The annual updates to Webkit and Safari are exciting for a web developer like me. A feature finally shipping on Mobile Safari tends to mean it’s now a feature we can actually use. Here’s my recap of what’s new.

  • backdrop-filter is awesome. So much hacking to get legible text over an image is now a solved problem. Supports Apple’s blurry design aesthetic.
  • scroll-snap-points are awesome. Microsoft had this in IE10, but it was nice how they presented them as their brainchild. Supports Apple’s trend in scroll-jacking websites.
  • ES6 features are great.
  • @supports is very welcome.
  • PiP… meh? Probably nice for video sites and advertisers.
  • webkitMouseForce Ugh. I mean I guess we’ll support your own proprietary ForceTouch hardware now. Why not extend W3C PointerEvents as opposed to creating more proprietary events? I dunno.

Those were just the updates in the video. There’s loads more over on developer.apple.com; Unprefixed CSS Properties1, Responsive Design Mode™2, Pinned Tabs3, and lots of other nice features.

I’m happy to see things move forward but annual updates is an interesting choice for Safari.

  1. Yay! ↩

  2. Safari’s Responsive Design Mode™ only focuses only on Apple’s device sizes, reinforcing an Apple Monoculture, but sure great. ↩

  3. You’ll need to create a new 100% black SVG favicon for this to work… umm… okay… sure…oh it also appears to have broken compat. Good job. ↩