Compare version numbers in Objective-C

objective-c comparison
mlecho picture mlecho · Dec 30, 2009 · Viewed 26.8k times · Source

I am writing an application that receives data with items and version numbers. The numbers are formatted like "1.0.1" or "1.2.5". How can I compare these version numbers? I think they have to be formatted as a string first, no? What options do I have to determine that "1.2.5" comes after "1.0.1"?

Answer

Nathan de Vries picture Nathan de Vries · Jan 2, 2010

This is the simplest way to compare versions, keeping in mind that "1" < "1.0" < "1.0.0":

NSString* requiredVersion = @"1.2.0";
NSString* actualVersion = @"1.1.5";

if ([requiredVersion compare:actualVersion options:NSNumericSearch] == NSOrderedDescending) {
  // actualVersion is lower than the requiredVersion
}

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