Toptal is a marketplace for top iOS and iPhone developers, engineers, programmers, coders, architects, and consultants. Top companies and startups can hire Toptal dedicated (full-time), hourly, or part-time iOS freelancers for their mission-critical software projects.
Mehul is a full-stack engineer with 15 years of professional experience, specializing in iOS development for the last seven years. He has led consumer-facing projects impacting millions of Uber, BlackBerry, and Bolt users. His professional background includes working with various technologies, including iOS, web, back-end, and desktop. Mehul is eager to take on iOS projects where he can leverage his experience to drive projects forward efficiently and with high-quality work.
Ryan is a senior-level iOS and web developer passionate about creating amazing user interfaces and experiences. He's very comfortable working anywhere in the development stack and has 10+ years of doing it. He's well-spoken, very easy to communicate with, quick to respond, and excels at figuring out optimal solutions for any challenge you present. Ryan has an entrepreneurial drive and understands the challenges startups face.
Denis is a software developer with 12+ years of experience in Android and iOS mobile native development and architecture. He is an expert in Kotlin, Java, Swift, Objective-C, .NET, and C++. With solid technical and communication skills, Denis easily solves technical leadership challenges and provides guidance to development teams.
Olga is a software developer with over ten years of experience. During this time, she developed more than 20 iOS applications, some of which currently have around 8 million monthly active users. As a part of a small team of two developers, she built a bank app from scratch in only two months. Olga loves working with an analytics-driven approach to create the best user experience possible in the shortest amount of time.
Tommy is an expert iOS developer with over a decade of experience in this field. Aside from iOS, he enjoys writing back-end APIs using PHP and Node.js. Work-wise, Tommy is detail-oriented and prefers to be deeply involved in a project with constant communication. He's worked in teams of all sizes and has also led a few. Tommy takes a quality-focused approach to engineering and avoids taking shortcuts that compromise maintainability or user experience while always being aware of business needs.
Stephen has specialized in iOS design and development since 2012. He has delivered a wide array of groundbreaking apps for clients, ranging from individuals to some of Germany's largest companies in the automotive and other sectors. The products he invents are exceptionally well-designed and usable because he understands customers' needs, collaborates closely with stakeholders, and responds to ongoing user feedback. Stephen values customer satisfaction, team harmony, integrity, and reliability.
Maria is a software engineer with expertise in iOS development, using Swift and the UIKit framework. She has industry experience in the finance, insurance, and legal sectors. Maria developed a collaboration iOS app for lawyers and law firms and a fitness app that allows users to integrate with several fitness device providers and aggregate their data in one place. She has also worked on back-end services using AWS, Firebase, Node.js, and Python.
Stephen is a senior full-stack engineer with over ten years of experience. He has five years at Meta, working on mobile video products, including Facebook, Instagram Live, and Oculus TV, and one year as a lead. He also has ten years of iOS and mobile-first development. He was a service Army Intel Analyst with a Secret Security Clearance as of 2022. He was a previous CTO and cofounder of multiple startups. He has a bachelor's in Computer Science from the University of Missouri, Columbia.
Dani is a senior engineer based out of San Francisco. He has previously co-founded Saily, a mobile app that was acquired in 2017. In 2018, he was listed on Forbes 30 Under 30 for developing the most advanced iOS (Swift/ObjC) framework. He's authored several iOS focused courses, spoken at tech events around the world, and lead large and small teams of talented engineers. Dani now enjoys helping startups build their mobile MVP fast.
Dmitry is an energetic, passionate iOS developer with 10 years of experience in mobile development. He's capable of writing efficient, robust, highly reusable, testable, and maintainable code. He advocates for a seamless user experience with a polished, self-descriptive user interface. He also has strong expertise in database design, cloud technologies (AWS), and architectural patterns. Recently, Dmitry has led a team of iOS developers to develop a banking iOS application.
Aline is a mobile developer with 7+ years of experience specializing in the iOS environment, building apps from scratch, and handling large existing codebases. At Uber, she was part of the Safety team, shipping features used by millions of users with high levels of reliability and observability. At PicPay, a large Brazilian fintech, she led the mobile platform team, focusing on automation and efficiency. Aline is willing to leverage her experience and skill set on new and challenging projects.
iOS developers are crucial to mobile app development projects, serving nearly one-third of all mobile users globally by building and maintaining native apps for Apple products. This hiring guide presents actionable instructions for assessing iOS developers, as well as advice for crafting compelling job listings and interview questions.
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Testimonials
Tripcents wouldn't exist without Toptal. Toptal Projects enabled us to rapidly develop our foundation with a product manager, lead developer, and senior designer. In just over 60 days we went from concept to Alpha. The speed, knowledge, expertise, and flexibility is second to none. The Toptal team were as part of tripcents as any in-house team member of tripcents. They contributed and took ownership of the development just like everyone else. We will continue to use Toptal. As a startup, they are our secret weapon.
Brantley Pace
CEO & Co-Founder
I am more than pleased with our experience with Toptal. The professional I got to work with was on the phone with me within a couple of hours. I knew after discussing my project with him that he was the candidate I wanted. I hired him immediately and he wasted no time in getting to my project, even going the extra mile by adding some great design elements that enhanced our overall look.
Paul Fenley
Director
The developers I was paired with were incredible -- smart, driven, and responsive. It used to be hard to find quality engineers and consultants. Now it isn't.
Ryan Rockefeller
CEO
Toptal understood our project needs immediately. We were matched with an exceptional freelancer from Argentina who, from Day 1, immersed himself in our industry, blended seamlessly with our team, understood our vision, and produced top-notch results. Toptal makes connecting with superior developers and programmers very easy.
Jason Kulik
Co-founder
As a small company with limited resources we can't afford to make expensive mistakes. Toptal provided us with an experienced programmer who was able to hit the ground running and begin contributing immediately. It has been a great experience and one we'd repeat again in a heartbeat.
Stuart Pocknee
Principal
How to Hire iOS and iPhone Developers through Toptal
1
Talk to One of Our Industry Experts
A Toptal director of engineering will work with you to understand your goals, technical needs, and team dynamics.
2
Work With Hand-Selected Talent
Within days, we'll introduce you to the right iOS developer for your project. Average time to match is under 24 hours.
3
The Right Fit, Guaranteed
Work with your new iOS developer for a trial period (pay only if satisfied), ensuring they're the right fit before starting the engagement.
Find Experts With Related Skills
Access a vast pool of skilled developers in our talent network and hire the top 3% within just 48 hours.
The cost associated with hiring an iOS developer depends on various factors, including preferred talent location, complexity and size of the project you’re hiring for, seniority, engagement commitment (hourly, part-time, or full-time), and more. In the US, for example, Glassdoor’s reported average total annual pay for iOS developers is $132,500 as of June 2024. With Toptal, you can speak with an expert talent matcher who will help you understand the cost of talent with the right skills and seniority level for your needs. To get started, schedule a call with us — it’s free, and there’s no obligation to hire with Toptal.
How quickly can you hire with Toptal?
Typically, you can hire an iOS developer with Toptal in about 48 hours. For larger teams of talent or Managed Delivery, timelines may vary. Our talent matchers are highly skilled in the same fields they’re matching in—they’re not recruiters or HR reps. They’ll work with you to understand your goals, technical needs, and team dynamics, and match you with ideal candidates from our vetted global talent network.
Once you select your iOS developer, you’ll have a no-risk trial period to ensure they’re the perfect fit. Our matching process has a 98% trial-to-hire rate, so you can rest assured that you’re getting the best fit every time.
How do I hire an iOS developer?
To hire the right iOS developer, it’s important to evaluate a candidate’s experience, technical skills, and communication skills. You’ll also want to consider the fit with your particular industry, company, and project. Toptal’s rigorous screening process ensures that every member of our network has excellent experience and skills, and our team will match you with the perfect iOS developers for your project.
How are Toptal iOS developers different?
At Toptal, we thoroughly screen our iOS developers to ensure we only match you with the highest caliber of talent. Of the more than 200,000 people who apply to join the Toptal network each year, fewer than 3% make the cut.
In addition to screening for industry-leading expertise, we also assess candidates’ language and interpersonal skills to ensure that you have a smooth working relationship.
When you hire with Toptal, you’ll always work with world-class, custom-matched iOS developers ready to help you achieve your goals.
Can you hire iOS developers on an hourly basis or for project-based tasks?
You can hire iOS developers on an hourly, part-time, or full-time basis. Toptal can also manage the entire project from end-to-end with our Managed Delivery offering. Whether you hire an expert for a full- or part-time position, you’ll have the control and flexibility to scale your team up or down as your needs evolve. Our iOS developers can fully integrate into your existing team for a seamless working experience.
What is the no-risk trial period for Toptal iOS developers?
We make sure that each engagement between you and your iOS developer begins with a trial period of up to two weeks. This means that you have time to confirm the engagement will be successful. If you’re completely satisfied with the results, we’ll bill you for the time and continue the engagement for as long as you’d like. If you’re not completely satisfied, you won’t be billed. From there, we can either part ways, or we can provide you with another expert who may be a better fit and with whom we will begin a second, no-risk trial.
Dennis is a full-stack mobile developer with more than a decade of iOS and Swift expertise. He specializes in growth experience and in-app monetization and has held many technical leadership positions. As VP of Research and Development at SocialKit, he oversaw the launches of multiple apps that reached six-figure monthly downloads.
When it comes to apps that run on Apple’s iOS platform, it’s not easy to hire app developers who can deliver a high-quality finished product. As of June 2024, the Apple App Store featured more than 1.9 million apps, but in 2022 alone, the App Store rejected 1.7 million apps for falling below its standards. Still, an iOS app has to succeed in measures of user satisfaction and user engagement, not just in the App Store.
In terms of mobile app market share, is iOS app development worth the challenge? Absolutely: iOS holds almost one-third of the global market share and more than two-thirds of total subscription revenue while consistently leading the US market. Regardless of location, it’s lucrative for companies with their own mobile apps to support iOS.
To prepare for hiring top iOS developers, this guide helps you navigate relevant tech trends, understand the essentials to include in iOS developer job descriptions, and effectively interview candidates who seek to contribute to your development projects.
What Attributes Distinguish Quality iOS Developers From Others?
iOS developers are often responsible for several crucial aspects of an iOS app and its life cycle. They work in dedicated teams within a development environment like the Xcode IDE to create, debug, and maintain code written in either Swift or Objective-C (to a lesser extent). They may work heavily on the front end, collaborating with UI/UX designers to create apps in accordance with Apple’s Human Interface Guidelines.
In addition, mobile developers on smaller teams may be further tasked with creating corresponding back-end services, running DevOps processes, and helping with both manual and automated QA. Mobile apps come with various challenges that make the ability to manage data on Apple ecosystem devices like iPhones, iPads, and Apple Watches very important.
Like all mobile app developers, iOS developers may be assigned to integrate common features such as push notifications, purchase flows, or location services—it all depends on business requirements. Here are a few of the most important areas an iOS developer might work on:
Web API integration and networking: Working with REST APIs and back-end services may be a hard requirement for certain app features. Candidates may then need to be comfortable with parsing JSON or XML data, handling network error cases appropriately, and making requests using URLSession or Alamofire in Swift, or NSURLSession in Objective-C.
Push notifications: If your project aims to get a user’s attention in real time (even when their phone is locked), you may need an iOS programmer who knows how to use the Apple Push Notification service to leverage this popular engagement technique.
Background tasks: Your app may need to perform short tasks (e.g., refresh or fetch) or long tasks (e.g., extensive data processing) in the background. If so, you’ll need an application developer who knows how to enable these capabilities and register tasks with Apple’s background task scheduler.
Authentication: If your app requires a login, you’ll need an iOS developer who has experience with secure frameworks like OAuth and services specific to your tech stack like Auth0 or Firebase Authentication.
Skilled developers know when a solution already exists within the built-in features of the iOS frameworks they’re using, and won’t waste resources on reinvention. They also keep themselves current regarding Apple’s App Store guidelines so their app submissions succeed rather than requiring rework.
Core Skills for iOS App Development
No software skill sets exist in a vacuum, even in the context of proprietary technologies. Regardless of the specific use case, all iOS developers should be skilled with the following tools:
Swift/Objective-C – Swift skills alone are suitable for most projects, since Swift is Apple’s preferred language for iOS development. However, if your company maintains an Objective-C code base, this skill is a must-have for your candidates. If you’re migrating to Swift, you’ll want someone with both skills.
Swift developers should know how to leverage functional programming concepts in implementing business logic, such as composing via higher-order functions and using map(), filter(), and reduce(). They should also know how to keep apps running stably using optional types, and how to optimize compilation times by avoiding heavy reliance on type inference.
An Objective-C developer’s knowledge should go beyond basic object-oriented programming concepts like classes, objects, methods, and properties, and include protocols and categories, as well as memory management best practices, such as when to use automatic reference counting and how to avoid memory leaks. They should also be skilled with Cocoa Touch, which enables developers to access iOS-specific hardware and software features like the camera, GPS, and touch screen.
Xcode – Apple’s official IDE for iOS development, Xcode, has few viable alternatives. The best iOS developer candidates should be power users of Xcode’s code editor, integrated source control, and debugger, and have mastery of Xcode’s Interface Builder—or alternatively, SwiftUI—for building user interfaces. Candidates should also know their way around Xcode’s Instruments for performance optimization; poor performance is often caused by increasing the complexity of the UI without adequately profiling and optimizing hangs.
On smaller teams where candidates might be tasked with publishing, they should be familiar with App Store Connect as well as Xcode app signing and provisioning processes; you may even require them to have their own Apple Developer account. On any size team—even one large enough to have dedicated QA staff—proficiency using Xcode’s Simulator is a requirement for the front-line testing that developers do before releasing a build.
Complementary Skills for iOS App Development
While some complementary iOS developer technical skills will depend on your project specifics, the ones worth paying attention to on an iOS developer’s résumé will often include the following:
Core Data – In the Core Data framework, Apple provides a robust way for iOS developers to model, store, and query data without needing to know the details of underlying data technologies like SQL. Core Data yields many user benefits, such as the ability to sync app data across any Apple devices sharing an iCloud account. Knowing the standard way to do this using Core Data allows developers to spend less time reinventing a sync solution, and provides users with a sync experience that is consistent across numerous iOS apps. Most iOS development teams will be right at home with solutions done the Core Data way, so your current candidates need to be too.
Unit testing – Creating and maintaining automated tests of lower-level components (units) of your iOS codebase are a very worthwhile investment: Regression prevention, reduced QA costs, easier debugging, and a stabler codebase make unit testing a boon from both a developer and a business perspective. Meticulous developers will be in the habit of integrating unit testing with the coding and debugging workflows of their development process.
Swift Usage for iOS App Development: Hiring Swift vs. Objective-C Specialists
Swift was released in 2014 and created to be the successor to Objective-C, offering clearer and more concise syntax, faster performance, and features like automatic memory management. As a result, Objective-C has fallen out of fashion for building new apps, and is now mostly relevant in the hiring market when it comes to the maintenance and refactoring of legacy software.
Because Swift is the default choice these days, if your iOS app development project only uses Swift, the candidate pool will be a lot bigger. If you’re looking for mobile app developers to migrate a legacy Objective-C app to Swift, you’ll want to make sure they have prior experience with this process. Objective-C specialists are often proficient with Swift due to its current popularity, but Swift specialists early in their career may not have any experience with Objective-C.
How Can You Identify the Ideal iOS Developer for You?
To find your ideal iOS developer, you must first have an accurate picture of your project and its overall requirements. Start by thinking about questions like these, as applicable:
Is it a greenfield project, a prototype, a recent launch needing scaling, or a well-established app experiencing a change in team structure?
Does your app use any special integrations, uncommon APIs, or advanced features like real-time video processing?
Is it written in Swift or Objective-C, and is there any plan for that to change?
What are the strengths of your current developers and adjacent team members (designers, project managers, etc.)? What skill gaps do you need to fill?
iOS Development Common Use Cases
It’s worth considering whether your project intersects with these common use cases to ensure that candidates have the appropriate experience and specialization. The use cases for iOS development services are far-reaching and apply to nearly every industry, but broadly speaking, they most often fall into these categories:
Apps made to generate revenue via:
In-app purchases, as is common with subscriptions in utility and lifestyle apps as well as mobile games.
Advertising, which is prevalent not only with games but also with apps that provide free services.
Sales of the app itself, as seen in all app categories.
Apps built for non-revenue purposes such as:
Customer engagement apps that are usually provided free of charge.
Companion apps for specific hardware, like smart home and other IoT devices.
Internal apps meant only for employees, most common among larger enterprises.
Whether creating e-commerce apps, social media clients, productivity tools, home automation, mobile games, or myriad other categories of mobile apps, companies wanting their offerings to run on iPhones will need iOS developers.
After you’ve considered your particular use case, you can list the gaps in your team. Next up in the hiring process is to discover what sort of iOS developer will fill them best. It’s important to narrow your search to the specific level of experience necessary to get the job done and satisfy all project requirements.
Distinguishing Between Junior, Mid-level, and Senior iOS Developers
Often having less than two years of experience in iOS development, a junior developer can create (and perhaps publish) basic iOS applications independently, but will raise time requirements for senior team members, who will need to mentor them in best practices, advanced feature implementation, scaling, and enterprise-quality publishing standards. For example, if they’ve mainly created apps that rely on real-time online data, they may not have delved into Core Data as a storage component for more complex projects. Or perhaps they’ve never had to implement more sophisticated graphics using a lower-level technology like Core Graphics.
A larger iOS project might benefit from a junior developer working on smaller tasks—for example, in a news reader app, they might be tasked with implementing a dark mode option—but when bugs arise, it may take the help of a mid-level or senior developer to navigate the project and troubleshoot effectively. This is especially true if their tasks affect multiple project components.
With between two and five years of experience in iOS development, a mid-level developer will have worked on several iOS apps from start to finish to publication, and learned valuable architectural lessons from their maintenance periods as well. They will likely know both Swift and Objective-C, along with several common iOS architectures, so that they can start making positive contributions soon after onboarding with most iOS codebases.
Mid-level developers will have likely implemented a greater variety of features, so they’ll be comfortable with more advanced technologies like Core Animation, Core Location, and Core ML. They’re used to taking ownership of entire features, whether that means integrating with third-party services, implementing custom user interface or user experience components, or creating novel solutions to address business- and app-specific challenges in projects of any size.
With at least five years of software development experience focused on iOS, a senior developer will have no trouble proving their reliability in delivering successful projects. Senior developers will know how—and more importantly, when—to use expert-level iOS developer skills like leveraging Grand Central Dispatch or optimizing graphics performance using iOS Metal. They have the Swift and Objective-C skill sets needed to maintain or even migrate an Objective-C project, and also to create a well-architected project in either language from scratch. They’ll have a deep familiarity with common iOS design patterns like MVC, MVVM, and VIPER, as well as common Apple frameworks like UIKit (and others provided by Cocoa Touch), AppKit, and SwiftUI. Good candidates will have the soft skills (especially the communication skills) needed to mentor developers, but they’ll also be comfortable collaborating with cross-functional teams and stakeholders to keep project requirements clear and easy to translate into actionable goals. Hire a senior developer with extensive experience if you don’t have one already for any mission-critical or complex iOS project.
In the end, projects and teams have their nuances, and the target experience level is up to you. When it’s not clear what you need, it’s worth consulting the senior developers on your team. If you don’t have any, hire iOS developers with the best track record you can find.
How to Write an iOS Developer Job Description for Your Project
With a rough list of requirements, especially technical ones, you can start customizing an iOS developer job description template. You may also want to incorporate elements from a Swift developer job description if it applies to your project. The more detail you’re able to include, the better—this way, candidates will self-filter more accurately, saving your time and theirs. But the job description has to be accurate to be effective, so it’s worth having someone close to the project check the final listing to make sure that you’re on the right track to hire iOS app developers who will best help your development team meet your business needs.
What Are the Most Important iOS Developer Interview Questions?
It sounds simple enough, but a question like this can be a great icebreaker to kick off a conversation and begin to assess a candidate’s understanding of how their role fits into the bigger picture of an organization. An iOS developer primarily writes and maintains code in the Objective-C or Swift programming languages to build mobile applications for the iPhone. But to write that code in a way that aligns with your brand and business goals, an iOS developer’s daily tasks may overlap significantly with several other roles, depending on the size of your team. A skilled iOS developer should be able to draw upon their direct experiences interacting with these overlapping and adjacent roles: UI/UX designer, graphic designer, DevOps engineer, app publisher, project manager, team lead, marketer, software architect, back-end developer, network engineer, accessibility specialist, and security expert. However they approach your project, an iOS developer must be skilled at translating user requirements into functional, visually appealing, and on-brand mobile features.
If you were to choose between SwiftUI and UIKit for a greenfield project, which project aspects would you need to consider, and why?
This is a great question to ask to get a sense of the candidate’s decision-making process and experience with software architecture. SwiftUI, significantly newer but still mature, makes sense as a default choice for new iOS projects, especially if their feature set will be fairly standard. But an experienced developer should recognize that SwiftUI still lacks some features that the older UIKit has full support for. Apple is improving this situation incrementally, but for more complex or feature-rich projects (for example, those relying on concurrent programming), SwiftUI may come with an unnecessary development burden. A pragmatic candidate may propose a hybrid approach to benefit from the strengths of the two frameworks—especially SwiftUI’s speed in terms of both rapid application development and superior on-hardware runtime performance. That said, a brand-new project may still need to support older versions of iOS that will limit the use of certain features in newer versions of SwiftUI, in which case it isn’t a wise option.
How do you approach accessibility in iOS projects?
Accessibility should be one of the highest priorities in the development process—in fact, regulations may impose accessibility requirements on your project. Strong candidates should know their way around the XCode IDE’s Accessibility Inspector for initial auditing. They should be able to describe their experience with this feature, what they found helpful about it, and some of its limitations. They should also know how to make apps compatible with iOS accessibility features like VoiceOver, Voice Control, and Dynamic Type, and be able to provide examples of how accessibility has changed how they’ve approached UI label texts.
When should you use Apple’s Security framework?
Much like accessibility, security is of the utmost concern when building and maintaining any app that handles user data. The Security framework provides low-level functionality for security aspects like code signing, secure data storage and transportation, cryptography, and user authentication and authorization. But it’s not meant to be a catchall solution, or even the first choice when it comes to developer security considerations. A good answer will highlight that a higher-level framework should be used instead whenever possible. For example, developers tasked with implementing HTTPS functionality would use the URL Loading System API, which uses the Security framework, rather than just using the Security framework directly.
Why Do Companies Hire iOS Developers?
Regardless of industry, any company with a serious mobile strategy needs to offer an iOS-specific app, and therefore needs experienced iOS developers. Your company’s app may well be the primary way your clients interact with you; if so, keeping high standards for your app’s user experience is a crucial strategy for maintaining your organization’s reputation and profitability.
Whether launching a minimum viable product, optimizing an iOS app as it scales, or maintaining a legacy application, companies continue to fuel the demand for iOS developers. But as a hiring manager, you need to know your project’s specific technical needs before you can find a suitable iOS developer.
With the relevant topics and technologies from this guide at hand, you’re ready to start shaping your job description and narrowing your candidate pool. Hiring the right developer for your project will let you see firsthand how offering a professionally made iOS application can bolster your company’s success.