How to run CocoaPods on Apple Silicon (M1)

ios macos flutter cocoapods apple-silicon

224,333

Solution 1

EDIT: I recently disabled Rosetta, and Cocoapods runs just fine with the addition of the ffi gem.

For anyone else struggling with this issue, I just found a way to solve it. In addition to running terminal in Rosetta:

Right-click on Terminal in Finder
Get Info
Open with Rosetta

I installed a gem that seems to be related to the symbol not found in the error:

sudo gem install ffi

After doing this, cocoapods runs as expected.

Solution 2

2022 July Update

If you can use Homebrew to manage cocoapods.

# Uninstall the local cocoapods gem
sudo gem uninstall cocoapods

# Reinstall cocoapods via Homebrew
brew install cocoapods

2021 Solution

# STEP 1: Install ffi
sudo arch -x86_64 gem install ffi

# STEP 2: Re-install dependencies
arch -x86_64 pod install

Additional Information

#1 For anyone seeing the arch: posix_spawnp: gem: Bad CPU type in executable error, you must first install Rosetta. Thanks, @Jack Dewhurst

#2 If you run pod commands pretty often, setting up an alias in .zshrc or .bash_profile might be handy. Thanks, @theMoonlitKnight for the suggestion.

alias pod='arch -x86_64 pod'

Solution 3

TL;DR:

Install your own version of Ruby with Homebrew / rbenv / RVM (e.g. brew install ruby)
Add it and the gems binaries to your PATH and make sure the new version is used with which ruby (should be /opt/homebrew/opt/ruby/bin/ruby instead of /usr/bin/ruby if installed with Homebrew)
Install CocoaPods with sudo gem install cocoapods (make sure ethon is at least version 0.13.0)
Run pod install

Detailed answer:

All answers suggesting using Rosetta / arch -x86_64 are workarounds and not quite solving the real issue that comes from the way RbConfig and the universal binaries work.

require 'rbconfig'

OSVERSION = RbConfig::CONFIG['host_os']
ARCH = RbConfig::CONFIG['arch']
HOSTCPU = RbConfig::CONFIG['host_cpu']
BUILDCPU = RbConfig::CONFIG['build_cpu']
TARGETCPU = RbConfig::CONFIG['target_cpu']

puts "OS: #{OSVERSION}"
puts "Arch: #{ARCH}"
puts "Host CPU: #{HOSTCPU}"
puts "Build CPU: #{BUILDCPU}"
puts "Target CPU: #{TARGETCPU}"

If you call ruby on a file containing this code with the universal binary shipped with macOS, you will get the following result on an M1 Mac:

OS: darwin20
Arch: universal-darwin20
Host CPU: x86_64
Build CPU: x86_64
Target CPU: universal

As you can see, RbConfig was compiled for a « universal » CPU but built with an x86 CPU, and the rbconfig.rb file that was generated (see /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/universal-darwin20/rbconfig.rb) consequently uses invalid information for the host CPU.

As ffi uses information from RbConfig (see https://github.com/ffi/ffi/blob/dfae59e293974efaa7b4d414e5116d7a2187a06e/lib/ffi/platform.rb#L61 and https://github.com/ffi/ffi/blob/e3f2cf9b82055709ddbeecbf77810f43438c4b64/spec/ffi/fixtures/compile.rb#L11), we end up with OP’s error message.

The solution is, therefore, to get a version of Ruby built specifically for arm64 by using either Homebrew, rbenv or RVM.

For Homebrew:

Execute brew install ruby
Add export PATH=/opt/homebrew/opt/ruby/bin:/opt/homebrew/lib/ruby/gems/3.0.0/bin:$PATH to your .zshrc (you can find your Homebrew installation directory with $(brew --prefix) if needed)
Execute source ~/.zshrc or restart your shell
Make sure you are using the correct ruby binary by executing which ruby (should be $(brew --prefix)/opt/ruby/bin/ruby)
Install CocoaPods with sudo gem install cocoapods
Make sure you are using the correct pod binary by executing which pod (should be $(brew --prefix)/lib/ruby/gems/3.0.0/bin/pod)
Make sure ethon is version 0.13.0 or more with gem info ethon, otherwise run sudo gem install ethon
Run pod install

Ruby won't come with future macOS versions by default

Moreover, it should be noted that ruby is still included in macOS only « for compatibility with legacy software », as evidenced by running irb -v, so this is probably a good opportunity to install your own version anyway:

WARNING: This version of ruby is included in macOS for compatibility with legacy software. In future versions of macOS the ruby runtime will not be available by default and may require you to install an additional package.

irb 1.0.0 (2018-12-18)

Sources:

Solution 4

To install completely cocoapods on Mac with M1 chip (Apple Silicon), please follow these steps:

Duplicate the Terminal application in the Utilities folder.
Right-click on the app and choose to Get Info.
Rename the other version of the app as you like.
Check the option "open with Rosetta".
Install Cocoapods with the command "sudo gem install cocoapods"
Type the command line "gem install ffi" to fix the ffi bundle problem. Now you can do a "pod install" without a problem.

Source : iPhoneSoft

Solution 5

Simplest way I found :

sudo gem uninstall cocoapods

brew install cocoapods

View more solutions

224,333

Jacobo Koenig

Updated on July 08, 2022

Comments

Jacobo Koenig almost 2 years

I have a Flutter project that I'm trying to run on iOS. It runs normally on my Intel-based Mac, but on my new Apple Silicon-based M1 Mac it fails to install pods.

LoadError - dlsym(0x7f8926035eb0, Init_ffi_c): symbol not found - /Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/ffi-1.13.1/lib/ffi_c.bundle
/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/rubygems/core_ext/kernel_require.rb:54:in `require'
/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/rubygems/core_ext/kernel_require.rb:54:in `require'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/ffi-1.13.1/lib/ffi.rb:6:in `rescue in <top (required)>'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/ffi-1.13.1/lib/ffi.rb:3:in `<top (required)>'
/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/rubygems/core_ext/kernel_require.rb:54:in `require'
/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/rubygems/core_ext/kernel_require.rb:54:in `require'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/ethon-0.12.0/lib/ethon.rb:2:in `<top (required)>'
/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/rubygems/core_ext/kernel_require.rb:54:in `require'
/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/rubygems/core_ext/kernel_require.rb:54:in `require'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/typhoeus-1.4.0/lib/typhoeus.rb:2:in `<top (required)>'
/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/rubygems/core_ext/kernel_require.rb:54:in `require'
/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/rubygems/core_ext/kernel_require.rb:54:in `require'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/sources_manager.rb:74:in `cdn_url?'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/sources_manager.rb:36:in `create_source_with_url'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/sources_manager.rb:21:in `find_or_create_source_with_url'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/installer/analyzer.rb:178:in `block in sources'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/installer/analyzer.rb:177:in `map'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/installer/analyzer.rb:177:in `sources'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/installer/analyzer.rb:1073:in `block in resolve_dependencies'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/user_interface.rb:64:in `section'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/installer/analyzer.rb:1072:in `resolve_dependencies'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/installer/analyzer.rb:124:in `analyze'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/installer.rb:414:in `analyze'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/installer.rb:239:in `block in resolve_dependencies'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/user_interface.rb:64:in `section'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/installer.rb:238:in `resolve_dependencies'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/installer.rb:160:in `install!'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/command/install.rb:52:in `run'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/claide-1.0.3/lib/claide/command.rb:334:in `run'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/lib/cocoapods/command.rb:52:in `run'
/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/cocoapods-1.10.0/bin/pod:55:in `<top (required)>'
/usr/local/bin/pod:23:in `load'
/usr/local/bin/pod:23:in `<main>'

Based on a Github workaround, I tried to run Terminal using rosetta, but the issue remains the same: https://github.com/CocoaPods/CocoaPods/issues/9907#issuecomment-655870749

Realising it's still early for Macs with Apple Silicon. Is there a way to make this work for the time being?

Simon McLoughlin almost 3 years

Was unable to get it working without rosetta following the accepted answer, on a new M1 mac mini. Once installed via rosetta, its probably still running in compatibility mode, even if rosetta is later turned off. The correct answer is Valentin Briand's answer below. A very outdated version of Ruby is installed on Macs by default. Whats needed is to install a newer ruby (easiest via homebrew), config terminal to use that version and then just install cocoapods as normal

Jacobo Koenig over 3 years

Thanks Medhi. Since this is just a paraphrasing of my own answer, I cannot mark it as accept it. If you find this format to be more legible, you can suggest an edit to the answer.
Medhi over 3 years

Hi Jacobo, i figured that your answer were too quick and I didn't even notice the Rosetta part. Sorry, but it's not my call to decide which is best :)
Cliff Helsel over 3 years

This appears to work for me also. First, enable Rosetta on Terminal, install the ffi gem as documented above, then you can disable Rosetta.
Praveen over 3 years

I had the same error and followed the above method and pod got installed. I am using MacBook M1
danial dehvan over 3 years

despite all of the above answers that didn't work for me, this one worked! thanks.
Guven over 3 years

@CliffHelsel What does this actually do? Install a separate version of ffi? If yes, which version is installed? If not, how does this actually help? Couldn't get it working yet, just trying to understand the details.
caffeinum over 3 years

This is underrated. Any of the previous comments didn't help me, and I only needed to run one demo.
Adro about 3 years

@Metropolis, does this mean everytime I'm gonna install new pods, I'll be using this command arch -x86_64 pod install?
Muhammad bin Yusrat about 3 years

How did you manage to disable rosetta.. I don't see any way of doing it...
Jasper Blues about 3 years

IT WORKS !!!!!!!!!!!!! Make sure to use the system ruby. RVM installed ruby (2.7.0) didn't work.
SuperTully about 3 years

These commands worked for me, whereas the original answer did not. Thanks!
Nicolas Braun about 3 years

These commands work fine but you have to use the system version of Ruby. This did not work when i used Ruby 2.7 via rbenv
gundrabur about 3 years

This finally worked for me on a Mac mini M1. I like to add: After step 6. you can switch off "open with Rosetta 2" on the Terminal app again.
Firanto about 3 years

@MuhammadbinYusrat I think what he meant was unchecking the Open with Rosetta on the Terminal.
Endel Dreyer about 3 years

I was having exactly the experience you describe here. Tried applying the patch for ethon locally, but same Segmentation fault error was happening. What seemed to work for me (after having ruby --version as arm64-darwin20) was installing an older version of cocoapods (1.5.2)
Shengchalover about 3 years

Followed every step but was only able to make pods to install after manually installing the latest typhoeus/ethon gem from github (which already includes the patch in the latest commit as of March 28 3e87140...). thanks for diving deep into the issue!
Austin Jones about 3 years

I tried this but get a missing compatible arch error
Hikeland about 3 years

This answer should be marked as the correct answer in 2021.
El Horrible about 3 years

ethon 0.13.0 is out. Thank you for your research.
Louis Lemasson about 3 years

"arch -x86_64" is a hack to just get things working, so this should be the accepted answer. Works perfectly.
ThinkAndCode about 3 years

will there be any issues if don't disable rosetta?
El Horrible about 3 years

@ValentinBriand I installed cocoapods using brew (/opt/homebrew/bin/pod) and it seems it all works (I am using ruby 3.0.1p64). I have ethon 0.12.0 on system ruby but that is not used.
jignesh.world about 3 years

arch: posix_spawnp: gem: Bad CPU type in executable
ScottyBlades almost 3 years

I must be an idiot, because this didn't work for me.
Emre Önder almost 3 years

I done the steps but which pod still gives me /usr/local/bin/pod path. Other steps are correct. How can I change pod location to ruby one?
Valentin Briand almost 3 years

@EmreÖnder do which ruby and which gem point to your Homebrew directory? If not, make sure that /opt/homebrew/opt/ruby/bin is before /usr/bin in your PATH
Emre Önder almost 3 years

Yes which ruby and which gem shows me the correct directory. I uninstalled cocapods and reinstall it but didn't work. If I type $(brew --prefix)/lib/ruby/gems/3.0.0/bin/pod) install rather than pod install It is working. Somehow, cocapod seems usr/bin rather than ruby path
vilmoskörte almost 3 years

This works. Forget the "arch -x86_64" circumvention in the other answers.
Mihir Oza almost 3 years

"open using Rosetta" comes in general section. It’s for those who don’t know this option
Frankely Diaz almost 3 years

Go for the detailed answer is worth the extra minutes! thank you
lee almost 3 years

Thanks, this work for my. With my Xcode work space, also need to update Carthage script path to run success. Thanks again.
tontonCD almost 3 years

Works fine. I need to keep "open with Rosetta" for the Terminal before calling pod install (if not, fails) The next solution (with the -x86_64 option) seems fine too, I'll try it.
tontonCD almost 3 years

wonderful! and it works also with arch -x86_64 pod update. Note that I did sudo gem install ffi once before, don't know if it's important
tontonCD almost 3 years

I have this version, but I still need to prefix all commands with arch -x86_64
Harshit Jain almost 3 years

Great @tontonCD , also you don't need sudo gem install ffi command because you're already doing same with sudo arch -x86_64 gem install ffi
Ahmed Kamal almost 3 years

@tontonCD if you're coming from an older version, uninstalling and reinstalling CocoaPods might fix this for you. please confirm if you had the chance to do so.
tontonCD almost 3 years

No, sorry, my M1 is new, it's the first time I install cocoa pod. It suggests that uninstalling is not sufficient... but perhaps mandatory...
Smart Coder over 2 years

I was having issue with React/RCTBridgeModule.h file not found.
LW001 over 2 years

Could you please link to the answer you're adding to instead of the user auspicious99? They have edited two answers to this question and it's not clear which one you meant to add to. You can copy the link to an answer using the "Share" button below it and edit your post to contain the URL of the answer.
username over 2 years

@LW001 I did the edit - makes sense! Thank you so much!
Adrian Mole over 2 years

You appear to have already posted an extremely similar (near identical) answer elsewhere. Please refrain from so doing; a comment linking to your earlier answer may be more appropriate in such cases.
Mahadhi Hassan Chowdhury over 2 years

Not Working in MacMINI. Getting this error "arch: posix_spawnp: pod: Bad CPU type in executable"
bauerMusic over 2 years

So until there's an ffi update, instead of pod install we need arch -x86_64 pod install every time?
Mike Portanova over 2 years

@EmreÖnder did you ever solve this? My M1 computer arrived today and can't get pod to point to the right ruby.
Anthony Sette over 2 years

Rocking the M1X and this is still an issue, thanks for the help!
Bryan Bryce over 2 years

This is just a duplicate of other earlier answers. Opening with Rosetta isn't required
Kartik Watwani over 2 years

@MikePortanova I can help you. This works like a charm on my new iMac. First, run brew --prefix. Let's say the result is mikes/path. Then the changes for you would be export PATH=mikes/path/opt/ruby/bin:mikes/path/lib/ruby/gems/3.0.0/‌bin:$PATH. Now which ruby and which pod should return mikes/path/opt/ruby/bin/ruby and mikes/path/lib/ruby/gems/3.0.0/bin/pod respectively after you install ruby and cocoa pods as mentioned in the answer.
SmileBot over 2 years

Great answer! But which pod returns /opt/homebrew/bin/pod for me. It seems to run fine. How do I point to the correct pod binary?
Valentin Briand over 2 years

@smileBot I think it's fine since which pod is pointing to your homebrew directory. Also, /opt/homebrew/bin/pod is likely a symlink so check where it points to.
SmileBot over 2 years

@ValentinBriand Ok great. It is a symlink pointing to /opt/homebrew/Cellar/cocoapods/1.11.2_1/bin/pod.
theMoonlitKnight over 2 years

Put alias pod='arch -x86_64 pod' in .zshrc or .bash_profile to just type pod install
Ananthakrishna over 2 years

@xinyang I used these methods but for a firebase project its not working? any idea
aheigins over 2 years

incredible!! after 2-3 hours of searching this fixed it.. thank you.
Christian Gossain over 2 years

This really should be the accepted answer. It's not a workaround. Also note that if you installed cocoa pods before installing Homebrew, make sure to temporarily comment out the Homebrew path from your .zshrc file (or bash version), fully uninstall cocoa pods then add the Home-brew path back. Otherwise there terminal will use the non-Homebrew version of cocoa pods (at least that was my experience).
Albert James Teddy over 2 years

Do not read only the TL;DR, read the "For Homebrew" list that explains each step, in particular how to set up the PATH correctly.
Jack Dewhurst over 2 years

For anyone seeing the arch: posix_spawnp: gem: Bad CPU type in executable error you must first install Rosetta.
TomV over 2 years

[!] Oh no, an error occurred. on Mac M1
TomV over 2 years

The other solutions didn't work. But this one did. Thanks!
Supto over 2 years

Proper solution
sergevm over 2 years

Works fine! To have 'which pod' to show the proper version of CocoaPods, I had to restart my terminal. Followed the brew path.
CodeChanger over 2 years

perfectly working great answer (y)
CoBrA2168 over 2 years

This should be the correct answer. Thank you for the detailed explanation. Worked fantastic on my 2021 MacBook Pro M1 Max.
TomV over 2 years

Only partially works: pod install works fine. pod update has this error: LoadError - dlopen(/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/ffi-1.15.4/lib/ffi_c.bu‌ndle, 0x0009): tried: '/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/ffi-1.15.4/lib/ffi_c.bundle' (mach-o file, but is an incompatible architecture (have 'x86_64', need 'arm64e')), '/usr/lib/ffi_c.bundle' (no such file) - /Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/ffi-1.15.4/lib/ffi_c.bundle /System/Library/Fr
Yakup DURMUS over 2 years

Work it ! Thanks so much. I am use M1 macbook
Sniady over 2 years

I confirm, only brew helped.
qix over 2 years

I used asdf as my ruby version manager and this works fine...as long as you remember to remove any CocoaPods install (sudo /usr/bin/gem uninstall cocoapods) you may have done earlier with the ancient system Ruby, or ! That placed the pod command in /usr/local/bin, which was picked up first in my PATH instead of the asdf shim.
Lucas Garcez over 2 years

To set the Homebrew-installed Ruby to take priority over the system Ruby I need set if [ -d "/opt/homebrew/opt/ruby/bin" ]; then export PATH=/opt/homebrew/opt/ruby/bin:$PATH export PATH=`gem environment gemdir`/bin:$PATH fi on my ~/.zshrc. For the complete guide see mac.install.guide/ruby/13.html
Juan Fernandez Sosa over 2 years

this works fine with my M1 chip
1nstinct over 2 years

brew install ruby Running brew update --preinstall... ==> Auto-updated Homebrew! Updated 1 tap (homebrew/core). ==> Updated Formulae Updated 1 formula. Error: Cannot install under Rosetta 2 in ARM default prefix (/opt/homebrew)! To rerun under ARM use: arch -arm64 brew install ... To install under x86_64, install Homebrew into /usr/local.
SeanMC over 2 years

This works for me on several M1 Macs. Much prefer this over manually running Rosetta for every pod-install
achow over 2 years

Excellent answer and worked for me. Wish this could be pinned to the top
dotslash over 2 years

This works great. I also did brew install libffi for using some 3rd party libs with flutter. the gem shipped from macOS isn't cool.
Владислав Стариков over 2 years

Thank you! Saved my day. This should be accepted answer.
Tautvydas over 2 years

Second step gives me this: arch: Can't find pod in PATH
Kalamarico over 2 years

Thanks a lot to explain the main reason for understand the problem @ValentinBriand The 16k reputation should be yours xDDD
mducc about 2 years

In my case. Just open .zshrc and put alias pod='arch -x86_64 pod' in the end of line
razvan about 2 years

@NicolasBraun how did you get it to work with rbenv?
n13 about 2 years

Feb 2022 - this works. Lots of outdated answers here because native Apple Silicon only started working recently with CocoaPod. Kudos for updating this answer!
pravchuk about 2 years

You copied my answer and edited yours. That's not fair.
Volkov Maxim about 2 years

"2022 Update" works on M1!
Amon C about 2 years

If you get error to install cocoapods use "sudo gem install cocoapods "
Erhan Demirci about 2 years

thanks.really helpful. saved my time
IamToobDude about 2 years

Can someone explain what arch -x86_64 is? Just curious because this is the second time I've revisited this page due to firebase issues and it's also a year later and only the 2021 answer works for me despite the timeline.
Nguyễn Anh Tuấn about 2 years

This solution works pretty well for me without the need of "Open terminal with Rosetta".
IamToobDude about 2 years

How do I add the path for this part? " Make sure you are using the correct pod binary by executing which pod (should be $(brew --prefix)/lib/ruby/gems/3.0.0/bin/pod) "
NineToeNerd about 2 years

Installing cocoapods via brew doesn't work if you're trying to use cocoapods-keys. Installing ruby through homebrew worked for me (as in this answer: stackoverflow.com/a/66556339/3462536) -- See issue thread in cocoapods-keys here: github.com/orta/cocoapods-keys/issues/217
Soropromo about 2 years

God bless you..I spent 10 hours on this, it worked.
Cyber about 2 years

Try not to use Terminal with Rosetta
Rashesh Bosamiya about 2 years

This worked for me! I'm using Mac mini M1 & macOS Monterey. I installed cocoa pods using brew. Thank you for this answer
Vikas chhabra about 2 years

Did not worked.
Chutipong Roobklom almost 2 years

Confirm this solution works for Monterey 12.3.1 (updated 2022-May)
sjmeverett almost 2 years

For the PATH, I added export PATH="$PATH:`gem environment gemdir`/bin" to my ~/.profile
Zaporozhchenko Oleksandr almost 2 years

it will be installed, but not linked, if you try to link - error occure
gaurav5430 almost 2 years

after installing cocoapods using homebrew, i get command not found on zsh