You can use @public, @private, or @protected on the instance variables. Unfortunately these do not extend to the properties themselves and you have to use a dif

You can use @public, @private, or @protected on the instance variables. Unfortunately these do not extend to the properties themselves and you have to use a different approach as in the sibling comment: @interface SomeClass (SomePrivateCategory) @property (nonatomic, assign) NSUInteger count; ... @end