

You will need an App Store account to download Xcode even though Xcode is free.

If you don’t have Xcode already, click on the Apple icon in the upper left of your menu and select App Store… to open the Mac App Store. Xcode is an IDE (Integrated Development Environment) that includes everything you need to develop macOS, iOS, watchOS and tvOS apps. Unlike some other platforms, developing for macOS requires the installation of just one tool: Xcode. If you already have a developer account for distributing iOS apps, then you are all set – Apple has merged the developer accounts so that you only need a single account to distribute apps for any Apple devices. But this is not a requirement until you are ready to send your app out to the world, and even then, only if you want to distribute through the Mac App Store. Once you’ve built your app, if you want to upload it to the App Store for distribution, you’ll also need to pay for an Apple developer account. You’ll learn how to install this later in this section.

This series is for complete beginners – no experience of developing for iOS or macOS is required! Take a quick look through the topics to make sure and then skip straight ahead to the next part of the series.
