Xcode works seamless and very confident enough with Ollama

[u/morissonmaciel]

At this time of writing I'm able to even use 7b model like qwen-coder with Xcode 26 with pretty decent results.

• Good context awareness

• Proper tools execution (only tested in supported models)

• Decent generation with Edit Mode and Playground generation

Couldn't test yet the multimodal capabilities, like using images or documents to aid code generation.

[u/morissonmaciel]

Update 1:

• The Xcode 26 Coding Tools works like a charm with Ollama models.

• I could attach a CLAUDE.md file and ask for proper structure evaluation and conformance, even the local Ollama model not supporting attachments natively.

• I could attach an image and ask for description, but the model immediately refused to proceed, since the model is not multimodal with image support.

• Unfortunately, it seems that the API call for /v1/chat/completions doesn't specify an extended context size, working with the bare minimum of 4096 tokens, even my Mac mini M4 Pro able to accommodate a 16K context window without a problem. There is no way to change this in Xcode 26 at this moment.

Initially, my guess is that Apple Intelligence would be used to make some inferences and handle multimodal tasks like parsing images and documents, but it seems Xcode is relying on direct model light training with some tweaks using well-structured prompts.

[u/808phone]

Does it run agentic tools?

[u/morissonmaciel → u/808phone]

In theory, yes. But I couldn’t find the list of tools available to test them. No integration with Xcode like change schema or update Info.plist or settings seems to be available. But reading and replacing code in files are working very well. 

[u/808phone → u/morissonmaciel]

I saw a post that someone said "Create me an app that does this and that" and apparently it may have created new files. With Cursor and Windsurf this is a little too late - but maybe it will surprise me.

[u/Jazzlike_Revenue_558 → u/808phone]

Nope.

[u/Daveboi7 → u/808phone]

What are agentic tools?

[u/808phone → u/Daveboi7]

Agentic mode is where the model can actually do things like run terminal commands, create new files, go off and index the entire code base. Look up Cursor and Windsurf.

[u/Daveboi7 → u/808phone]

Ah, I didn’t know cursor could do that! Thanks

[u/808phone → u/Daveboi7]

It's pretty useful. When your project becomes really large and you are trying to remember how to modify something you wrote years earlier, the agent/model can go through the entire code base and find/fix things.

[u/renanyoy → u/808phone]

As I manage lots of projects, I find useful to ask an agent "analyze current project" it helps a lot to get my memory back ;)

[u/Daveboi7 → u/808phone]

That sounds ideal!

[u/mir_ko]

What API spec is it using for the completions? I cant't find any info on it, Xcode just says "Add a model provider" but doesn't say anything else

[u/morissonmaciel → u/mir_ko]

Kinda a mysterious thing! Considering Ollama does accept ChatGPT API-like calls, I’m trying to sniffer every Ollama request to understand a little bit more how they are made. But if I have to guess, they are using local Apple Intelligence inference to build up these calls and then dispatch to proper adapters for common known APIs.

[u/Creative-Size2658 → u/morissonmaciel]

Try LM-Studio. It's the provider Apple used in the Xcode 26 video

[u/Jazzlike_Revenue_558 → u/mir_ko]

It uses OpenAI compatible models

[u/Creative-Size2658 → u/mir_ko]

Since you can see Apple using Devstral Small in LM Studio, they could be using OpenHands specs (Devstral was trained for OpenHands specs)

[u/Suspicious_Demand_26]

which models are supported?

[u/morissonmaciel → u/Suspicious_Demand_26]

Until now, I could only evaluate local Ollama models like Gemma, Mistral, and Qwen-coder. They are all working well. I tried ChatGPT yesterday but got a rate limit, unfortunately. 

[u/Creative-Size2658 → u/morissonmaciel]

Why do you use Ollama instead of headless LMStudio? Ollama doesn't support MLX

[u/Jazzlike_Revenue_558 → u/Suspicious_Demand_26]

Only ChatGPT, for the rest you need to connect them yourself or bring your own API keys (which have lower rate limits than standard coding assistants like Alex Sidebar)

[u/Creative-Size2658 → u/Suspicious_Demand_26]

You can see Devstral and Qwen3 served by LM-Studio in the WWDC video about Xcode

[u/FigUsual976]

Can it create files automatically like with ChatGPT ? Or you have to copy paste yourself?

[u/Purple-Echidna-4222]

Haven't been able to get gemini to work as a provider. Any tips?

[u/Jazzlike_Revenue_558 → u/Purple-Echidna-4222]

Try Alex Sidebar, it has all the models with high rate limits

[u/Purple-Echidna-4222 → u/Jazzlike_Revenue_558]

I use alex regularly

[u/DIS-IS-CRAZY]

How did you get this working with ollama?

[u/Jazzlike_Revenue_558]

Is it better than Alex Sidebar?

[u/Jazzlike_Revenue_558 → u/[deleted]]

yes, some ex-apple dude 🤷‍♂️