iPhone emulators for PC, and what they really are

People search for an iPhone emulator for two reasons. Developers want to see how an app behaves on iOS without buying every model of iPhone. Everyone else wants to play an iOS game or use an iPhone-only app on a Windows computer. The first need has good answers. The second, as of 2019, has none.

Why nobody runs App Store apps on Windows

An emulator for an older games console can work because the console’s hardware is fixed and well documented. iOS apps are compiled for Apple’s ARM chips, signed by Apple, encrypted for the account that bought them, and tied to system frameworks that exist only inside iOS. No public program reproduces all of that on a PC, and Apple’s license terms do not allow iOS to run on anything but Apple hardware. Any download page promising App Store games on Windows is selling something else.

Tools for developers

Xcode Simulator

Apple’s own Simulator ships free with Xcode and runs on macOS only. It is a simulator, not an emulator: your app is compiled for the Mac’s own processor and runs against a copy of the iOS frameworks, which makes it fast. It covers every current iPhone and iPad screen size and iOS version you install. It only runs apps you build from source, not apps downloaded from the App Store. It also leaves out hardware features such as the camera and some sensors, so final testing still needs a real device.

For Windows users who want to learn iOS development, the usual answer is a used Mac mini, or a rented Mac in the cloud from services such as MacinCloud, accessed over remote desktop. Both run the real Xcode.

Remoted iOS Simulator for Windows

Developers using Xamarin in Visual Studio 2017 get a Windows window that shows the iOS Simulator. The simulator itself still runs on a Mac on the same network, paired with Visual Studio as a build host, and Windows only displays it and passes input through. It suits teams that write code on Windows but keep a Mac for builds.

Appetize.io

Appetize runs iOS and Android apps in a web browser, on any operating system, by streaming a simulator hosted on its servers. You upload a simulator build of your app, compressed as a .zip, and share a link. It is used for demos, customer support and quick checks. A free tier gives 100 minutes a month, with paid plans beyond that. It still needs a build made with Xcode.

BrowserStack App Live

BrowserStack launched App Live in 2017 to let testers use real iPhones and iPads in its data centers through the browser. You upload your app’s .ipa file and interact with it on physical hardware, with logs and crash reports. It is a paid service and, like the others, it tests your own apps. Because the devices are real, it catches problems that simulators miss, such as memory limits on older models and differences in how each iOS version handles permissions.

TestFlight

TestFlight is Apple’s beta-testing service. It is not an emulator at all: it delivers pre-release builds to real iPhones owned by your testers. Some lists attach it to Xamarin or describe it as a Mac emulator, which confuses two unrelated products.

Look-alikes for curious users

iPadian

iPadian is a Windows program that reproduces the look of the iPad home screen. It runs its own collection of apps written for it, and it cannot install or open apps from Apple’s App Store. The developers themselves call it a simulator of the interface. Treat it as a novelty.

AIR iPhone

AIR iPhone is an older program built on Adobe AIR that mimics the iPhone’s interface on a PC. It shows what the phone looked like years ago. It runs no iOS apps.

Ripple

Ripple is a Chrome extension for testing mobile web apps and Cordova or PhoneGap apps written in HTML5, emulating screen sizes and device features in the browser. It was never able to run native iOS apps.

If you want to play an iOS game on a PC

Check whether the game also exists for Android. Many popular mobile titles do, and Android emulators for Windows such as BlueStacks run the Android version. Otherwise, the game needs an iPhone or iPad, or a Mac running the developer’s own Mac version if one exists.

MobiOne Studio, a Windows tool for designing mobile apps, still appears in older lists. It has been discontinued, and the downloads that remain sit on third-party mirror sites.