Hey everyone, I'm beyond excited to share that I've been selected as a Distinguished Winner in this year's Swift Student Challenge! 🎉 It all started last summer, in the middle of a Western Culture class. I was zoning out , and my attention drifted to the Apple Pencil in my hand. And then ,it hit me — this thing is literally a next-level game controller. Think about it: pixel-perfect precision, haptic feedback, multiple built-in sensors... Why aren't we using this for gaming? And that got me thinking — why have we spent the last 500 years treating the "pencil" as just a tool for creation, and not for play? Since graphite pencils were invented in 1564, we've had this incredibly natural way to interact with 2D and 3D space... and nobody's fully tapped into it for games. So, I did something about it. I built a game that's 100% controlled by the Apple Pencil yep, just the Pencil. I know what you're thinking: "How does that even work??" And honestly, I'd love to tell you... but I'm in the final stages of getting it onto the App Store, and it should be live within the next couple of weeks. So for now... 🤐😄 In the meantime, I've set up a Discord server for anyone who's curious about the gameplay, the design, or just wants to brainstorm ideas with me. If you're into creative controls, game design, or just want to hang — come join the conversation! [Join the Discord here!] https://discord.gg/5Rm8WKbekf Can't wait to share more soon!

I was wondering wether you have to create your full app as an Xcode app and then translate it into playgrounds? Because some of the submissions I have seen on YouTube are running on Xcode iPad emulators.

Please help me! I don't know how to write this.I tried many times, and I think it's right, but it always wrong.PLEASE!!

Hi, I have a question related to eligibility. If we consider the eligibility rules and the submission window doesn't change for next year and if the challenge is still happening, would I be eligible in the following scenario - I graduated from an American University for my undergraduate in December 2025, and the submission is in February 2026, according to "Be enrolled in, or have graduated within the last 90 days from, an accredited academic institution or official homeschool equivalent, or an Apple Developer Academy", am I eligible. I am not sure if it applies to university or just high school. If you don't want to answer the hypothetical answer for next year. Take this scanerio, would I have been eligible for this year's challenge if I had graduated from university in December 2024. Thank you

It's Thursday, March 27th 2025 and I'm living in the UK, I have completed my project and submitted it before February 23rd and got the confirmation email and on March 27th, it says results are out but even after I wait for a long time, I still get the same message: We’ve received your submission. We'll send you an email when results are posted. Even after I come back 16 hours into the day which is 4PM GMT, so I want to know where to see the results anywhere else or if it's just a delay.

Hello! i developed an app for the Swift Student Challenge and submitted it, can I publish it to the app store before it is judged.

Hello ! I submitted my project for the Swift Student Challenge at 22 of February, but I never received a confirmation email. I also checked my Apple Developer account, but there is no information about my submission. I used only one Apple ID to submit. I checked all folders on my Gmail.com and didn't find any message about confirmation. What should I do ?

Hi, is there any way to use front camera to do the motion capture? I want recognize if the user raised there hands up with the front camera on iPhone. I was able to do it with the back camera, not the front. Also, if there is any sample code, or document, I would be super happy. Waiting for your reply!!

I developed my app on xcode, and it builds fine for xcode on simulator. However, when I transferred the swiftpm file to my ipad, the playground failed to build with only the error message "Build failed", while preview on playgrounds works fine. I am not sure what the cause of the error is, if anyone has any tips that would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Hi! I have a concern for the SSC: I worked on the Playground app, but on MacOS. My app has been developped to be firstly used on a mac, as the playground app let you directly download your app on you mac and act as a real one. When i wanted to submit, I noticed there is nowhere to specify whether your app should be tested on iPad or on MacBook. I saw Playground apps would be tested on an iPad, does it mean I have to refactor my app to work on one, or i can mention on a comment that it is a MacOS app, and should therefore be tested on a mac? Thanks for your help on this

Hey everyone! I’m currently working on my Swift Student Challenge app and exploring ways to enhance its visuals. I was wondering—does anyone know if images generated by Apple Intelligence Image Playground can be used in the app?

Hello. I've made a shape in the app which looks like the hello sign on apple products at startup. Is this considered plagiarism, or is it acceptable to use it in an app? P.s: i've used Path for it and drawed it with curves

Hi! While working on my Swift Student Challenge submission it seems that I found a race condition (TOCTOU) bug in SwiftUI when using sheets, and I'm not sure if this is expected behaviour or not. Here's an example code: import SwiftUI struct ContentView: View { @State var myVar: Int? @State private var presentSheet: Bool = false var body: some View { VStack { // Uncommenting the following Text() view will "fix" the bug (kind of, see a better workaround below). // Text("The value is \(myVar == nil ? "nil" : "not nil")") Button { myVar = nil } label: { Text("Set value to nil.") } Button { myVar = 1 presentSheet.toggle() } label: { Text("Set value to 1 and open sheet.") } } .sheet(isPresented: $presentSheet, content: { if myVar == nil { Text("The value is nil") .onAppear { print(myVar) // prints Optional(1) } } else { Text("The value is not nil") } }) } } When opening the app and pressing the open sheet button, the sheet shows "The value is nil", even though the button sets myVar to 1 before the presentSheet Bool is toggled. Thankfully, as a workaround to this bug, I found out you can change the sheet's view to this: .sheet(isPresented: $presentSheet, content: { if myVar == nil { Text("The value is nil") .onAppear { if myVar != nil { print("Resetting View (TOCTOU found)") let mySwap = myVar myVar = nil myVar = mySwap } } } else { Text("The value is not nil") } }) This triggers a view refresh by setting the variable to nil and then to its non-nil value again if the TOCTOU is found. Do you think this is expected behaivor? Should I report a bug for this? This bug also affects .fullScreenCover() and .popover().

Hi, Does the iPad Playgrounds app act completely the same way as a MacBook Playground? I am developing my app on a 2020 MacBook Air M1 using Swift Playgrounds. However, since the testing is going to be done on an iPad Swift Playgrounds, I was worried if my playground would work, since it relies heavily on the screen size etc. My app runs completely perfect on MacBook Playrgounds, but doesn't work on the iPad simulator on Xcode.

Hi! I wanted to use Lottie in my swiftpm app, but I've been running into errors and I'm not sure if it's possible. When I try to run the app, it crashes and I get errors saying that the library isn't loaded and the files aren't found (basically these: https://github.com/lottie-react-native/lottie-react-native/issues/373 , https://github.com/airbnb/lottie-ios/issues/2233 ). But moving the framework file into the PackageFrameworks folder doesn't work, and also I'm getting the error that swiftpm cannot distribute packages containing binary frameworks and from what I understand that just isn't something that swiftpm can do. So I was wondering if anyone knows any workarounds to this, or if I should just ditch Lottie? Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated!

Hello, my submission is based on Haptics. Without it the App doesn't make sense. And only real iPhone can give this opportunity. But it says that Xcode playgrounds will be tested on Simulator. Is it indeed like this? What can I do? Thank you in advance!

Hi everyone, I'm currently working on a Swift Playgrounds project where I need to incorporate a Metal shader file. However, when I tried to include my shader file (PincushionShader.metal), I encountered the following error: Is it possible to use Metal shader files within Swift Playgrounds, it is really important for my swift student challenge scene? If not, are there any workarounds or recommended approaches for testing Metal shaders in a similar environment? Any guidance or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Hello, since I'm using SwiftUI and some interface should be optimized for different devices(like iPad and iPhone), so I'm curious that what device would be used to run the App? Is it iPad or iPhone? And could I use SDKs like SiriKit?

I have created a model folder and some swift files that are contained inside the folder. I change the file names to reflect structure or content and when I close the project and reopen it the file names revert to "New File" I am using Swift Playgrounds on Mac. Not Xcode Playgrounds

Hi everyone, I am doing my app playground, when I change the development team or try to clear it, this bug happend? So I wonder do I have to remove it when I submit my work or just leave it there. Signing for "myapp" requires a development team. Select a development team in the Signing & Capabilities editor.