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The team has been on a roll lately with massive fixes & improvements. Like last months announcement of over 500 fixes. https://webkit.org/blog/17967/news-from

by alberth 3mo ago

The team has been on a roll lately with massive fixes & improvements. Like last months announcement of over 500 fixes. https://webkit.org/blog/17967/news-from-wwdc26-webkit-in-safari-27-beta/ https://webkit.org/blog/17967/news-from-wwdc26-webkit-in-saf...

bombcar 3mo ago
They finally used some of those trillions to buy one (1) Claude pro subscription.
- lern_too_spel 3mo ago
  It's because the EU is forcing competition on them for iOS Safari, and iOS Safari shares code with MacOS Safari. Now they have to at least try to keep up.
  - SaltyBackendGuy 3mo ago
    I am OOTL - How does the EU force competition in this context?
    - fragmede 3mo ago
      The EU passed laws to force Apple to allow other browser engines to run. Previously, all iOS browsers were reskinned WebKit by Apple decree.
      - ulfw 3mo ago
        And is there any other browser engine actually running on iOS anywhere?
        ulfw 3mo ago
        Getting downvoted but no answer. So Hackernews
        lern_too_spel 2mo ago
        There are several under development. Microsoft recently claimed their Blink-based prototype is almost 30% faster than iOS Safari.
  - nwah1 3mo ago
    And it wasn't just laziness that made them drag their feet. They actively fear the web as a platform, and very much want everyone to do everything through their app stores, using their own macOS/iOS-exclusive proprietary SDKs... which also means developers themselves needing to acquire a Mac with XCode, and a Developer subscription.
ksec 3mo ago
The Safari beta is actually covering ~6 months of work in WebKit. So it isn't one release with 500 fixes. It is more of a consolidation. But yes WebKit has been getting tons of feature gap and bug fixed in the past 2-3 years. I think it accelerated during Safari 17, and Safari 18 has been the release that I find it good enough for most cases and finally with no rendering issues on all the site I browse. I have been trying to get the release note and update from Safari on HN frontpage but it never got much attention. Hopefully like you others will see how far Safari has come. And out of all the features coming from new macOS releases it has always been Safari that I am most looking forward to. At the same time I still think it has some way to go before catching up to Firefox and Chrome is many areas. But at least it is improving fast.

by alberth 3mo ago

bombcar 3mo ago

They finally used some of those trillions to buy one (1) Claude pro subscription.

lern_too_spel 3mo ago
It's because the EU is forcing competition on them for iOS Safari, and iOS Safari shares code with MacOS Safari. Now they have to at least try to keep up.
- SaltyBackendGuy 3mo ago
  I am OOTL - How does the EU force competition in this context?
  - fragmede 3mo ago
    The EU passed laws to force Apple to allow other browser engines to run. Previously, all iOS browsers were reskinned WebKit by Apple decree.
    - ulfw 3mo ago
      And is there any other browser engine actually running on iOS anywhere?
      - ulfw 3mo ago
        Getting downvoted but no answer. So Hackernews
      - lern_too_spel 2mo ago
        There are several under development. Microsoft recently claimed their Blink-based prototype is almost 30% faster than iOS Safari.
- nwah1 3mo ago
  And it wasn't just laziness that made them drag their feet. They actively fear the web as a platform, and very much want everyone to do everything through their app stores, using their own macOS/iOS-exclusive proprietary SDKs... which also means developers themselves needing to acquire a Mac with XCode, and a Developer subscription.

ksec 3mo ago

The Safari beta is actually covering ~6 months of work in WebKit. So it isn't one release with 500 fixes. It is more of a consolidation. But yes WebKit has been getting tons of feature gap and bug fixed in the past 2-3 years. I think it accelerated during Safari 17, and Safari 18 has been the release that I find it good enough for most cases and finally with no rendering issues on all the site I browse. I have been trying to get the release note and update from Safari on HN frontpage but it never got much attention. Hopefully like you others will see how far Safari has come. And out of all the features coming from new macOS releases it has always been Safari that I am most looking forward to. At the same time I still think it has some way to go before catching up to Firefox and Chrome is many areas. But at least it is improving fast.