Apple introduced the Swift programming language at WWDC 2014.
Apple unveiled Swift during its Worldwide Developers Conference in June 2014. The language was designed for software development across Apple platforms, including iOS and macOS, and was intended to work alongside Objective-C. Chris Lattner led its initial development at Apple, with contributions from other engineers.
Swift combined a modern syntax with features intended to improve safety and performance. These included type inference, optionals, and safeguards against some common programming errors. Although Swift was presented as a new language, it was designed to interoperate with Apple’s existing Objective-C ecosystem.
Apple made Swift open source in 2015. It has since expanded beyond Apple development and is also used on other platforms, although its strongest association remains with applications for Apple operating systems.