Apple’s new iOS and iPadOS 16.4 betas will let Safari net apps in your homescreen ship you push notifications, in accordance with a new post on the WebKit blog.
Way back to the primary iPhone, you’ve been ready so as to add a shortcut to web sites to your homescreen represented as app-like icons, however the net apps haven’t been capable of ship you notifications or present notification badges. With iOS and iPadOS 16.4, nevertheless, that can change.
Right here’s how the push notifications will work, in accordance with the weblog submit by Brady Eidson and Jen Simmons — although it sounds rather a lot like how they work with native apps already:
An internet app that has been added to the Residence Display screen can request permission to obtain push notifications so long as that request is in response to direct person interplay — comparable to tapping on a ‘subscribe’ button supplied by the online app. iOS or iPadOS will immediate the person to present the online app permission to ship notifications. The person can then handle these permissions per net app in Notifications Settings — identical to another app on iPhone and iPad.
The notifications from net apps work precisely like notifications from different apps. They present on the Lock Display screen, in Notification Heart, and on a paired Apple Watch.
Internet apps may even be capable to set a notification badge rely, in accordance with the weblog, and the notifications will help Focus modes, too. And in case you have a number of variations of an internet app in your homescreen, they will have totally different settings, which may be helpful to assist separate private and work use, for instance. I’m personally glad we are able to handle the notifications on a per-web-app foundation; that ought to make it rather a lot simpler to maintain them underneath management.
These net push notification modifications had been truly promised fairly a very long time in the past, as Apple first introduced net push notifications had been on the way in which back at WWDC 2022 in June. That stated, like on desktop, I don’t assume I’ll be turning on any net push notifications — I have already got turned most of my notifications for native apps off.
It’s not simply Safari that’s getting some net app enhancements: beginning with iOS and iPadOS 16.4, it can save you web sites and apps from third-party browsers to your homescreen, too.