Xcode6: Run two instances of the simulator

ios xcode xcode6 simulator
vintagexav picture vintagexav · Oct 19, 2014 · Viewed 54.7k times · Source

I have two different targets for my iOS app. Is it possible to run simultaneously the two apps on two different instances of the simulator? It's ok if it would require not to benefit of the Xcode's debugger. So far the only solution I found was to install two versions of XCode, but that's a very heavy/space-consuming solution.

Answer

i40west picture i40west · Oct 19, 2014

You can run two instances of the iOS simulator from the command line. They won’t be attached to Xcode debugging—indeed, it seems only to work if you do it without Xcode running at all.

First, you need to run the app in the simulator from Xcode, in order to get it installed in the simulator. Make sure you’re running the same simulators you’ll ultimately be using

Now open a Terminal window, and do this.

cd /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Applications
open -n iOS\ Simulator.app
open -n iOS\ Simulator.app

Update for Xcode 7: With Xcode 7 the application name of the simulator has changed, so it's this instead:

cd /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Applications
open -n Simulator.app
open -n Simulator.app

When the second one launches you’ll get an error alert. Just dismiss it and select a different device from “Hardware” » “Device”. Now you have two simulators running, and whatever apps you already installed in them from Xcode will be there.

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