macOS App Best Practices

Overview

macOS apps are organized around scenes the system manages: windows, document groups, settings, and menu-bar extras. Pick the right scene types for SwiftUI, gate Mac-only behavior behind #if os(macOS), and reserve Mac Catalyst for bringing an existing iPad app to the Mac rather than starting new Mac apps on it. The guidance below is grounded in Apple's SwiftUI, AppKit, and Mac Catalyst docs.

App Architecture: Scenes

A Scene is a root of a view hierarchy with a system-managed life cycle; an App presents its scenes. The system shows scenes differently per type and platform, and may display several instances of one WindowGroup at once (for example, multiple windows).