How to run iPhone emulator WITHOUT starting Xcode?

244
votes

On my old Mac running Snow Leopard, I could type "ios" into spotlight and it would start up the iPhone/iPad emulator by itself.

I have since had to get a new machine running Lion. I have installed Xcode for Lion, I have installed the developer tool options from the preferences panel.

But the "ios" option is no longer there :( The only way now seems to be to run Xcode, create an empty project and then launch emulator with the run option.

I have searched and searched the intertubes and the facewebs, but nothing helps.

Does anyone know how to run only the emulator on Lion?

UPDATE: THIS IS RESPONSE TO @ike_love thread below. THAT answer is not assured to work on all Yosemite machines.

enter image description here

19
xcodeosx-lionios-simulator
type "simulator" instead of "ios" ;) – René Roth

19 Answers

205
votes

The easiest way without fiddling with command line:

  1. launch Xcode once.
  2. run ios simulator
  3. drag the ios simulator icon to dock it.

Next time you want to use it, just click on the ios simulator icon in the dock.

423
votes

Assuming you have Xcode installed in /Applications, then you can do this from the command line to start the iPhone Simulator:

$ open /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/iPhoneSimulator.platform/Developer/Applications/iPhone\ Simulator.app

(Xcode 6+):

$ open /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Applications/iOS Simulator.app

You could create a symbolic-link from your Desktop to make this easier:

$ ln -s /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/iPhoneSimulator.platform/Developer/Applications/iPhone\ Simulator.app ~/Desktop

(Xcode 6+):

$ ln -s /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Applications/iOS Simulator.app ~/Desktop

As pointed out by @JackHahoney, you could also add an alias to your ~/.bash_profile:

$ alias simulator='open /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/iPhoneSimulator.platform/De‌​veloper/Applications/iPhone\ Simulator.app'

(Xcode 6+):

$ alias simulator='open /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Applications/iOS\ Simulator.app'

(Xcode 7+):

$ alias simulator='open /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Applications/Simulator.app'

Which would mean you could start the iPhone Simulator from the command line with one easy-to-remember word:

$ simulator
89
votes

In XCode 7+ the location is now 

/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Applications/Simulator.app

Run it from the command line

$ open -a Simulator

Hope that helps somebody

31
votes

From Terminal you have to run:

open -a Simulator
24
votes

No need to do anything on the commandline.

Just use spotlight to run simulator.app

screenshot of spotlight searching simulator.app

21
votes

is it helpful to you see the image enter image description here

Edit

Now with new Xcode if the icon of the Xcode is on dock you can just right click it and form the menu you can select Open Developer Tool and in the sub menu you can select the iOS Simulator to open the simulator without opening the Xcode.!enter image description here

20
votes

You can get it to launch via spotlight if you create an Automator launcher for it:

  1. Open Automator.app
  2. Choose type of Application
  3. Select Actions > Library > Utilities > Launch Application
  4. Open the dropdown of applications that can be launched and choose Other
  5. You can't directly select the Simulator app because it's inside the Xcode.app package. So instead you'll have to navigate to it in a separate Finder window and drag it onto the file selector window. It will be at one of the following paths depending on your version of Xcode (oldest to newest):
    • /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/iOS Simulator.app
    • /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/iPhoneSimulator.platform/Developer/Applications/iOS Simulator.app
    • /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Applications/Simulator.app
  6. Finally, save this Automator app in your applications folder as iOS Simulator.app

Create Automator app

To get a nice icon for the Automator app you just made, you can do the following:

  1. Right click iOS Simulator.app and choose Get Info
  2. Click the icon in the upper left corner and do Cmd-C to copy it
  3. Right click your Automator app and choose Get Info
  4. Click the icon in the upper left corner and do Cmd-V to paste

Copy icon

16
votes

As the multitude of answers indicate, there are lots of different ways to address this issue. Not all of them address what is my number one issue, and what seems to be the asker's priority, as well: The ability to launch from Spotlight.

Here's the solution that works well for me, and should work with any OS X and XCode versions. I've tested it on OS X 10.11 and XCode 7.3.

Initial setup does require launching XCode, but after that, you won't need to just to get to the Simulator.

Setup

  1. Launch XCode
  2. From the XCode menu, select Open Developer Tool > Simulator
  3. In the dock, control (or right) click on the Simulator icon
  4. Select Options > Show in Finder
  5. While holding down Command and Option, drag the Simulator icon to the applications directory. This creates an alias to it.
  6. If desired, rename the alias from "Simulator" to "iOS Simulator". Whatever you name it is what it will show up as in Spotlight.

Note: There are other ways to get to the location of the Simulator app (steps 1-4), such as using Go to Folder… in the Finder, but those require knowing the location of the Simulator to begin with. Since that has changed from version to version of XCode, this way should work regardless of these changes.

Use

  1. Launch Spotlight (command-space, etc.)
  2. Type "simulator" or "ios" (if you renamed the alias).
  3. If necessary, use the down arrow to scroll to the Simulator alias. Eventually, spotlight should learn and make the alias the top choice so you can skip this step.
  4. Hit return
12
votes

Try below instruction for launching iphone simulator:

Goto Application Folder-->Xcode app-->right click to Show Package Contents-->now show files in xcode contents-->Developer-->Platforms-->iPhoneSimulator.platform-->Developer-->Applications--> now show iOS Simulator app click to launch iphone simulator...!

11
votes

With Xcode 6 the location of the simulator has changed to:

/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Applications/iOS Simulator.app

It can no longer be found here:

/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/iPhoneSimulator.platform/Developer/Applications/iPhone Simulator.app

I hope this helps someone since I sometimes want to start the simulator from terminal.

9
votes

The solutions above didn't work for me in ZSH. I needed to escape the dot in the iPhoneSimulator.platform. This works for me:

alias simulator="open /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Applications/iOS\ Simulator.app"

This could be even more resilient version:

alias simulator="open -a 'iOS Simulator'"
8
votes

There's a far easier way:

  1. Hit command + space, Spotlight Search will appear
  2. Type in iOS Simulator and hit return

Done.

----- In follow up to @E. Maggini downvote---

Yes you can still easily access iOS Simulator using Spotlight.

enter image description here

8
votes

In the terminal: For Xcode 9.x and above

$ open /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Applications/Simulator.app

For Xcode-beta 9.x and above

$ open /Applications/Xcode-beta.app/Contents/Developer/Applications/Simulator.app
5
votes

The easiest way is to use Spotlight Search. Just click CMD+Space and type in search Simulator. Just like this:

enter image description here

And in few seconds emulated device will be loaded:

enter image description here

To switch to another device you can use menu under Hardware -> Device

There are few different cool instruments you can use under Hardware menu, such as orientation change, gestures, buttons, FaceID, keyboard or audio inputs.

3
votes
  1. Go into Finder.
  2. On the sidebar, click applications.
  3. Find Xcode in Applications.
  4. Right click Xcode by whatever settings you have (usually two finger click [not tap]).
  5. Click "Show Package Contents."
  6. Go into the Contents folder.
  7. Search simulator.
  8. Wait 30 secs for it to load.
  9. Scroll down and find iOS Simulator.
  10. You may drag this onto the dock for easier access.

I hope this helps!

3
votes

I know it is an old question, but this might help someone using Xcode11+ and macOS Catalina.

To see a list of available simulators via terminal, type:

$ xcrun simctl list

This will return a list of devices e.g., iPhone 11 Pro Max (6A7BEA2F-95E4-4A34-98C1-01C9906DCBDE) (Shutdown). The long string of characters is the device UUID.

To start the device via terminal, simply type:

$ xcrun simctl boot 6A7BEA2F-95E4-4A34-98C1-01C9906DCBDE

To shut it down, type:

$ xcrun simctl shutdown 6A7BEA2F-95E4-4A34-98C1-01C9906DCBDE

Alternatively, to launch a simulator:

open -a simulator

Source : How to Launch iOS Simulator and Android Emulator on Mac

1
votes

I created an automator app based on @trojanfoe's answer so you can launch iOS Simulator directly from your Dock https://github.com/tsdexter/ios-simulator-expo-utilities/

1
votes

In case you were trying to open multiple distinct simulators at once:

Open the Simulator app, not Xcode.

Then File >> Open Device >> Select iOS version >> select device.

enter image description here

The location of the 'open device' has changed in different Xcode versions so it may be at a different place

0
votes

From Terminal just run this command:

ios-sim  start

Or,add this to your ~/.profile to save yourself a few keystrokes:

alias ios="ios-sim  start"

Not sure which version of Max OS X and Xcode this command became available. I'm running 10.10.3 and 6.3 respectively.