Mention iOS 17.4 non-WebKit browsers

Site Development
1

Affected page

Especially :

On iOS, any app that can browse the web is restricted to using an Apple-provided WebKit framework, so there is little reason to use a third-party web browser.

iOS 17.4 will be released soon and will allow browser developers to use their own browser engine instead of WebKit, at least only in the EU AFAIK.

When this update comes out, we should modify the sentence mentioned above to mention this EU-specific change. We should try to recommend one or two non-WebKit browsers for EU users and also modifying this sentence of the crtieria :

  • Android browsers must use the Chromium engine.
    • Unfortunately, Mozilla GeckoView is still less secure than Chromium on Android.
    • iOS browsers are limited to WebKit.

For recommending other browsers, I only have Brave that comes to my mind.

1 Like
2

We’ll hold off on this until we see what the non-WebKit market for iOS browsers looks like. You’re correct that it is only available for apps exclusively available in the EU, meaning developers like Brave, Google, and Mozilla will need to maintain two browsers if they want to take advantage of this, one for the EU market and one for everywhere else.

Given the monumental effort that will be required then, for relatively little gain on the developer’s side of things, I’m not sure we’re even going to see any notable non-WebKit browsers on iOS anytime soon in the first place.

6 Likes
3

I don’t think there has been any implementation of how the development / distribution flow of how this will look yet?