tool 'xcodebuild' requires Xcode, but active developer directory '/Library/Developer/CommandLineTools' is a command line tools instance

Question

This is very much a duplicate of xcode-select active developer directory error except none of those solutions worked for me.

$ sudo xcode-select --reset
$ sudo xcodebuild -license accept                                  
xcode-select: error: tool 'xcodebuild' requires Xcode, but active developer directory '/Library/Developer/CommandLineTools' is a command line tools instance
$ sudo xcode-select --install
xcode-select: error: command line tools are already installed, use "Software Update" to install updates

I don't even have xcode on my machine.

Answer 1

The fix for me here was that my [ XCode > Preferences > Locations > Command Line Tools ] dropdown was empty. No idea why. But after clicking it and selecting the only available option my "active developer directory" error finally went away.

Mac Os 12.3.1 | Date: 5/4/22

Answer 2

I had "xcode-select active developer directory error" too when installing Xcode beta. In your case you don't even need full Xcode, command line tools should work fine. Read this Github issue