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Personal experience as a web dev: the mobile Safari PWA experience (and even regular browser experience) is terrible. The browser is riddled with bugs and lacks

Personal experience as a web dev: the mobile Safari PWA experience (and even regular browser experience) is terrible. The browser is riddled with bugs and lacks support for features that have been around for a while. I apologzie for not having examples bc it was a few months ago that I was struggling with this, but hopefully someone else can fill some in. I honestly believe Apple's stranglehold on the mobile browsing experience has been one of the most disempowering things to mobile users in the last decade.

ExMachina73 4y ago
This was an interesting recent development if it ends up being true, specifically Apple opening up iOS browser engine restrictions: https://9to5mac.com/2022/12/13/apple-mulls-opening-browser-engine-nfc-and-more-to-third-party-apps/ https://9to5mac.com/2022/12/13/apple-mulls-opening-browser-e...
lelandfe 4y ago
Personal experience shipping a big PWA: Safari's PWA experience is not just bad, it's all but undiscoverable: Open the Share sheet, scroll down, tap "Add to Home Screen," fill in the information, tap Add. There are simply no users that do this, and it is not an alternative to having a mobile app in the App Store.
- CharlesW 4y ago
  > There are simply no users that do this… 100%. PWAs are not a priority for Apple (and shouldn't be for developers) because users don't search for apps in web search engines, they search for them in the App Store.
  - locutous 4y ago
    App store discoverability is very poor. Web discoverability is much easier to manage. It's something you have more control over and can buy easier through marketing via any channel you want. App store pages just don't convert well.
- donbrae 4y ago
  I agree about the installation process (though the user shouldn’t need to fill in any info). The actual user experience when using home screen PWAs can be made to be OK, but there really needs to be a meta tag or whatever to allow an ‘Add to Home Screen’ banner to appear (similar to the way you can link to the App Store if you have a native app).
function_seven 4y ago
Personal experience as a web user: I agree. I'm not even talking about bugs per se. Just the experience. I find myself constantly battling misinterpreted gestures. I try to zoom out on a page. Safari thinks I want to switch to the Tab View. I don't. Please just make the page smaller so I can see it all. Or, I try to grab a UI slider that's positioned near the left edge of the viewport. Safari thinks I want to navigate back to the previous page. Nope. Apparently if form controls are too close to the screen's edge, they're read-only at that point? So many gestures are overloaded now that it's a stressful thing sometimes to get it to do what I want. Being pixel-perfect with my fat dumb finger is no fun.
MBCook 4y ago
Why is the answer to this question always “Safari sucks”? Are there no good PWAs that run on Android? Are there none that, though perhaps smaller is scope, run well in Safari? People have been advocating for PWAs for a very long time now but it’s incredibly hard to get examples of good ones. There is always some complaint about Safari instead.
- Gigachad 4y ago
  Telegram is probably the best example of a PWA. It's not as good as the mobile app, especially for gestures, but it's better than a lot of native apps.
  - dmitriid 4y ago
    Telegram really is an outlier among messengers. Each version is developed by like one person, and they are all feature-rich, feature-complete, fast and smooth.
- cglong 4y ago
  Apple's stronghold affects PWA feasibility on Android too. If I have to write a PWA for Android and a native app for iOS to cover gaps in Safari, why choose a PWA at all?
  - MBCook 4y ago
    Apple may be ~50% of the market in the US but it’s ~20% of the market worldwide. On the desktop anyone on any mainstream OS can use Chrome or FF. Yet someone the total lack of PWA success is 100% Safari’s fault. Look at all those users I listed above. How are there no common/well known PWAs if they’re so great? People use websites like the Google Suite and Figma and such. They use web apps built as desktop apps in Electron. They use native apps. Almost no one uses PWAs. Even if Figma or Gmail or whatever is available to be saved as a PWA it doesn’t seem to be commonly done. There must be some other problem than Safari. It can’t be the big issue.
    - 4y ago
faizmokhtar 4y ago
Is it because it's actually riddle with bugs or just that most devs built on top of features only available on Chrome?

ExMachina73 4y ago

This was an interesting recent development if it ends up being true, specifically Apple opening up iOS browser engine restrictions: https://9to5mac.com/2022/12/13/apple-mulls-opening-browser-engine-nfc-and-more-to-third-party-apps/ https://9to5mac.com/2022/12/13/apple-mulls-opening-browser-e...

lelandfe 4y ago

Personal experience shipping a big PWA: Safari's PWA experience is not just bad, it's all but undiscoverable: Open the Share sheet, scroll down, tap "Add to Home Screen," fill in the information, tap Add. There are simply no users that do this, and it is not an alternative to having a mobile app in the App Store.

CharlesW 4y ago
> There are simply no users that do this… 100%. PWAs are not a priority for Apple (and shouldn't be for developers) because users don't search for apps in web search engines, they search for them in the App Store.
- locutous 4y ago
  App store discoverability is very poor. Web discoverability is much easier to manage. It's something you have more control over and can buy easier through marketing via any channel you want. App store pages just don't convert well.
donbrae 4y ago
I agree about the installation process (though the user shouldn’t need to fill in any info). The actual user experience when using home screen PWAs can be made to be OK, but there really needs to be a meta tag or whatever to allow an ‘Add to Home Screen’ banner to appear (similar to the way you can link to the App Store if you have a native app).

function_seven 4y ago

Personal experience as a web user: I agree. I'm not even talking about bugs per se. Just the experience. I find myself constantly battling misinterpreted gestures. I try to zoom out on a page. Safari thinks I want to switch to the Tab View. I don't. Please just make the page smaller so I can see it all. Or, I try to grab a UI slider that's positioned near the left edge of the viewport. Safari thinks I want to navigate back to the previous page. Nope. Apparently if form controls are too close to the screen's edge, they're read-only at that point? So many gestures are overloaded now that it's a stressful thing sometimes to get it to do what I want. Being pixel-perfect with my fat dumb finger is no fun.

MBCook 4y ago

Why is the answer to this question always “Safari sucks”? Are there no good PWAs that run on Android? Are there none that, though perhaps smaller is scope, run well in Safari? People have been advocating for PWAs for a very long time now but it’s incredibly hard to get examples of good ones. There is always some complaint about Safari instead.

Gigachad 4y ago
Telegram is probably the best example of a PWA. It's not as good as the mobile app, especially for gestures, but it's better than a lot of native apps.
- dmitriid 4y ago
  Telegram really is an outlier among messengers. Each version is developed by like one person, and they are all feature-rich, feature-complete, fast and smooth.
cglong 4y ago
Apple's stronghold affects PWA feasibility on Android too. If I have to write a PWA for Android and a native app for iOS to cover gaps in Safari, why choose a PWA at all?
- MBCook 4y ago
  Apple may be ~50% of the market in the US but it’s ~20% of the market worldwide. On the desktop anyone on any mainstream OS can use Chrome or FF. Yet someone the total lack of PWA success is 100% Safari’s fault. Look at all those users I listed above. How are there no common/well known PWAs if they’re so great? People use websites like the Google Suite and Figma and such. They use web apps built as desktop apps in Electron. They use native apps. Almost no one uses PWAs. Even if Figma or Gmail or whatever is available to be saved as a PWA it doesn’t seem to be commonly done. There must be some other problem than Safari. It can’t be the big issue.
  - 4y ago

faizmokhtar 4y ago

Is it because it's actually riddle with bugs or just that most devs built on top of features only available on Chrome?