Install needle with Homebrew, Nix

Project links

• Homepage
• Upstream docs
• Package manager page

Commands and aliases

• needle

Project history

The public GitHub repository was created on 2018-04-06. The README frames Needle against Swift DI libraries such as Cleanse and Swinject, while comparing its compile-time generated graph more closely to Dagger on the JVM. The project goals call out high reliability, code generation performance for multi-million-line codebases, and compatibility with iOS architectures including RIBs and MVx.

Needle ships both a runtime framework, NeedleFoundation, and the `needle` generator executable packaged by Homebrew. Its release process documentation explicitly includes publishing to CocoaPods and Homebrew, which matches its split identity as both a Swift package/library and a developer tool installed into build phases.

Adoption history

Needle's primary adoption channel is iOS application architecture, especially large Swift apps where runtime service locators are too loose and hand-wired dependency trees become noisy. Swift Package Index listed the package as in development for 8 years, with 42 releases and 42 contributors when checked in 2026, and the GitHub API showed 2,006 stars and 160 forks on 2026-07-01.

Homebrew is important because teams usually need the generator binary in local and CI builds. Homebrew's formula page showed stable version 0.25.1 and 1,766 installs over 365 days, 70 over 90 days, and 17 over 30 days when checked on 2026-07-01.

How it is used

In practice, developers add NeedleFoundation to a Swift app, model scopes as `Component` types, express dependencies as Swift protocols, then run `needle generate` to emit a generated file that wires the graph. The generator is commonly invoked from an Xcode build phase or CI step so dependency graph mistakes become compilation errors.

Needle is attractive to package nerds because the Homebrew formula is not the library itself; it is the code-generation tool that makes the library's safety story work. That puts it in the same operational family as SwiftGen, Sourcery, and other source-generation CLIs that become part of a build pipeline.

Why package nerds care

Needle is a notable example of a company-scale mobile architecture tool packaged for general use. It shows how a Swift library can require a separately installed command-line generator, and why Homebrew remains relevant even for ecosystems that also use Swift Package Manager or CocoaPods.

Timeline

• 2018-04-06: Public GitHub repository created.
• 2019: Community tutorials and comparisons began presenting Needle as Uber's compile-time-safe Swift DI option.
• 2024-08: GitHub releases page listed v0.25.1 with Swift 6-related release notes.
• 2026-07-01: Homebrew formula stable version observed as 0.25.1.

Related projects

• NeedleFoundation
• Swinject
• Cleanse
• Dagger
• Uber RIBs

Sources

• https://api.github.com/repos/uber/needle
• https://formulae.brew.sh/formula/needle
• https://github.com/uber/needle
• https://github.com/uber/needle/blob/master/RELEASE.md
• https://swiftpackageindex.com/uber/needle