Should Apple Continue to Ban Rival Browser Engines on iOS?

[Mr. Awesome]

Huh? Safari and Chrome both use WebKit, and WebKit is open source. Even MS Edge uses WebKit.

Android users can install any browser they want, and each browser can and does run on its own render engine, same as on PC/Mac.

True, but Chromium is a heavily modified fork of WebKit that is very very different from the main branch.

 

[jakebrosy]

Why not ask your AG to file a lawsuit forcing Apple to open this up?

United States v. Microsoft Corp. - Wikipedia

 

[jz0309]

so chromium on iOS and webkit on Android?

 

[t0rqx]

I never ever installed Chrome. Cause I always caught every app trying to installing this adware along with the intended app. The only reason Chrome is this big is because it gets installed without most user consent when installing apps back in the old days.

But both need to open up. I ain’t using no Google Chrome.

 

[Mousse]

The last thing Apple needs is more headache about anti-competitive practices. Don't give the enemy more ammo.

Apple keeps saying everything is for security. Payment only through the AppStore...security. No sideloadig...security. Only webkit...security. Y'all can gaslight some of the people some of the time, but Apple can gaslight the fanbois all of the time. To paraphrase Benny Franklin: Those who give up liberty for token security deserve neither liberty nor security.

That said, Chrome sucks. It's a resource hog and more bloated than me after Thanksgiving dinner.

 

[So@So@So]

Huh? Safari and Chrome both use WebKit, and WebKit is open source. Even MS Edge uses WebKit.

Android users can install any browser they want, and each browser can and does run on its own render engine, same as on PC/Mac.

Unfortunately you are wrong!
Chrome did use WebKit in the beginning, but not happy with some of Apple's decisions Google did branch WebKit and now it's a different rendering engine!

 

[temende]

Assuming the browser meets the usual App Store requirements, I don't see what the issue with competing browsers is. Most people will just end up using Safari anyways.

 

[deannnnn]

I don't think "preventing monoculture" is a good reason to ban things. If Safari was dominant they'd have a different excuse.

I support Apple's walled garden ecosystem because of the benefits it provides when it comes to side-loading and iMessage. But blocking Chromium on iOS provides no benefits.

 

[MysticCow]

I am all for allowing other browser engines, if for nothing else than to stop my iPhone 12 from trying to cook itself in Safari. Bring them on!

But, on the flip side of things, Firefox for Android SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS because of the lack of their full array of addons. If Firefox can fully work with its own engine in iOS, then it needs to have the full array of addons instead of what we currently have in Android.

Chrome for Android is only halfway decent at best when compared to Safari, but at least it would give Apple a wake up call to stop making a friggin' web browser that tries to cook our iPhones.

 

[ArtOfWarfare]

Which browsers make your devices run ‘10x hotter’? Both Safari and Chrome are based on WebKit, and while Chrome is resource-heavy, Safari is definitely not a lightweight either.

This hasn't been true in nearly a decade. Chrome forked away from WebKit (they named their new engine Blink) in 2013.

So for the first 5 years of its existence it was the same. In the 9 years since, the two years have drifted apart.

===

Apple is trying to accuse Chrome of being the new Internet Explorer, but they have it backwards. Safari is the new Internet Explorer.

IE had a giant marketshare because of unfair practices. Chrome beat it back and won despite those unfair practices because it was better.

And now we have the same thing - Safari has its giant marketshare because of unfair practices. They're actually more extreme than what Microsoft ever did, so Chrome hasn't been able to do anything on iOS.

Of course, the truly great browser is Firefox.

If iOS allowed for other browsers, I think Firefox would be the major winner. Sure, maybe in absolute terms we'd see more Chrome on iOS than Firefox on iOS, but Firefox would double their marketshare while Chrome's would only increase by ~20%. This could maybe give Firefox the boost they need to keep fighting against Chrome and keep the pushing the web as a whole forward.

 

[now i see it]

Apple could make Safari upgradable separately from OS releases. That would be a step in the right directing in the foreseeable future.

But that’s unfortunately the whole point. Lock WebKit to the OS and people are inevitably forced to use the updated version of iOS which always slows down older devices until a future version won’t even run on the phone anymore.
Older iPhones running newer versions of iOS always is a painful experience.

The cynics in me says….
WebKit is locked to the OS and no other browser rendering engine is allowed to drive future iPhone sales via forced obsolescence.

 

[Heat_Fan89]

They should allow choice.

 

[Haiku_Oezu]

I say let ‘em. If a third party browser thrashes my battery I’ll just uninstall it and go on with my life.
Give people a chance, not everyone is going to immediately blame apple the second their iPhone craps out, people understand you need to be weary of what you install on your devices.

As it stands having third party browsers on the app shore is a joke, they don’t really do anything other than maybe sync your bookmarks with the desktop counterpart or have some built in extensions which are now obsolete.

 

[Treq]

I think google chrome should use webkit on all platforms.

 

[ghanwani]

Yes. That way they can get others to help them debug and fix issues with WebKit improving user experience.

 

[Zaft]

This effects like the 1% of people that actually care. Average Joes see chrome is available and that’s that. Do you honestly think the majority care about browser engines?

The browsers all load websites the same.

 

[Mr. Dee]

No, I don’t want everything to be Chromium based. If we go that direction we end up creating a monoculture. We saw it with IE 6 and Google Chrome has pretty much become that. I wish Apple had not given up on Safari for Windows. In fact they should have gone further and released it for Android and Linux.

 

[4jasontv]

What a load of... Sweeney didn't have a dispute with Apple over "App Store fees" he had a dispute over injecting code that bypassed the app store policy and could have been a serious security risk to Apple customers.

It's up to Twitter to remove him from their platform... but it's on MR to ban him from this one.

 

[genovelle]

Banning apps because you think your own code is better is just silly.

Why? Safari is basically banned by companies that heavily partner with Google. Without Apple the geeks would create another windows explorer like vacuum and Macs would be stuck with a rarely updated browser that depends on 3rd parties that hope to put them out of business and take their customers.

 

[TheYayAreaLiving 🎗️]

Which browsers make your devices run ‘10x hotter’? Both Safari and Chrome are based on WebKit, and while Chrome is resource-heavy, Safari is definitely not a lightweight either.

Google Chrome has been known to run the device hotter because the browser itself consumes a lot of memory. Overheating is very normal when using Google Chrome.

I don't have overheating issues with a safari browser.

 

[genovelle]

No, I don’t want everything to be Chromium based. If we go that direction we end up creating a monoculture. We saw it with IE 6 and Google Chrome has pretty much become that. I wish Apple had not given up on Safari for Windows. In fact they should have gone further and released it for Android and Linux.

I believe they should do so now and invest 10s of billions into it. If they don’t they will have no place on the internet.

 

[vipergts2207]

Huh? Safari and Chrome both use WebKit, and WebKit is open source. Even MS Edge uses WebKit.

Android users can install any browser they want, and each browser can and does run on its own render engine, same as on PC/Mac.

No, Google forked the WebCore component of WebKit almost a decade ago now. Chrome uses the Blink engine, as do most other browsers. Now I don't know whether Android allows other browser engines or not, but I'm taking the comments in the article regarding Google blocking competing engines at face value.

 

[Dozer_Zaibatsu]

I don't think they should be forced to allow it. But the government spent $$$M to prosecute Microsoft for bundling Internet Explorer as the default browser in Windows 98? So who knows the precedent for anti-competitiveness now. It just probably depends on how much money Tim Cook donates to the right politicians.

 

[nwcs]

Personally, I'd want the option to pick the technology that works for me. Apple could easily resolve the problem by having two flavors of iOS. One that's basically what we have now and one that's iOS Expanded that has the ability to side load, load alternate browsers, etc. The license and terms would be different between the two and the messaging could be very clear what costs/benefits there are for both. Let the user decide which platform to go on. Start with the stock default and let the user swap over to the Expanded edition. Solves many, many problems but keeps people initially in the more secure mode.

 

[evertjr]

Allowing chromium on iOS will lead to less innovation on native apps. Chrome is a performance and battery killer on every platform because it wants to be a operating system, on iOS it wouldn't be different. Google wants everything on the web where they are kings, while Apple strives for native and integrated experiences, it's conflict of interests. Most web developers seeks the easier path, I can see they quickly requiring chrome to use websites just so they don't have to write good code. Apple is the only one with enough arms to fight Google's total web dominance.

 

[Xavier]

And we are returning to the old phone days where cell companies had a ton of junk apps on your phone that you couldn't get rid of.