Apple Releases Safari Technology Preview 187 With Bug Fixes and Performance Improvements

[MacRumors]

Apple today released a new update for Safari Technology Preview, the experimental browser Apple first introduced in March 2016. Apple designed the Safari Technology Preview to test features that may be introduced into future release versions of Safari.

Safari Technology Preview 187 includes fixes and updates for Accessibility, Animations, CSS, Forms, Rendering, Scrolling, Storage, SVG, Web API, and WebGL.

The current Safari Technology Preview release is compatible with machines running macOS Ventura and macOS Sonoma, the latest version of macOS that Apple released in September 2023.

The Safari Technology Preview update is available through the Software Update mechanism in System Preferences or System Settings to anyone who has downloaded the browser. Full release notes for the update are available on the Safari Technology Preview website.

Apple's aim with Safari Technology Preview is to gather feedback from developers and users on its browser development process. Safari Technology Preview can run side-by-side with the existing Safari browser and while designed for developers, it does not require a developer account to download.

Article Link: Apple Releases Safari Technology Preview 187 With Bug Fixes and Performance Improvements

 

[christarp]

Damn, I can't believe it, they've done it again! They've released a new Safari Technology Preview With Bug Fixes and Performance Improvements!

 

[carrrrrlos]

Would be great if Apple looked in the rear view on occasion. There is no support for Safari on OS 10.11 for my 2009 iMac (yeah, still kinda running w/ the OG GPU). Firefox is great for streaming Netflix though.

 

[segfaultdotorg]

It would be helpful if they would specify which bugs are being fixed, and under which situations performance is being improved. Whatever happened to proper release notes?

 

[xeenon]

It would be helpful if they would specify which bugs are being fixed, and under which situations performance is being improved. Whatever happened to proper release notes?

There are very detailed release notes (down to the WebKit GitHub link and radar number!) for every Safari Technology Preview release. https://developer.apple.com/documentation/safari-technology-preview-release-notes/stp-release-187

 

[Diopter]

Whatever happened to proper release notes?

MacRumors might pump out the same post every time there's a new STP release (which, by the way, is roughly every two weeks!), but Apple releases very detailed release notes, as noted by xeenon above.

In fact the release notes for Safari and Safari Technology Preview over the past few years have become increasingly detailed. It's not uncommon for Apple/WebKit to also do a deep dive on the specific changes and features for Safari point releases, including explanations of changes and code examples. For example, this one last month:

WebKit Features in Safari 17.2

Web technology is constantly moving forward, with both big new features and small subtle adjustments.

webkit.org

I highly recommend following the WebKit RSS feed: https://webkit.org/feed/

You'll get a lot more out of it than you will from MacRumors' generic filler posts.

 

[MCKLMT]

There are very detailed release notes (down to the WebKit GitHub link and radar number!) for every Safari Technology Preview release. https://developer.apple.com/documentation/safari-technology-preview-release-notes/stp-release-187

Do you really observe (performance) improvements over regular version? 🤨

 

[Diopter]

Do you really observe (performance) improvements over regular version? 🤨

I think you’re missing the point of Safari Technology Preview, and Xeenon didn’t claim it had better performance compared to Safari. It isn’t guaranteed to be faster overall, or even stable, but specific things might be.

It’s a testing ground for technologies that might eventually make their way into the release version of Safari. Web developers can test the latest WebKit version, report bugs, test experimental and developing standards, etc. It isn’t a straight “beta of the next Safari”.

But it often does include performance improvements for specific things, which will eventually make it into Safari (for example, a couple of years ago I identified a performance regression in certain types of MP4 files played in Safari and this was reported and fixed in Safari Technology Preview, and the fix was in the next public Safari release). It also often includes new bugs, because it’s an in-progress build with web technologies that may not even have a finalised standard yet (a recent example being CSS nesting, which went through several iterations).

So non-developers probably shouldn’t be using Safari Technology Preview.

 

[macmac30]

Time for a rant - who here is frustrated with the somewhat recent addition of pauses when clicking on different folders located in “Favorites bar” in the iPadOS version of Safari? Open a folder from the favorite bar and it is immediate. While open, if you click on another folder in the bar, it takes half a second to close followed by another half second to open the next folder. It didn’t used to be like this. Who here has a teenager using Apple products? I do, and I’m blown away at how FAST they navigate. I asked my 20yo son the other day what he thought about this and he replied that this was one of the main reasons he doesn’t use Safari on his iPad. Too damn slow when he’s browsing the different folders on his Favorites bar. Apple, please fix!!!