Swift: Create utility methods as static class or regular functions? [duplicate]

Question

Coming from Java we often create utility methods as:

class Util {
    public static doSomething(...) {
        ....
    }
}

In Swift it seems you can do the same with static func

class Util {
     static func doSomething(...) {
         ....
     }
}

But then you can also just do a stand alone function in Swift which is not not within a class.

func doSomething(...) {
      ....
}

What is the best practice? Is this subjective or there is a reason why you must pick one or the other approach?

Answer 1

It is largely subjective and there is no reason why you must pick one over the other.

That being said, some people favor the static method approach for organizational reasons, or as a form of namespacing. For example, using the static method approach also allows you to have a method ClassA.doSomething() and a method named ClassB.doSomething().