Hello everyone,
As some of you may already be aware of, Apple recently published their intention to discontinue support for certain aspects of the behaviour of progressive web apps (PWAs) on iPhones in the EU, starting from iOS 17.4. This decision represents a different direction from Apple’s previous signals and actions regarding PWAs, and has sparked significant reactions within the tech community over the last few days.
At present, our initial analyses of the 17.4 beta release indicate that Norway (and most likely other non-EU countries) remains unaffected. However, it remains uncertain and beyond Appfarm’s immediate influence if this will still be the case in the future.
Appfarm is monitoring the situation and will continue to investigate potential effects for our existing customer solutions. At this time, we do not possess further insights into how this will unfold, but we are proactively preparing for potential scenarios of changed behaviour of PWAs on iOS. Based on our current understanding, the likely implications of this decision would be that Appfarm Apps (along with all PWAs) installed on iOS Home Screens would not open in full-screen mode, but still work as fully functional web applications, opening in the default browser (in most cases Safari). In-app push notifications (a feature just recently implemented for PWAs on iOS) will no longer be supported.
We understand the importance of this development for our community and are committed to keeping you informed as the situation progresses. The behaviour of PWAs on Android remains unaffected by this.
Best regards from the Appfarm team