Apple Details Safari 16.4 and its 135 New Web Features and Enhancements

safari webkit push

With today’s public release of iOS 16.4, iPadOS 16.4 and more, Apple has debuted a slew of new features for Safari.

The WebKit blog has explained in great detail the new features and improvements.

Safari 16.4, WebKit’s latest release, is here and it brings an impressive 135 new web features and over 280 polish updates, says Apple, noting the new changes are available with macOS Ventura, macOS Monterey, macOS Big Sur, iPadOS 16, and iOS 16.

One of the highlights of this release is the support for Web Push on iOS and iPadOS 16.4, allowing web developers to send push notifications using Push API, Notifications API, and Service Workers. Web Push notifications are deeply integrated with iOS and iPadOS, offering the same user experience as notifications from other apps.

WebKit has also made significant improvements for web apps, such as adding support for the Badging API and the id member of the Web Application Manifest standard. These enhancements allow web app developers to display app badge counts and enable multiple installations of the same web app.

Additionally, third-party web browsers can now offer the “Add to Home Screen” feature.

Safari 16.4 also enhances support for Web Components with the addition of Declarative Shadow DOM, ElementInternals, and the Imperative Slot API. These new capabilities make it easier for developers to create reusable custom HTML elements with encapsulated functionality, write Patrick Angle, Marcos Caceres, Razvan Caliman, Jon Davis, Brady Eidson, Timothy Hatcher, Ryosuke Niwa, and Jen Simmons on the WebKit blog.

In terms of CSS, Safari 16.4 brings support for various new properties, values, pseudo-classes, and syntaxes, paving the way for the future of graphic design on the web. This update also introduces new typography features and support for Relative Color Syntax.

To dive deeper into all the additions and improvements in Safari 16.4, visit the WebKit blog for more details.

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