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!
Selecting any option will automatically load the page
Post
Replies
Boosts
Views
Created
I'm converting a Chrome Extension to a Safari Web Extension, I found it's not easy to get favicon of current tab/url natively.
The tab object in Safari doesn't have favIconUrl.
{
	"id": 121,
	"index": 6,
	"active": true,
	"width": 1324,
	"audible": false,
	"url": "https://github.com/",
	"mutedInfo": {
		"muted": false
	},
	"windowId": 2,
	"title": "GitHub",
	"incognito": false,
	"pinned": false,
	"height": 935,
	"highlighted": true,
	"status": "complete"
}
		
2. I didn't find Safari has similar thing like chrome://favicon
3. I found Safari's favicon caches in ~/Library/Safari/Favicon Cache/favicons but have no idea how to use them in Safari Web Extension.
Does webkit have a way to display a smart banner for a home screen web app similar to how a smart banner can be displayed for native apps?
I recently noticed (10/23) that Twitter showed a smart banner encouraging Home Screen web app on my Mac running Sonoma.
How is this done?
Hi there!
I'm new to App Development and I'm running into the following error when playing audio on a website loaded through a WKWebView:
0x112000cc0 - ProcessAssertion::acquireSync Failed to acquire RBS assertion 'WebKit Media Playback' for process with PID=70.197, error: Error Domain=RBSServiceErrorDomain Code=1 "(originator doesn't have entitlement com.apple.runningboard.assertions.webkit AND originator doesn't have entitlement com.apple.multitasking.systemappassertions)" UserInfo={NSLocalizedFailureReason=(originator doesn't have entitlement com.apple.runningboard.assertions.webkit AND originator doesn't have entitlement com.apple.multitasking.systemappassertions)}
Looking through this forum, it seems more people have this issue, yet no one has found a solution (or posted it...). The solutions that I did find (Background Modes capability, webView.configuration.allowsInlineMediaPlayback = true), did nothing.
To make sure the issue had nothing to do with my own code, I created an empty project to reproduce the issue. I'm not sure on the best way to share it, but it's a small file (forgive me, I have no clue what it does, actually chatGPT made it for me. My real application is a WebApp wrapped with Capacitor, so it handles all the Swift stuff)
import SwiftUI
import WebKit
struct WebView: UIViewRepresentable {
let urlString: String
func makeUIView(context: Context) -> WKWebView {
let webView = WKWebView()
webView.configuration.allowsInlineMediaPlayback = true
webView.configuration.allowsAirPlayForMediaPlayback = true
webView.navigationDelegate = context.coordinator
return webView
}
func updateUIView(_ uiView: WKWebView, context: Context) {
if let url = URL(string: urlString) {
let request = URLRequest(url: url)
uiView.load(request)
}
}
func makeCoordinator() -> Coordinator {
Coordinator(self)
}
class Coordinator: NSObject, WKNavigationDelegate {
var parent: WebView
init(_ parent: WebView) {
self.parent = parent
}
func webView(_ webView: WKWebView, didFailProvisionalNavigation navigation: WKNavigation!, withError error: Error) {
print("Web page loading failed: \(error.localizedDescription)")
}
}
}
struct WebViewDemo: View {
var body: some View {
NavigationView {
WebView(urlString: "https://www.w3schools.com/html/tryit.asp?filename=tryhtml5_audio_all")
.navigationBarTitle("Web View")
}
}
}
struct WebView_Previews: PreviewProvider {
static var previews: some View {
WebViewDemo()
}
}
Nothing special, right?
When I build the app and navigate to a website that has an tag (https://www.w3schools.com/html/tryit.asp?filename=tryhtml5_audio_all). I still see the error when I play the audio.
It plays nonetheless, but the error is there. I'm not at all interested in actually playing audio in the background/when the app is closed/suspended. I just want the error to go away!
I've tried different iOS versions (14,15,16,17), but the problem persists.
Anyone know what's happening?
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.
Hi! We are having a hard time with the universal link, help is appreciated! Thanks in advance!
The universal link doesn't work after installation for some time. A user has to wait for from 5 to a couple of hours after the app is installed on the device.
This has also affected App reviewers since we need the universal link to work for successful login. Each submission will receive a rejection of we cannot login and it will be approved until we kindly ask them to try again.
I believe the JSON is delivered to devices by Apple's CDN system and the fact that it works on most devices most of the time should imply that we have a valid apple-app-site-association setup.
So I am really confused about the wait time, which is giving us trouble with app review and a bad user experience
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).
In a project to create a web extension for Safari, using scripting.registerContentScript() API to inject a bunch of scripts into web pages, I needed to manage a dynamic whitelist (i.e., web pages where the scripts should not be injected).
Fortunately, scripting.registerContentScripts() gives you the option of defining a list of web pages to be considered as a whitelist, using the excludeMatches parameter in the directive, to represent an array of pages where the script should not be injected.
Here just a sample of what I mean:
const matches = ['*://*/*'];
const excludeMatches = ['*://*.example.com/*'];
const directive = {
id: 'injected-jstest',
js: ['injectedscript.js'],
matches: matches,
excludeMatches: excludeMatches,
persistAcrossSessions: false,
runAt: 'document_start'
};
await browser.scripting.registerContentScripts([directive])
.catch(reason => { console.log("[SW] >>> inject script error:",reason); });
Of course, the whitelist (the excludeMatches array) is not static, but varies over time according to the needs of the moment.
Everything works perfectly in Chromium browsers (Chrome, Edge, ...) and Firefox, but fails miserably in Safari. In fact, Safari seems to completely ignore the excludeMatches parameter and injects the script even where it should not.
Has anyone had the same problem and solved it somehow?
NOTE : To test the correctness and capabilities of the API in each browser, I created a simple repository on Github with the extension code for Chromium, Firefox and Safari (XCode project).
I have a Safari App Extension which allows users to switch between last open tabs with a shortcut option+tab in the same way it's possible to switch between last open apps with command+tab.
Here is how i do it:
I inject a content script on all websites which has the only thing – key listener for option+tab presses.
When a user presses option+tab, that keyboard listener detects it and sends a message to the Safari Handler.
Then Safari Handler sends a message to the containing app and it shows a panel with last open tabs.
This approach has a problem: it shows a message to a user in settings: "Can read sensitive info from web pages, including passwords..."
Which is bad, because in reality i don't read passwords.
If i remove SFSafariContentScript key in the Safari App Extension target's Info.plist, then this message about reading sensitive data disappears, but then i loose the ability to open the tabs panel.
How can I open my app window with a shortcut without frightening a user?
It's possible to listen to global key presses, but that would require a user to grant the app permissions of Accessibility (Privacy & Security) in macOS system settings, which also sounds shady.
I know an app which does not require an Accessibility permission: https://apps.apple.com/ua/app/tabback-lite/id6469582909 and at the same time it does not tell a user about reading sensitive data in the extension settings.
Here is my app: https://apps.apple.com/ua/app/tab-finder/id6741719894 It's open-source: https://github.com/kopyl/safari-tab-switcher
Hi all,
I need to detect if my web application (pure HTML / Javascript) is opened from:
Safari from a Mac
Safari from an iPad but by asking for the desktop version
I tried to check for many properties (including the navigator.useragent) but no difference were visible. Anyone could help me?
Thank you
Hi. I'm a developer of Tab Finder (https://apps.apple.com/us/app/tab-finder/id6741719894)
My problem is that every time i switch from my first window to a second window, the tabs in the validateToolbarItem() are INcorrect on a first call, but when I switch back from the second window to my main window, the tabs are CORRECT even on a first call.
To demonstrate it, i recorded a video: https://youtu.be/RwskzrSJ8u0
To run the same sample extension from the video, you can get the code from this GitHub repo: https://github.com/kopyl/test-tabs-change
Its only purpose is to log URLs of an active page of all tabs.
The SafariExtensionHandler's code of the sample app is very simple:
import SafariServices
func printOpenTabsHost(in window: SFSafariWindow) async {
let tabs = await window.allTabs()
log("Logging tabs for a new window: \(window.hashValue)")
for tab in tabs {
let page = await tab.activePage()
let properties = await page?.properties()
let url = properties?.url
log(url?.absoluteString ?? "No URL")
}
}
class SafariExtensionViewController: SFSafariExtensionViewController {
static let shared = SafariExtensionViewController()
}
class SafariExtensionHandler: SFSafariExtensionHandler {
override func validateToolbarItem(in window: SFSafariWindow, validationHandler: @escaping ((Bool, String) -> Void)) {
Task {
await printOpenTabsHost(in: window)
}
validationHandler(true, "")
}
override func popoverViewController() -> SFSafariExtensionViewController {
return SafariExtensionViewController.shared
}
}
Could you please tell if i'm missing something and how to see the actual tabs inside the overridden validateToolbarItem call of the SafariExtensionHandler (or in any other way, I'm okay with any implementation as long as it works).
Topic:
Safari & Web
SubTopic:
General
Tags:
Extensions
Safari Services
Safari and Web
Safari Extensions
Hi all!
I have been working on a web speech recognition service using the Web Speech API. This service is intended to work on smartphones, primarily Chrome on Android and Safari (or WebKit WebView) on iOS.
In my specific use case, I need to set the properties continuous = true and interimResults = true. However, I have noticed that interimResults = true does not always work as expected in WebKit.
I understand that this setting should provide fast, native, on-device speech recognition with isFinal = false. However, at times, the recognition becomes throttled and slow, yielding isFinal = true and switching to cloud-based recognition.
To confirm whether the recognition is cloud-based, I tested it by disabling the internet connection before starting speech recognition. In some cases, recognition fails entirely, which suggests that requiresOnDeviceRecognition = false is being applied. (Reference: SFSpeechRecognitionRequest.requiresOnDeviceRecognition)
I believe this is not the expected behavior when setting interimResults = true. I have researched the native services used by the Web Speech API on iOS devices, and the following links seem relevant:
• SFSpeechRecognizer
• SFSpeechRecognitionRequest.shouldReportPartialResults
• SFSpeechRecognizer.supportsOnDeviceRecognition
• Recognizing speech in live audio
• Apple Developer Forums Discussion
I found that setRequiresOnDeviceRecognition and setShouldReportPartialResults appear to be set correctly, but apparently, they do not work as expected:
WebKit Source Code
I’m encountering an issue with a Safari extension bundled with our main application (F-Secure). The extension is not appearing consistently in Safari settings on a customer’s iPad running iOS 18.3. Below are the details of the issue:
Issue Description
The Safari extension is bundled with the main app (F-Secure).
After installing the app, the extension should automatically appear in Settings > Safari > Extensions, where the user can enable it.
On the customer’s iPad, the extension is missing from the Safari settings. It briefly appeared once but then disappeared again.
When i use adjust redirect:
https://app.adjust.com/xxxxxx?label=xxxxxx&redirect=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.testingmcafeesites.com%2Ftestcat_bu.html
It open 2 links:
https://Fwww.testingmcafeesites.com
then http://www.testingmcafeesites.com/testcat_bu.html
And in my app use redirect link for open a web page. But content in domain url like https://www.testingmcafeesites.com/ not be set. So it talke long time often 1 minute for finish request in first link.
It hapen only in ios 18 i tested in ios 17 and ios 16 it open one link only.
It seems fetch() does not include credentials (cookie) even when credentials: include is used and Safari extension has host_permissions for that domain when using from a non-default Safari profile.
It includes credentials (cookie) when using from the default profile (which has the default name Personal).
Is there anyone who 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 credentials (cookie) from host_permissions.
I already posted https://developer.apple.com/forums/thread/764279, and opened feedback assistant (FB15307169).
But it is still not fixed yet. (macOS 15.4 beta 3)
I hope this is fixed soon.
I'm experiencing issues with audio playback in my React video player component specifically on iOS mobile devices (iPhone/iPad). Even after implementing several recommended solutions, including Apple's own guidelines, the audio still isn't working properly on iOS Safari. It works completely fine on Android. On iOS, I ensured the video doesn't autoplay (it requires user interaction). Here are all the details:
Environment
iOS Safari (latest version)
React 18
TypeScript
Video files: MP4 with AAC audio codec
Current Implementation
const VideoPlayer: React.FC<VideoPlayerProps> = ({
src,
autoplay = true,
}) => {
const videoRef = useRef<HTMLVideoElement>(null);
const isIOSDevice = isIOS(); // Custom iOS detection
const [touchStartY, setTouchStartY] = useState<number | null>(null);
const [touchStartTime, setTouchStartTime] = useState<number | null>(null);
// Handle touch start event for gesture detection
const handleTouchStart = (e: React.TouchEvent) => {
setTouchStartY(e.touches[0].clientY);
setTouchStartTime(Date.now());
};
// Handle touch end event with gesture validation
const handleTouchEnd = (e: React.TouchEvent) => {
if (touchStartY === null || touchStartTime === null) return;
const touchEndY = e.changedTouches[0].clientY;
const touchEndTime = Date.now();
// Validate if it's a legitimate tap (not a scroll)
const verticalDistance = Math.abs(touchEndY - touchStartY);
const touchDuration = touchEndTime - touchStartTime;
// Only trigger for quick taps (< 200ms) with minimal vertical movement
if (touchDuration < 200 && verticalDistance < 10) {
handleVideoInteraction(e);
}
setTouchStartY(null);
setTouchStartTime(null);
};
// Simplified video interaction handler following Apple's guidelines
const handleVideoInteraction = (e: React.MouseEvent | React.TouchEvent) => {
console.log('Video interaction detected:', {
type: e.type,
timestamp: new Date().toISOString()
});
// Ensure keyboard is dismissed (iOS requirement)
if (document.activeElement instanceof HTMLElement) {
document.activeElement.blur();
}
e.stopPropagation();
const video = videoRef.current;
if (!video || !video.paused) return;
// Attempt playback in response to user gesture
video.play().catch(err => console.error('Error playing video:', err));
};
// Effect to handle video source and initial state
useEffect(() => {
console.log('VideoPlayer props:', { src, loadingState });
setError(null);
setLoadingState('initial');
setShowPlayButton(false); // Never show custom play button on iOS
if (videoRef.current) {
// Set crossOrigin attribute for CORS
videoRef.current.crossOrigin = "anonymous";
if (autoplay && !hasPlayed && !isIOSDevice) {
// Only autoplay on non-iOS devices
dismissKeyboard();
setHasPlayed(true);
}
}
}, [src, autoplay, hasPlayed, isIOSDevice]);
return (
<Paper
shadow="sm"
radius="md"
withBorder
onClick={handleVideoInteraction}
onTouchStart={handleTouchStart}
onTouchEnd={handleTouchEnd}
>
<video
ref={videoRef}
autoPlay={!isIOSDevice && autoplay}
playsInline
controls
crossOrigin="anonymous"
preload="auto"
onLoadedData={handleLoadedData}
onLoadedMetadata={handleMetadataLoaded}
onEnded={handleVideoEnd}
onError={handleError}
onPlay={dismissKeyboard}
onClick={handleVideoInteraction}
onTouchStart={handleTouchStart}
onTouchEnd={handleTouchEnd}
{...(!isFirefoxBrowser && {
"x-webkit-airplay": "allow",
"x-webkit-playsinline": true,
"webkit-playsinline": true
})}
>
<source src={videoSrc} type="video/mp4" />
</video>
</Paper>
);
};
Apple's Guidelines Implementation
Removed custom play controls on iOS
Using native video controls for user interaction
Ensuring audio playback is triggered by user gesture
Following Apple's audio session guidelines
Properly handling the canplaythrough event
Current Behavior
Video plays but without sound on iOS mobile
Mute/unmute button in native video controls doesn't work
Audio works fine on desktop browsers and Android devices
Videos are confirmed to have AAC audio codec
No console errors related to audio playback
User interaction doesn't trigger audio as expected
Questions
Are there any additional iOS-specific requirements I'm missing?
Could this be related to iOS audio session handling?
Are there known issues with React's handling of video elements on iOS?
Should I be implementing additional audio context initialization?
Any insights or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
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
I have an app that has a WKWebView for watching YouTube videos. When the videos are windowed the audio seems fine, positionally as well. All perfectly.
When I fullscreen the video and it goes into the native visionOS video player the audio messes up.
It will suddenly sound like it is in your ears, or maybe even just one ear channel, or the position will be wrong. It might be fine for a moment but the second I touch the controls or move the window the sound jumps across the room, away from the window, or switches to stereo.
Sometimes exiting windows entirely you will still hear the videos playing. Even if you open the window back up and go to another screen and open another video, now you hear 2 videos playing at the same time with no way to stop the first one in the background, requiring to force restart the app.
It is all sorts of glitchy. I haven't the slightest clue what is happening here. I am strongly feeling this is a visionOS bug.
I tried using AVAudioSession to change some of the sound settings, and that makes zero difference in behavior.
Multiple testers have also reported this behavior and it has been seen on both visionOS 2.3 and 2.4 betas.
Thanks for the help! This is driving me mad! It is extremely consistent behavior!
From a mail app or similar, when opening a webpage in Safari as an external browser, JavaScript on the webpage stops running if Safari goes into the background. Is there a way to prevent this from happening?
Sample code for the counter:
Behavior: Upon returning from the background, the counter continues for about 7-8 seconds but does not progress further.
For example, if Safari is kept in the background for about 20 seconds and then brought back, the counter stops at around 7-8 seconds and only resumes counting after returning to the foreground.
Expectation: The counter should continue running even if Safari goes into the background.
Good morning fellow developers,
For a while i am struggeling with providing sound to my users on IOS (Safari on Mac is no problem and every other device is not a problem) (we have an existing phone system and made a chat as well), the case is very simple: the notification sound is only for users who are logged in and online for chat.
i have tried multiple things:
Audio play with javascript (start with mute, play when user clicks a button so the sound is familiar, play when user clicks a button and directly pause it and continue when needed)
PWA: the dashboard has been made available as pwa and notifications using google firebase. The popup does show for notifcations to be allowed (and receiving the notifications does work on any other device) But any IOS device cannot register.
The information i find is that notifications were supported with 16.4 or higher but also have been deprecated around IOS 17, auto play is not allowed.
We have an app in development for our product as well were we will have a notification which will handle this, but that is not the solution we can use now.
Long story, short question: is it still somehow possible to push a notification to the user when using the PWA or play a sound in the browser (based on an ajax function). The app/website wont be in the background, so it will always be on the screen.
Languages we use: html/javascript (mostly vanilla)/php