Apple Safari

In short: The browser developed by Apple, the default browser on macOS and iOS.

In more detail: Uses the WebKit rendering engine instead of the Chromium base common to Chrome/Edge. Known for good energy efficiency on Apple devices, but sometimes slower adoption of new web standards compared to Chrome.

In Depth

The last WebKit stronghold

Safari is today the only still-relevant browser with a WebKit-based engine — practically all other major browsers (Chrome, Edge, Opera, Brave) now run on Chromium/Blink, which was originally itself a fork of WebKit but has since developed independently. This makes Safari an important but often-neglected test target for web developers: a page only tested in Chromium browsers can look different or behave differently in Safari, because WebKit implements some CSS or JavaScript features later, differently, or with different bugs — a well-known annoyance in the web development community, often described as “Safari is the new Internet Explorer”, alluding to Internet Explorer’s historical role as the compatibility headache.

The App Store iOS peculiarity

A peculiarity on iOS: for security reasons, Apple long didn’t allow alternative rendering engines in the App Store — every “browser” on iPhone/iPad (even Chrome or Firefox for iOS) had to use WebKit internally, so was technically just a different interface over the same engine. This only changed from 2024 in the EU, due to the Digital Markets Act, which requires Apple to allow genuine alternative engines on iOS devices in the EU — a direct intervention into Apple’s previously strict control over the iOS browser landscape.

Privacy as a differentiator

Safari traditionally places particular emphasis on privacy features like Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP), which makes cross-site tracking via cookies harder — Safari was one of the first major browsers to block third-party cookies by default, considerably ahead of Chrome, which stuck with unlimited third-party cookie tracking for a long time (partly because Google’s own business model relies heavily on ad tracking, which represents a structural conflict of interest). This early privacy positioning fits with Apple’s general marketing as a privacy-focused company.

Energy efficiency

On Apple hardware, Safari is often considered more energy-efficient than Chromium-based alternatives — Apple specifically optimises WebKit for its own hardware (Apple Silicon chips), which regularly shows up in benchmarks as longer battery life under intensive browser use, an often-cited reason MacBook users stick with Safari despite Chrome’s market dominance.

Web extensions and limitations

Safari has supported the same Web Extensions API as Chrome/Firefox for a few versions now, so many browser extensions can be ported with manageable effort — before that, Safari needed a completely separate extension format, which considerably limited the availability of popular add-ons compared to Chrome. Even so, the selection of extensions remains smaller than Chrome’s, since many developers primarily develop for Chrome’s larger user base and treat Safari support as a secondary goal.

See also: Apple, Browser, Google Chrome