Swift Student Challenge – United States

The Challenge has given thousands of student developers the opportunity to showcase their creativity and coding capabilities through app playgrounds, and earn real-world skills that they can take into their careers and beyond.

Get Inspired

• From connecting peers to mental health resources, to identifying ways to support sustainability efforts on campus, Swift Student Challenge participants around the world are using their creativity to develop apps that solve real-world problems. They encourage you to brainstorm and develop thoughtful ideas for apps that address important issues in your community and beyond.

Distinguished Winners

• Exceptional work deserves exceptional recognition.
• They’re continually impressed by the outstanding submissions they receive for the Swift Student Challenge. And new for the 2024 Challenge, they’re recognizing applicants who take their app playground concepts, design, and execution to the next level — with a next-level award.
• Out of 350 total Challenge winners, they’ll name 50 Distinguished Winners whose submissions demonstrate excellence in innovation, creativity, social impact, or inclusivity. This esteemed group will receive an invitation to join them — in person — this summer for three inspiring days at Apple in Cupertino, where they’ll gain invaluable insights from Apple experts and engineers, connect with their peers through exciting activities, and enjoy a host of other engaging, unforgettable experiences. Travel and lodging included.
• All Challenge winners will receive one year of membership in the Apple Developer Program, a complimentary voucher to take an App Development with Swift certification exam, and a special gift from Apple.

Get Ready

Learning to code with Swift, the same language used by professional developers, offers limitless possibilities to build apps that solve problems that are important to you. Join a worldwide community of student developers who use Swift to create the next generation of groundbreaking apps.

• Explore your tools
  • Tools like Swift Playgrounds and Xcode enable anyone with an idea to create something incredible. If you’re new to app development, try Swift Playgrounds, which includes everything you need to go from your first line of code to building your first app.
  • If you’re already familiar with app development, try Xcode, Apple’s powerful, integrated development environment, used by professionals around the world to develop, test, and distribute their apps.
• Design your app
  • Great apps begin with great ideas. Think about what your app will do and what problem it can solve.
  • You can use the App Design Workbook to review the core principles of the app design process: define, prototype, test, validate, and iterate. For a detailed look at building a prototype, watch 60-Second Prototyping. You can even practice designing an app using the Design a Simple App project. When you’re ready, design the app you’ll submit to the Challenge.
• Learn how to build your app
  • Download the latest version of Swift Playgrounds. Develop your SwiftUI skills by exploring Get Started with Apps and Keep Going with Apps. These engaging tutorials demonstrate the core concepts of coding and building apps.
  • Take your learning further with Swift Playgrounds tutorials, like Animating Shapes, Organizing with Grids, and Editing Grids.
• Build and iterate
  • Now it’s time to put your new Swift and SwiftUI skills into practice by building your app. Swift Playgrounds is a great place to start. To create a new app playground, open the software and tap the App button (+).
• Educator resources
  • Encouraging students to participate in the Swift Student Challenge is a great way to inspire and motivate their creativity, and gives them a fantastic opportunity to stand out among their peers.
  • When you teach coding, you’re not only teaching the language of technology, but also new ways of bringing ideas to life. Apple has designed resources that make it easy for anyone to teach and learn app design, coding, and development.

Applying

• To be eligible for the Challenge, at the time you submit your app playground you must:
  • Be 13 years of age or older in the United States, or the equivalent minimum age in the relevant jurisdiction (for example, 16 years of age in the European Union);
  • Be registered for free with Apple as an Apple developer or be a member of the Apple Developer Program; and
  • Fulfill one of the following requirements:
    • Be enrolled in an accredited academic institution or official homeschool equivalent;
    • Be enrolled in a STEM organization’s educational curriculum;
    • Be enrolled in an Apple Developer Academy; or
    • Have graduated from high school or equivalent within the past 6 months and be awaiting acceptance or have received acceptance to an accredited academic institution.
• You can receive a Swift Student Challenge award up to four times.

For more information, visit Apple.