Trying to use /usr/bin/gcc instead of Xcode clang for purposes of C++20

22 hours ago 3

ARTICLE AD BOX

On Macs g++/gcc are just wrappers to clang.

Unless you have explicitly gone and found and installed g++/gcc you are using clang.

Looking at your path:

/usr/bin/gcc /opt/homebrew/opt/node@22/bin /opt/homebrew/opt/ruby/bin /opt/homebrew/bin /opt/anaconda3/condabin /opt/homebrew/opt/node@22/bin /opt/homebrew/opt/ruby/bin /opt/homebrew/bin /Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/3.14/bin /Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/3.14/bin /Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/3.14/bin /Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/3.13/bin /usr/local/bin /System/Cryptexes/App/usr/bin /usr/bin /bin /usr/sbin /sbin /var/run/com.apple.security.cryptexd/codex.system/bootstrap/usr/local/bin /var/run/com.apple.security.cryptexd/codex.system/bootstrap/usr/bin /var/run/com.apple.security.cryptexd/codex.system/bootstrap/usr/appleinternal/bin /opt/pkg/env/active/bin /opt/pmk/env/global/bin /Library/Apple/usr/bin /usr/local/go/bin PATH is seporated by ':' not white space (lets assume you did that manually). This is wrong: /usr/bin/gcc You probably meant /usr/bin/

You can see which app your shell is picking up with: which

> which g++ /usr/bin/g++

If you don't trust that you can check if its a symbolic link:

> ls -la /usr/bin/g++ -rwxr-xr-x 78 root wheel 118880 Feb 24 19:41 /usr/bin/g++

If you don't want to chance the shell not finding the correct version you can be explicit and use the full path:

> touch x.cpp > /usr/bin/g++ --version x.cpp Apple clang version 21.0.0 (clang-2100.0.123.102) Target: arm64-apple-darwin25.3.0 Thread model: posix InstalledDir: /Library/Developer/CommandLineTools/usr/bin

Unless you have installed g++/gcc explicitly (probably means building it), then what is installed by default is clang++/clang.