that make development faster in objective C. With use of a multiple third-party libraries, and can always get with work done with least hassle and don’t have to think about logic of every code.
2. 2.Objective C is compatible with the any available version of an iOS. This robust nature of objective C makes it more sustainable over some time as developers don’t have to worry about the constant version changes of iOS.
3. 3.Objective C functions can be extended from original form and can be customized as per convenience by the addition of some functions. This ability to customize the programs makes it even more powerful.

Cons of Objective C

1. 1.Though the Objective C is fast, it takes a lot of time to code in an Objective C. Due to its difficult structure, it is tedious to write program in Objective C.
2. 2.The syntax of Objective C is more complex and difficult to understand. The complex structure makes it compex for a first-language to learn and even experienced developers face some of difficulties in shifting to Objective C.
3. 3.With an emergence and popularity of Swift, most people have started moving towards it and hence lesser number of a people are there in the Objective C community. Although due to alder language, many problems are already solved, the ability to adapt and evolve objective C gets reduced due to lack of youth coming into space.

Conclusion

Keeping all factors in a mind, it would be fair to say that Swift is a language to go. It is backed by a apple, it is easier to learn, and is now adapted by companies globally. Objective C is more reliable but there is strong case of Swift supporting backward compatibility with its growth making it even more acceptable to industry. Though Objective C is still here to stay due to the legacy issues and its backward compatibility, it is going to be diminishing market.