I just run into an issue today after upgrading to Xcode 26. Could be different with UE 5.6 but this worked with 5.5:
Edit the file /Users/Shared/Epic Games/UE_5.5/Engine/Config/Apple/Apple_SDK.json and change the line for MaxVersion to “MaxVersion”: “26.0.0”. In case you later get an error related to Xcode Metal compiler go to Xcode → Settings → Components, look for Metal toolchain and click download.
Solution didn’t work for me because i ended up being on a later version of xcode already.To check your version you can run this command and then update the max version accordingly
plutil -extract CFBundleShortVersionString raw /Application/Xcode.app/Contents/Info.plist
Thank you! I had the same issue and had to go to Xcode Settings => Components and at the bottom I had to install the Metal Toolchain 26.0.1 … after doing that UE launches!