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I switched from Chrome to Safari on my Mac about 7 years ago. At the time Apple was promoting performance and power efficiency. I’ve been very happy. Sometimes

I switched from Chrome to Safari on my Mac about 7 years ago. At the time Apple was promoting performance and power efficiency. I’ve been very happy. Sometimes I do run into css stuff that is missing, and PWA is still not great. Latest PWA screw up is that the app won’t switch to dark mode except if you force quit the app, and then it gets stuck on dark mode. This worked perfectly prior to iOS 17. My point is that Apple is competing with other browser implementations on MacOS, yet I’ve very rarely used anything other than Safari. Most exceptions have actually been because I need a plugin to debug the JS framework I’m using.

naet 3y ago
They're competing a lot less than they could be by nature of being the default browser, and also by not allowing non-webkit based browsers on the iOS apple store. I think without those very few people would be opting in to Safari. I read that both Google and Mozilla are developing non webkit iOS browsers in anticipation of some regulatory changes, and also that Apple has been staffing up the webkit/Safari team in response.
- idonotknowwhy 3y ago
  Lack of real Firefox is the actual blocker for me using an iPhone. But at the same time, I'm glad ios only allow safari and I hope the EU don't change this. I think the consequences would be bad if chrome works on every platform and suddenly there's no cross browser support for a lot of apps.
modeless 3y ago
You are not a representative sample. According to [1] Safari has 28% market share on MacOS. [Edit: This site was wrong, the real number is 37%, see below for a link] If WebKit's market share on iOS were to drop this low, web developers would likely test for WebKit a lot less, and tolerate WebKit's missing features a lot less, and Apple would soon face much worse web compatibility problems on both platforms. To prevent that they saw that they needed to seriously step up their investment in WebKit, and from what I've observed it seems like they did. Though perhaps not yet to the level they really need. Old habits die hard. Of course they could just do what Microsoft did and give up. I'm glad they haven't. [1] [Edit: this site was wrong, see below for better numbers]
- Angostura 3y ago
  Most recent data is from 2020 according to the text at the top of the page
  - hmottestad 3y ago
    I tried to find other sources, not easy I must admit. https://radar.cloudflare.com/reports/browser-market-share-2023-q2 https://radar.cloudflare.com/reports/browser-market-share-20... Cloudflare puts Safari at a bit under 40% for MacOS, so it looks like I’m very much n=1 and not particularly representative. Marketshare for Safari on MacOS is close to 85%, so I can definitely see that changing if users could install real alternate browsers.
    - modeless 3y ago
      Thanks for finding a better source! Sorry about the misleading number before.
      - hmottestad 3y ago
        Not that much difference between the two really. And compared to iOS it’s a stark contrast to how Safari is doing on Macs.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]

naet 3y ago

They're competing a lot less than they could be by nature of being the default browser, and also by not allowing non-webkit based browsers on the iOS apple store. I think without those very few people would be opting in to Safari. I read that both Google and Mozilla are developing non webkit iOS browsers in anticipation of some regulatory changes, and also that Apple has been staffing up the webkit/Safari team in response.

idonotknowwhy 3y ago
Lack of real Firefox is the actual blocker for me using an iPhone. But at the same time, I'm glad ios only allow safari and I hope the EU don't change this. I think the consequences would be bad if chrome works on every platform and suddenly there's no cross browser support for a lot of apps.

modeless 3y ago

You are not a representative sample. According to [1] Safari has 28% market share on MacOS. [Edit: This site was wrong, the real number is 37%, see below for a link] If WebKit's market share on iOS were to drop this low, web developers would likely test for WebKit a lot less, and tolerate WebKit's missing features a lot less, and Apple would soon face much worse web compatibility problems on both platforms. To prevent that they saw that they needed to seriously step up their investment in WebKit, and from what I've observed it seems like they did. Though perhaps not yet to the level they really need. Old habits die hard. Of course they could just do what Microsoft did and give up. I'm glad they haven't. [1] [Edit: this site was wrong, see below for better numbers]

Angostura 3y ago
Most recent data is from 2020 according to the text at the top of the page
- hmottestad 3y ago
  I tried to find other sources, not easy I must admit. https://radar.cloudflare.com/reports/browser-market-share-2023-q2 https://radar.cloudflare.com/reports/browser-market-share-20... Cloudflare puts Safari at a bit under 40% for MacOS, so it looks like I’m very much n=1 and not particularly representative. Marketshare for Safari on MacOS is close to 85%, so I can definitely see that changing if users could install real alternate browsers.
  - modeless 3y ago
    Thanks for finding a better source! Sorry about the misleading number before.
    - hmottestad 3y ago
      Not that much difference between the two really. And compared to iOS it’s a stark contrast to how Safari is doing on Macs.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]