Safari Extensions

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Enhance and customize the web browsing experience on Mac, iPhone, and iPad with Safari Extensions

Posts under Safari Extensions tag

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DOMContentLoaded not working in Safari App Extension
I am trying to run JavaScript only after the page has loaded, and according to here - https://developer.apple.com/documentation/safariservices/safari_app_extensions/injecting_a_script_into_a_webpage, I should use DOMContentLoaded. However, it does not seem to work. This is my content.js file: function runOnStart() {     document.addEventListener('DOMContentLoaded', function(e) {         document.body.style.background = "rgb(20, 20, 20)";         document.html.style.background = "rgb(20, 20, 20)";                var divElements = document.body.getElementsByTagName('div');         for(var i = 0; i < divElements.length; i++) {             let elem = divElements[i];             elem.style.background = "rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.05)";         }     }); } runOnStart(); If I take the code outside of the event listener, it runs fine, but a lot of the elements haven't loaded in yet so it doesn't work as it should. The function is definitely running, but the event listener simply doesn't work. I appreciate any help you can give!
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11k
Dec ’25
iOS 26 BETA 4 Safari Web Extension disappearing right after install, "extension" is no longer available.
our company created a web safari extension. before iOS 26 (beta) release we would archive our extension and install to our devices no problem. since iOS 26 (beta) (we also tried in beta 4 23A5297m) the extension would archive perfectly but when installing the extension would just not run. its found in settings under safari extension, but when enabled the extension and open safari it will show error message "Ext" is no longer available. to rule out all code issues, we built a new project from scratch with a new bundle id, tried to archive with no problem, but when installed in an iphone 16 with iOS 26 BETA (23A5297m) same error ocurs it installs but when opening safari it will give an error message saying extension is no longer available. attached in the google drive link is a zip file of the new project, a zip file with a succesfull build of the ipa file with enterprise distribute, a video of the entire proccess and the error that the iphone gives. also attached a log file from the iphone that includes the install and the crash of the app. within the logs there is a log saying Error occurred during transaction: The provided identifier "dev.sacal.ext" is invalid. before ios 26 the exact steps worked perfectly. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1PYDOv8IRvRY_ouqiOc0sJdcfh0CHbL72/view?usp=sharing
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1.8k
Oct ’25
Background script in the form of a service worker cannot be debugged
If the extension uses manifest v3 and a background script in the form of a service worker, then in Safari it is not possible to open the background script debugging window. If I expand the Developer menu in Safari, there is nothing under Web Extension Background Data (or disappear after click), which is an error. In other browsers (Edge, Chrome, Opera, Firefox) this works correctly. If I switch the background script back to non-persistent script mode, everything works fine and from the Developer menu and the Web Extension Background Data submenu I am able to open the background script debugging window for the extension. Am I doing something wrong?
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2k
Jan ’26
Safari Web Extension background script becomes unresponsive after 30 seconds
I'm experiencing a Safari Web Extension issue where the non-persistant background script seems to crash after 30 seconds even when the content script is messaging it. Here is a minimal-reproducible example. When running in an emulator, the background script will stay responsive forever. However, when running on a physical device, the background script becomes non-responsive after 30 seconds of activity. It never becomes responsive again until I toggle the extensions enable/disable toggle, after which it stays active for 30 seconds and then crashes again.
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2.5k
Sep ’25
Safari Extension Service Worker Permanently Killed on iOS 17.4.x-17.6
Since probably the late iOS 17.4.x, 17.5.1 and still now in 17.6 beta our extension has been experiencing issues with the accompanying background script or service worker being permanently killed with no warning after about 30-45 seconds after initial installation (installation, not page load!). In all other browsers (including Safari on MacOS) unloading the service worker is part of the normal lifecycle to save memory and CPU if it is idle. In our extension the service worker is used only during the first 5-10 seconds of every page visit, so we are used to seeing it unload after that and consider this a good thing. However, normally, the service worker is able to wake back up when needed - which is no longer the case in iOS. Once dead, nothing a normal user would do can wake the service worker back up: No events like webNavigation or similar will trigger anymore Any attempt to call sendMessage to it from a content-script also does not wake up the service worker and instead returns undefined to the content script immediately Closing and opening Safari does not start it again The only two things that will give the service worker another 30-40 seconds of life is a reboot of the device or disabling and then re-enabling the extension. During those few second the extension is working perfectly. There are no errors or indications in the logs of what is going on and the extension works just fine in Chrome, Firefox, Edge as well as Safari on MacOS and Safari in the Mobile simulator. Only actual iOS devices fail. It seems like a temporary workaround is to change the manifest to not load the service worker as a service worker by changing "background": { "service_worker": "service.js" } to "background": { "scripts": ["service.js"], "persistent": false } With this change (courtesy of https://forums.developer.apple.com/forums/thread/721222) the service worker is still unloaded but correctly starts up again when needed. Having to make this change does not seem to be consistent with manifest v3 specs though (see this part in Chrome’s migration guide as an example: https://developer.chrome.com/docs/extensions/develop/migrate/to-service-workers#update-bg-field). According to the release notes of 17.6 beta this bug was supposedly fixed: “Fixed an issue where Safari Web Extension background pages would stop responding after about 30 seconds. (127681420)” However, this bug is not fixed - or at least not entirely fixed. It seems to work better for super simple tests doing nothing but pinging the service worker from the content script, but for the full blown extension there is no difference at all between 17.5.1 and 17.6. Has there been a change in policy about service workers and background scripts for Safari in iOS? Are anyone else seeing this issue? Also seemingly related: https://forums.developer.apple.com/forums/thread/756309 https://forums.developer.apple.com/forums/thread/750330 https://developer.apple.com/forums/thread/757926 https://forums.developer.apple.com/forums/thread/735307
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2.4k
Sep ’25
Safari 18: fetch() in safari extension does not include credentials
It seems Safari 18's fetch() does not include credentials even credentials: include and safari extension has host_permissions for that domain. Is there anyone has this problem? I try to request in popup.js like this: const response = await fetch( url, { method: 'GET', mode: 'cors', credentials: 'include', referrerPolicy: 'no-referrer', } ); and it does not include the cookie from host_permissions. Those code worked in Safari 17 (macOS Sonoma).
7
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2.0k
Jan ’26
Safari Web Extension tab ids are 0 during webNavigation callbacks until onCompleted event
Safari Version 14.0.1 (16610.2.11.51.8) I am porting a Chrome/Firefox/Edge extension to Safari Web Extension. Mostly, the process was painless, I am, however, seeing quite different behavior in the tab ids generated by Safari compared to Chrome, Firefox, and Edge. My extension has callbacks for each of these browser.webNavigation events: browser.webNavigation.onBeforeNavigate browser.webNavigation.onCommitted browser.webNavigation.onDOMContentLoaded In each of these I rely on the tab id for various future tab targeting operations. When opening a new tab, the details object passed to each of these callbacks has a non-zero tabId on Chrome, Firefox, and Edge. However, in Safari, the tabId is always zero. To debug, I added one more callback: browser.webNavigation.onCompleted At this point Safari finally has a non-zero tabId in the details param. Needless to say this is causing some consternation with achieving the same outcomes as tab tracking on Chrome, Firefox, and Edge. It's like Safari is treating new tabs as "non tabs" until navigation completes. You can even see it when trying to get the tab by tabId=0: browser.tabs.get(tabId) // tabId=0 here &#9;.then(tab => { &#9;&#9;// tab is undefined &#9;}); Seems like this might be a bug. I can't imagine why the behavior is so different from other browsers. Any ideas on how to work around?
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2.7k
Apr ’25
Tab title and URL properties are empty when accessed via WebExtensions API after Safari restart
Hello - we have a Mac application that uses a browser extension and the web extension JS APIs to communicate with Safari. During user testing we found that the tab title and tab URL properties are empty when obtaining the set of open windows via windows.get() after a Safari restart. We are testing with Safari 18.4 (20621.1.15.11.10). We have made a TestFlight version of our app and extension available to help with testing: https://testflight.apple.com/join/Va8Zdv9d. Screenshot and screen recording are attached to the Feedback ID supplied below. STEPS TO REPRODUCE Install Tabby via the TestFlight link Enable the Tabby for Safari extension in the Safari extensions dialog Grant permissions for Tabby for Safari to all windows all the time Within Safari, open two windows each with at least two tabs Within the Tabby app, ensure you see the windows and tabs listed correctly (tab title displayed for each) Quit and restart Safari Expected behavior Safari re-opens existing windows and Tabby displays title for each tab Observed Safari re-opens existing windows but within Tabby all tabs except the current tab are displayed with a title of “Start Page”. Under the hood the tab title and tab URL properties are empty when returned via a windows.get() call after Safari restarts. NAME AND APPLE ID OF APP Tabby - Browser Tab Manager 1586203406 FEEDBACK ASSISTANT ID FB16389506
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212
Aug ’25
Safari Extension Message Passing Unreliable in iOS 18.4.1 and iOS 18.5
Hi everyone, I’m encountering a serious reliability issue with message passing in my Safari extension on iOS 18.4.1 and iOS 18.5 In my extension, I use the standard messaging API where the background script sends a message to the content scrip. The content script is listening using: browser.runtime.onMessage.addListener(handler); This setup has been working reliably in previous versions of iOS, but since updating to iOS 18.4.1 and iOS 18.5, I’ve noticed that messages sent from the background script are not consistently received by the content script. From my logs, I can confirm that: The background script is sending the message. The content script’s listener is not always triggered. There are no errors or exceptions logged in either script. It seems as if browser.runtime.onMessage.addListener is either not getting registered in time or failing silently in some instances. This issue is intermittent and does not occur all the time. Has anyone else experienced similar issues in iOS 18.4.1 and 18.5? Are there any known changes or workarounds for ensuring reliable communication between background and content scripts in this version? Any help or insights would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
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411
Sep ’25
Error: Invalid call to browser.storage.local.set(). Disk I/O error.
Hi, after upgrading MacOS (MB Air M1 Version 26.2 (25C56)) & Safari (Version 26.2 (21623.1.14.11.9)) to latest versions, we are experiencing a new bug occurring with our web extension (Click & Read) on local storage writing and getting this error : Invalid call to browser.storage.local.set(). Disk I/O error. This doesn't happen on other browsers (chromium, Firefox). export const setLocalStorage = async (value: object) => { try { await browser.storage.local.set(value); } catch (error) { console.error("[Click & Read] Error setting local storage", error); } };
5
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1.3k
Feb ’26
safari web extension 在进行direct distribution分发时 在safari setting 中显示“没有权限读取、修改或传输任何网页的内容”
使用direct distribution进行分发时,safari web extension 在safari setting 中显示没有权限读取、修改或传输任何网页的内容。 但是我在看公证日志显示插件是正常的公证的 这导致safari extension 无法使用。 公证日志 https://www.coupert.com/img/2025-04-10/notarization-log.json
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Apr ’25
Adoption of New MV3 Standards for Browser Extensions
As with the adoption of MV3 standards among all major browser vendors that allow browser extensions at the client-side, I understand that this is the same with Safari as well, as mentioned here (https://www.wwdcnotes.com/notes/wwdc22/10099/). However, as with Firefox, browsers may choose to adopt them incompletely and with few changes. I had a few questions regarding how Safari views this transition and what would be the next steps from here. Thus, it would be really great if the browser team could provide your insights on any or all of the following points: Would Safari adopt the exact standards proposed by the Chromium ecosystem such as with functionalities like header-based modifications in the coming days.  What would be the general timeline be for this in general?  Does this also translate to the fact that existing standards with MV2 standards would not be allowed to operate any further, as with the timeline with Chromium? Regards
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2k
May ’25
Safari Web Extension: This extension can read ... including passwords...
I want to migrate from a Safari App Extension to a Safari Web Extension, but don't know how to get rid of the message, telling users that my extension can access their passwords. Here is a message which I see: I was thinking that this might be because all Safari Web Extension get this type of access, but I have a Safari Web Extension which does not require such level of access: Here is the manifest: { "manifest_version": 2, "default_locale": "en", "name": "__MSG_extension_name__", "description": "__MSG_extension_description__", "version": "1.1", "icons": { "48": "images/icon-48.png" }, "background": { "scripts": [ "background.js" ], "persistent": true }, "browser_action": { "default_popup": "popup.html", "default_icon": { "16": "images/toolbar-icon-16.png" } }, "permissions": [ "nativeMessaging", "tabs" ] } and here is the Info.plist file: Here is the entire code of the extension: https://github.com/kopyl/web-extension-simplified
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548
Jan ’26
Enable a Developer ID-signed and notarised extension without enabling "allow unsigned extension"
Hello, According to the documentation: If you provide your extension in macOS and don’t want to use the Mac App Store for distribution, you can sign and notarize your extension’s app with a Developer ID to distribute it outside the Mac App Store. However, I found this to be untrue in practice. Even after signing and notarising the Safari extension correctly, it is not possible to enable it in Safari without turning on "allow unsigned extension". This makes it impossible to distribute your Developer ID–signed and notarized extension outside the Mac App Store. I would like to distribute my web extension directly to employees in my organization using MDM without having each user manually enable "allow unsigned extension" for it to work. Any way to make it work? The documentation is quite confusing in this aspect, it says "Safari only supports signed extensions" but my extension is rejected even if notarised and signed.
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170
Apr ’25
Tab onDetached and Tab onAttached web extension events are no longer generated in macOS 15.4 / Safari 18.4
Hello - we have a Mac application that uses a browser extension and the web extension JS APIs to communicate with Safari. As of macOS 15.4 / Safari 18.4 the tab OnAttached and tab onDetached events are no longer received. After some testing we verified that the events were working properly as of macOS 15.3 / Safari 18.3 but appear to have been broken in macOS 15.4. Note a similar issue was reported previously for Safari 17.6 and was fixed in macOS 15.0 (FB14324177). We have made a TestFlight version of our app (Tabby) available to simplify debugging via https://testflight.apple.com/join/Va8Zdv9d. To reproduce the issue: Install the Tabby TestFlight build on macOS 15.4 or 15.4.1 Open Safari, go to Safari settings and select the Extensions tab Enable the Tabby extension and grant permissions to all windows all the time Open a Safari window with at least 3 tabs Note the open window and tabs displayed in Tabby In Safari, perform a tab detach by dragging a tab out of the window Expected behavior Within Safari the detached tab should now be in it’s own window, and via the onDetached event Tabby should update to show the tab in it’s own window AND removed from the original window. Observed Safari fails to send the onDetached event and Tabby will continue to display the detached tab in its original window in addition to the new window. You can also use the repro steps above to observe the onDetached event being received or not by Tabby in the Safari developer console. The same steps but re-attaching the tab to the original window can be used to observe the onAttached event being received or not. We’ve attached two screen recordings to the Feedback ID below, one showing the events working on macOS 15.3, and one showing the events failing to be received on macOS 15.4.1. Note it also fails on macOS 15.4. FEEDBACK ID: FB17367977
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May ’25
browser.runtime.onMessage in content script intermittently fails on iOS 18.5 (Safari Web Extensions)
Hi everyone, I’m encountering a critical reliability issue with message passing in my Safari Web Extension on iOS 18.4.1 and iOS 18.5. In my extension, I’m using the standard messaging API. The background script sends a message to the content script using browser.tabs.sendMessage(...), and the content script registers a listener via: browser.runtime.onMessage.addListener(handler); This setup has been working reliably in all prior versions of iOS. However, after updating to iOS 18.4.1 and 18.5, I’ve noticed the following behavior: ✅ The content script is successfully injected, and onMessage.addListener is registered (I see logging confirming this). ✅ The background script sends the message using the correct tabId (also confirmed via logs). ❌ The content script’s onMessage listener is not consistently triggered. ⚠️ This issue is intermittent, sometimes the message is received, sometimes it is silently dropped. ❌ No exceptions or errors are thrown in either script, the message appears to be sent, but not picked up from the content script message listener.
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304
Jul ’25
IOS 26, web extensions no longer available
I recently upgraded my device from IOS 18.4 to IOS 26. My web extension has disapeared from safari. I can see it in Settings > Apps > Safari > Extensions and when I turn it on and re-open safari. I just get a mesasge that says "{extension name} is no longer avaiable". I have tried Manifest V2 and Manifest V3 both yield the same results. The current production extension bundled with the IOS app has the same problem. I can no longer use or test my own extension !? Help please !
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562
Jul ’25
Detecting Navigation Redirect Chains
I'm building a macOS extension that needs to track multi-step navigation chains (A → B → C) to adjust behavior based on where users came from. Current approach: Using webNavigation.onBeforeNavigate to detect intermediate steps, but experiencing issues in Safari that don't occur on Chrome/Firefox/Edge. Questions: Is webNavigation the right API for tracking redirect chains in Safari? Does ITP/Private Browsing affect event delivery? Any alternative approaches recommended? (Safari version 26.0.1) Any guidance appreciated!
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858
Dec ’25
DOMContentLoaded not working in Safari App Extension
I am trying to run JavaScript only after the page has loaded, and according to here - https://developer.apple.com/documentation/safariservices/safari_app_extensions/injecting_a_script_into_a_webpage, I should use DOMContentLoaded. However, it does not seem to work. This is my content.js file: function runOnStart() {     document.addEventListener('DOMContentLoaded', function(e) {         document.body.style.background = "rgb(20, 20, 20)";         document.html.style.background = "rgb(20, 20, 20)";                var divElements = document.body.getElementsByTagName('div');         for(var i = 0; i < divElements.length; i++) {             let elem = divElements[i];             elem.style.background = "rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.05)";         }     }); } runOnStart(); If I take the code outside of the event listener, it runs fine, but a lot of the elements haven't loaded in yet so it doesn't work as it should. The function is definitely running, but the event listener simply doesn't work. I appreciate any help you can give!
Replies
12
Boosts
3
Views
11k
Activity
Dec ’25
iOS 26 BETA 4 Safari Web Extension disappearing right after install, "extension" is no longer available.
our company created a web safari extension. before iOS 26 (beta) release we would archive our extension and install to our devices no problem. since iOS 26 (beta) (we also tried in beta 4 23A5297m) the extension would archive perfectly but when installing the extension would just not run. its found in settings under safari extension, but when enabled the extension and open safari it will show error message "Ext" is no longer available. to rule out all code issues, we built a new project from scratch with a new bundle id, tried to archive with no problem, but when installed in an iphone 16 with iOS 26 BETA (23A5297m) same error ocurs it installs but when opening safari it will give an error message saying extension is no longer available. attached in the google drive link is a zip file of the new project, a zip file with a succesfull build of the ipa file with enterprise distribute, a video of the entire proccess and the error that the iphone gives. also attached a log file from the iphone that includes the install and the crash of the app. within the logs there is a log saying Error occurred during transaction: The provided identifier "dev.sacal.ext" is invalid. before ios 26 the exact steps worked perfectly. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1PYDOv8IRvRY_ouqiOc0sJdcfh0CHbL72/view?usp=sharing
Replies
10
Boosts
4
Views
1.8k
Activity
Oct ’25
Background script in the form of a service worker cannot be debugged
If the extension uses manifest v3 and a background script in the form of a service worker, then in Safari it is not possible to open the background script debugging window. If I expand the Developer menu in Safari, there is nothing under Web Extension Background Data (or disappear after click), which is an error. In other browsers (Edge, Chrome, Opera, Firefox) this works correctly. If I switch the background script back to non-persistent script mode, everything works fine and from the Developer menu and the Web Extension Background Data submenu I am able to open the background script debugging window for the extension. Am I doing something wrong?
Replies
10
Boosts
6
Views
2k
Activity
Jan ’26
Safari Web Extension background script becomes unresponsive after 30 seconds
I'm experiencing a Safari Web Extension issue where the non-persistant background script seems to crash after 30 seconds even when the content script is messaging it. Here is a minimal-reproducible example. When running in an emulator, the background script will stay responsive forever. However, when running on a physical device, the background script becomes non-responsive after 30 seconds of activity. It never becomes responsive again until I toggle the extensions enable/disable toggle, after which it stays active for 30 seconds and then crashes again.
Replies
9
Boosts
7
Views
2.5k
Activity
Sep ’25
Safari Extension Service Worker Permanently Killed on iOS 17.4.x-17.6
Since probably the late iOS 17.4.x, 17.5.1 and still now in 17.6 beta our extension has been experiencing issues with the accompanying background script or service worker being permanently killed with no warning after about 30-45 seconds after initial installation (installation, not page load!). In all other browsers (including Safari on MacOS) unloading the service worker is part of the normal lifecycle to save memory and CPU if it is idle. In our extension the service worker is used only during the first 5-10 seconds of every page visit, so we are used to seeing it unload after that and consider this a good thing. However, normally, the service worker is able to wake back up when needed - which is no longer the case in iOS. Once dead, nothing a normal user would do can wake the service worker back up: No events like webNavigation or similar will trigger anymore Any attempt to call sendMessage to it from a content-script also does not wake up the service worker and instead returns undefined to the content script immediately Closing and opening Safari does not start it again The only two things that will give the service worker another 30-40 seconds of life is a reboot of the device or disabling and then re-enabling the extension. During those few second the extension is working perfectly. There are no errors or indications in the logs of what is going on and the extension works just fine in Chrome, Firefox, Edge as well as Safari on MacOS and Safari in the Mobile simulator. Only actual iOS devices fail. It seems like a temporary workaround is to change the manifest to not load the service worker as a service worker by changing "background": { "service_worker": "service.js" } to "background": { "scripts": ["service.js"], "persistent": false } With this change (courtesy of https://forums.developer.apple.com/forums/thread/721222) the service worker is still unloaded but correctly starts up again when needed. Having to make this change does not seem to be consistent with manifest v3 specs though (see this part in Chrome’s migration guide as an example: https://developer.chrome.com/docs/extensions/develop/migrate/to-service-workers#update-bg-field). According to the release notes of 17.6 beta this bug was supposedly fixed: “Fixed an issue where Safari Web Extension background pages would stop responding after about 30 seconds. (127681420)” However, this bug is not fixed - or at least not entirely fixed. It seems to work better for super simple tests doing nothing but pinging the service worker from the content script, but for the full blown extension there is no difference at all between 17.5.1 and 17.6. Has there been a change in policy about service workers and background scripts for Safari in iOS? Are anyone else seeing this issue? Also seemingly related: https://forums.developer.apple.com/forums/thread/756309 https://forums.developer.apple.com/forums/thread/750330 https://developer.apple.com/forums/thread/757926 https://forums.developer.apple.com/forums/thread/735307
Replies
9
Boosts
5
Views
2.4k
Activity
Sep ’25
Safari 18: fetch() in safari extension does not include credentials
It seems Safari 18's fetch() does not include credentials even credentials: include and safari extension has host_permissions for that domain. Is there anyone has this problem? I try to request in popup.js like this: const response = await fetch( url, { method: 'GET', mode: 'cors', credentials: 'include', referrerPolicy: 'no-referrer', } ); and it does not include the cookie from host_permissions. Those code worked in Safari 17 (macOS Sonoma).
Replies
7
Boosts
7
Views
2.0k
Activity
Jan ’26
Safari Web Extension tab ids are 0 during webNavigation callbacks until onCompleted event
Safari Version 14.0.1 (16610.2.11.51.8) I am porting a Chrome/Firefox/Edge extension to Safari Web Extension. Mostly, the process was painless, I am, however, seeing quite different behavior in the tab ids generated by Safari compared to Chrome, Firefox, and Edge. My extension has callbacks for each of these browser.webNavigation events: browser.webNavigation.onBeforeNavigate browser.webNavigation.onCommitted browser.webNavigation.onDOMContentLoaded In each of these I rely on the tab id for various future tab targeting operations. When opening a new tab, the details object passed to each of these callbacks has a non-zero tabId on Chrome, Firefox, and Edge. However, in Safari, the tabId is always zero. To debug, I added one more callback: browser.webNavigation.onCompleted At this point Safari finally has a non-zero tabId in the details param. Needless to say this is causing some consternation with achieving the same outcomes as tab tracking on Chrome, Firefox, and Edge. It's like Safari is treating new tabs as "non tabs" until navigation completes. You can even see it when trying to get the tab by tabId=0: browser.tabs.get(tabId) // tabId=0 here &#9;.then(tab => { &#9;&#9;// tab is undefined &#9;}); Seems like this might be a bug. I can't imagine why the behavior is so different from other browsers. Any ideas on how to work around?
Replies
5
Boosts
1
Views
2.7k
Activity
Apr ’25
Dark mode for extension popups
The extension popups don't seem to support the dark mode media query. The only way the query gets detected is when a color-scheme is added: <meta name="color-scheme"content="light dark">
Replies
5
Boosts
0
Views
1.4k
Activity
May ’25
Tab title and URL properties are empty when accessed via WebExtensions API after Safari restart
Hello - we have a Mac application that uses a browser extension and the web extension JS APIs to communicate with Safari. During user testing we found that the tab title and tab URL properties are empty when obtaining the set of open windows via windows.get() after a Safari restart. We are testing with Safari 18.4 (20621.1.15.11.10). We have made a TestFlight version of our app and extension available to help with testing: https://testflight.apple.com/join/Va8Zdv9d. Screenshot and screen recording are attached to the Feedback ID supplied below. STEPS TO REPRODUCE Install Tabby via the TestFlight link Enable the Tabby for Safari extension in the Safari extensions dialog Grant permissions for Tabby for Safari to all windows all the time Within Safari, open two windows each with at least two tabs Within the Tabby app, ensure you see the windows and tabs listed correctly (tab title displayed for each) Quit and restart Safari Expected behavior Safari re-opens existing windows and Tabby displays title for each tab Observed Safari re-opens existing windows but within Tabby all tabs except the current tab are displayed with a title of “Start Page”. Under the hood the tab title and tab URL properties are empty when returned via a windows.get() call after Safari restarts. NAME AND APPLE ID OF APP Tabby - Browser Tab Manager 1586203406 FEEDBACK ASSISTANT ID FB16389506
Replies
5
Boosts
1
Views
212
Activity
Aug ’25
Safari Extension Message Passing Unreliable in iOS 18.4.1 and iOS 18.5
Hi everyone, I’m encountering a serious reliability issue with message passing in my Safari extension on iOS 18.4.1 and iOS 18.5 In my extension, I use the standard messaging API where the background script sends a message to the content scrip. The content script is listening using: browser.runtime.onMessage.addListener(handler); This setup has been working reliably in previous versions of iOS, but since updating to iOS 18.4.1 and iOS 18.5, I’ve noticed that messages sent from the background script are not consistently received by the content script. From my logs, I can confirm that: The background script is sending the message. The content script’s listener is not always triggered. There are no errors or exceptions logged in either script. It seems as if browser.runtime.onMessage.addListener is either not getting registered in time or failing silently in some instances. This issue is intermittent and does not occur all the time. Has anyone else experienced similar issues in iOS 18.4.1 and 18.5? Are there any known changes or workarounds for ensuring reliable communication between background and content scripts in this version? Any help or insights would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
Replies
5
Boosts
7
Views
411
Activity
Sep ’25
Error: Invalid call to browser.storage.local.set(). Disk I/O error.
Hi, after upgrading MacOS (MB Air M1 Version 26.2 (25C56)) & Safari (Version 26.2 (21623.1.14.11.9)) to latest versions, we are experiencing a new bug occurring with our web extension (Click & Read) on local storage writing and getting this error : Invalid call to browser.storage.local.set(). Disk I/O error. This doesn't happen on other browsers (chromium, Firefox). export const setLocalStorage = async (value: object) => { try { await browser.storage.local.set(value); } catch (error) { console.error("[Click & Read] Error setting local storage", error); } };
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5
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1
Views
1.3k
Activity
Feb ’26
safari web extension 在进行direct distribution分发时 在safari setting 中显示“没有权限读取、修改或传输任何网页的内容”
使用direct distribution进行分发时,safari web extension 在safari setting 中显示没有权限读取、修改或传输任何网页的内容。 但是我在看公证日志显示插件是正常的公证的 这导致safari extension 无法使用。 公证日志 https://www.coupert.com/img/2025-04-10/notarization-log.json
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4
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0
Views
337
Activity
Apr ’25
Adoption of New MV3 Standards for Browser Extensions
As with the adoption of MV3 standards among all major browser vendors that allow browser extensions at the client-side, I understand that this is the same with Safari as well, as mentioned here (https://www.wwdcnotes.com/notes/wwdc22/10099/). However, as with Firefox, browsers may choose to adopt them incompletely and with few changes. I had a few questions regarding how Safari views this transition and what would be the next steps from here. Thus, it would be really great if the browser team could provide your insights on any or all of the following points: Would Safari adopt the exact standards proposed by the Chromium ecosystem such as with functionalities like header-based modifications in the coming days.  What would be the general timeline be for this in general?  Does this also translate to the fact that existing standards with MV2 standards would not be allowed to operate any further, as with the timeline with Chromium? Regards
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3
Boosts
2
Views
2k
Activity
May ’25
Safari Web Extension: This extension can read ... including passwords...
I want to migrate from a Safari App Extension to a Safari Web Extension, but don't know how to get rid of the message, telling users that my extension can access their passwords. Here is a message which I see: I was thinking that this might be because all Safari Web Extension get this type of access, but I have a Safari Web Extension which does not require such level of access: Here is the manifest: { "manifest_version": 2, "default_locale": "en", "name": "__MSG_extension_name__", "description": "__MSG_extension_description__", "version": "1.1", "icons": { "48": "images/icon-48.png" }, "background": { "scripts": [ "background.js" ], "persistent": true }, "browser_action": { "default_popup": "popup.html", "default_icon": { "16": "images/toolbar-icon-16.png" } }, "permissions": [ "nativeMessaging", "tabs" ] } and here is the Info.plist file: Here is the entire code of the extension: https://github.com/kopyl/web-extension-simplified
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3
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0
Views
548
Activity
Jan ’26
Enable a Developer ID-signed and notarised extension without enabling "allow unsigned extension"
Hello, According to the documentation: If you provide your extension in macOS and don’t want to use the Mac App Store for distribution, you can sign and notarize your extension’s app with a Developer ID to distribute it outside the Mac App Store. However, I found this to be untrue in practice. Even after signing and notarising the Safari extension correctly, it is not possible to enable it in Safari without turning on "allow unsigned extension". This makes it impossible to distribute your Developer ID–signed and notarized extension outside the Mac App Store. I would like to distribute my web extension directly to employees in my organization using MDM without having each user manually enable "allow unsigned extension" for it to work. Any way to make it work? The documentation is quite confusing in this aspect, it says "Safari only supports signed extensions" but my extension is rejected even if notarised and signed.
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3
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0
Views
170
Activity
Apr ’25
Tab onDetached and Tab onAttached web extension events are no longer generated in macOS 15.4 / Safari 18.4
Hello - we have a Mac application that uses a browser extension and the web extension JS APIs to communicate with Safari. As of macOS 15.4 / Safari 18.4 the tab OnAttached and tab onDetached events are no longer received. After some testing we verified that the events were working properly as of macOS 15.3 / Safari 18.3 but appear to have been broken in macOS 15.4. Note a similar issue was reported previously for Safari 17.6 and was fixed in macOS 15.0 (FB14324177). We have made a TestFlight version of our app (Tabby) available to simplify debugging via https://testflight.apple.com/join/Va8Zdv9d. To reproduce the issue: Install the Tabby TestFlight build on macOS 15.4 or 15.4.1 Open Safari, go to Safari settings and select the Extensions tab Enable the Tabby extension and grant permissions to all windows all the time Open a Safari window with at least 3 tabs Note the open window and tabs displayed in Tabby In Safari, perform a tab detach by dragging a tab out of the window Expected behavior Within Safari the detached tab should now be in it’s own window, and via the onDetached event Tabby should update to show the tab in it’s own window AND removed from the original window. Observed Safari fails to send the onDetached event and Tabby will continue to display the detached tab in its original window in addition to the new window. You can also use the repro steps above to observe the onDetached event being received or not by Tabby in the Safari developer console. The same steps but re-attaching the tab to the original window can be used to observe the onAttached event being received or not. We’ve attached two screen recordings to the Feedback ID below, one showing the events working on macOS 15.3, and one showing the events failing to be received on macOS 15.4.1. Note it also fails on macOS 15.4. FEEDBACK ID: FB17367977
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3
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0
Views
153
Activity
May ’25
browser.runtime.onMessage in content script intermittently fails on iOS 18.5 (Safari Web Extensions)
Hi everyone, I’m encountering a critical reliability issue with message passing in my Safari Web Extension on iOS 18.4.1 and iOS 18.5. In my extension, I’m using the standard messaging API. The background script sends a message to the content script using browser.tabs.sendMessage(...), and the content script registers a listener via: browser.runtime.onMessage.addListener(handler); This setup has been working reliably in all prior versions of iOS. However, after updating to iOS 18.4.1 and 18.5, I’ve noticed the following behavior: ✅ The content script is successfully injected, and onMessage.addListener is registered (I see logging confirming this). ✅ The background script sends the message using the correct tabId (also confirmed via logs). ❌ The content script’s onMessage listener is not consistently triggered. ⚠️ This issue is intermittent, sometimes the message is received, sometimes it is silently dropped. ❌ No exceptions or errors are thrown in either script, the message appears to be sent, but not picked up from the content script message listener.
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3
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3
Views
304
Activity
Jul ’25
IOS 26, web extensions no longer available
I recently upgraded my device from IOS 18.4 to IOS 26. My web extension has disapeared from safari. I can see it in Settings > Apps > Safari > Extensions and when I turn it on and re-open safari. I just get a mesasge that says "{extension name} is no longer avaiable". I have tried Manifest V2 and Manifest V3 both yield the same results. The current production extension bundled with the IOS app has the same problem. I can no longer use or test my own extension !? Help please !
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3
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1
Views
562
Activity
Jul ’25
Detecting Navigation Redirect Chains
I'm building a macOS extension that needs to track multi-step navigation chains (A → B → C) to adjust behavior based on where users came from. Current approach: Using webNavigation.onBeforeNavigate to detect intermediate steps, but experiencing issues in Safari that don't occur on Chrome/Firefox/Edge. Questions: Is webNavigation the right API for tracking redirect chains in Safari? Does ITP/Private Browsing affect event delivery? Any alternative approaches recommended? (Safari version 26.0.1) Any guidance appreciated!
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3
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0
Views
858
Activity
Dec ’25
iOS Safari Extension State
I'd like to know the install state of my iOS safari extension in the associated swift app. Is there any way to get this? As we have seen it is available for macOS here, is there anyway to know iOS Safari extension is enabled or not? Thanks
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2
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1
Views
675
Activity
Jul ’25