MVVM vs VIPER – Which One to Use?

As an iOS developer, choosing the right architecture is key to building clean and maintainable apps based on your requirements. Two popular iOS architectures are MVVM and VIPER. Here’s a simple comparison to help you understand them better:

What is MVVM?

MVVM stands for:

Model – Handles data and business logic

View – Displays UI and takes user input

ViewModel – Connects Model and View, prepares data for the UI

MVVM is simple and easy to use. It’s perfect for small to medium-sized projects and is widely used in SwiftUI apps.

What is VIPER?

VIPER stands for:

View - UI user interact with

Interactor - Logic comes here

Presenter - Connects the View and the interactor

Entity - Plain data structures such as User, Item, Article

Router - Handle the navigation between pages/screens

Each component has a specific responsibility. This makes the code more organized but also more complex.

Key differences,

Complexity: Viper is more complex while the MVVM is simple.

Code : MVVM is suitable for smaller projects while the VIPER is great for big projects

Test: MVVM is good but the VIPER has very good support to cover the most

Learning : MVVM is simple to apply but the VIPER needs steep learning curve

So, When to Use What?

Use MVVM if you’re building something quick, small, or using SwiftUI.

Use VIPER if you’re working on a large app with a big team and want everything modular and testable.