Apple’s Safari browser is highly popular for its catchy design, speed, and efficient resource management. This browser is primarily locked within the Apple ecosystem and available to all Apple devices, like iOS and Mac systems. However, as a developer, you must also use Safari for Windows to ensure consistent performance across all platforms beyond Apple.
However, ensuring Safari’s performance on Windows is easier said than done due to various compatibility issues. If you’re looking for efficient ways to run Safari and Windows to ensure consistent user performance across various platforms, this is the perfect blog for you.
Here, we will focus on web design, cross-browser compatibility testing strategies, and various tools to overcome the challenges of running Safari on Windows. This will ensure that users get the same seamless experience regardless of their platform.
Table of Contents
The Decline of Safari on Windows
There was a time when Safari was natively available on the Windows operating system. However, Apple discontinued the official support for it in 2012. Since the discontinuation, the developers have faced various difficulties in testing and optimizing their websites for Safari on Windows. This is because it will limit your ability to test web apps on a native Safari environment for this operating system.
However, there is still a segment of users who continue to access Safari on Windows through various methods like virtual machines or online browser platforms. So, from a developer’s and tester’s perspective, it is very important to ensure a consistent performance for these user segments while implementing their web application development process.
Why Consider Safari on Windows?
Although the majority of Safari’s user base remains within the Apple ecosystem, there is also a segment of users who prefer running Safari through virtual machines or browser emulators. In most of the cases these users will be from enterprise environments where Windows dominates. It can also include employees who have access to web apps across different platforms for their official needs.
Although Safari on Windows is not widely used anymore, ensuring its compatibility with Windows is a part of ensuring a consistent and universal web application experience. So, whether your users run Safari on Windows through non-native methods or switch between devices like Mac and Windows, they will expect a smooth experience.
Cross-Platform Challenges in Safari
The Safari web browser runs on the WebKit engine. Due to this rendering engine, content may render differently compared to other browsers like Google Chrome, running on the Blink engine, and Mozilla Firefox, running on the Gecko engine.
Due to the rendering differences, the developers and even the end users will face various inconsistencies in terms of functionality, layout, and performance across multiple platforms. So, the developers need to address these issues for ensuring the experience is uniform on both Mac and Windows platforms.
Let us now divert our attention towards some of the major cross-platform challenges that you will face while working with the Safari browser:
1. Rendering Differences
The WebKit engine follows different web standards than the Chromium-based browsers. This will result in major layout issues, particularly with responsive designs. Moreover, Safari is also infamous for handling certain CSS properties and layout behaviors differently. This is even more apparent when it comes to Flexbox, media queries, and grid layouts.
The primary solution for this problem is to use browser-specific CSS rules or modern development techniques like feature queries for directing and targeting Safari-specific rendering issues. It is also helpful to regularly test the browser layouts on Safari alongside other browsers. You can use this approach to identify and resolve issues at the earlier phases of the testing cycle.
2. Media Support
Safari is also known for its selective support of certain media formats, particularly audio and video formats. When working on Windows, this issue becomes more pronounced due to the codec availability. For example, while Safari supports the H.264 video codec and AAC audio codec, other popular formats like WebM are not natively supported in this browser.
As a solution, you must ensure that fallback media formats are available for all Safari users. To implement this approach, you can use HTML5 video with multiple source formats using the “<source>” tag. This approach will help you ensure that all the media formats are perfectly functional across multiple browsers.
3. Font Rendering and Typography
Finally, font rendering can be another major issue when switching between Mac operating systems and Windows. Safari on Mac uses a different anti-aliasing technique compared to browsers running on the Windows platform. This change can lead to text that may not appear completely on the platform or appear thicker/thinner.
To solve this issue, you must optimize your typography using CSS properties like font smoothing. This approach will help you to account for differences in font rendering. We also recommend testing font sizes, line heights, and widths for ensuring the text appears readable and aesthetically pleasing on both platforms.
Testing Strategies for Safari on Windows
As we already mentioned earlier, a native version of Safari for Windows is no longer supported. So, the developers have to rely on multiple alternative methods for testing Safari on this platform. Based on our research and experience, we have created a list of some of the most accurate and seamless options for this purpose:
1. Virtual Machines
One of the most commonly used approaches to run Safari on Windows is by using a virtual machine within the Windows environment. You can perform this process by using tools like VMware or VirtualBox. This approach will also help the developers to run a native version of Safari for running the testing scenario.
The major advantage of this process includes access to a native version of Safari and a realistic testing environment with minimal emulation artifacts.
However, you should also be careful that using virtual machines also comes with the hassle of setting up and maintaining a Mac OS virtual machine. This process can be challenging and resource-intensive. It also involves potential licensing issues while running the Mac operating system on non-Apple devices.
2. Browser Emulators and Cross-Browser Testing Platforms
There are multiple browser emulators and cross-browser testing platforms which allow the testers to test Safari on Windows without the requirement of installing and setting up a virtual machine. You can also use services like LambdaTest that provide cloud-based environments for testing websites on different browsers, including Safari.
LambdaTest is an AI-powered test orchestration and execution platform that lets you perform manual and automation testing at scale with over 3000 real devices, browsers, and OS combinations, including Safari browser online.
LambdaTest provides an easy-to-setup and use environment which does not require any complex installation processes. It also has access to different versions of Safari for implementing comprehensive testing. Finally, LambdaTest provides various troubleshooting and debugging options like comprehensive test reporting, automatic screenshot capturing, and video recording to improve bug detection and resolution processes.
3. Remote Safari Testing
Apple natively provides a feature known as Remote Web Inspector. You can use this option to remotely test your website on Safari, running on a Mac operating system or iOS device. In such a case, you can also use your Windows device as the primary host.
To perform this process, you have to connect your Mac device to the Windows device using a USB connection. It will also help you to debug and inspect Safari’s behavior from the Windows environment.
The primary advantage of this process is access to real-time debugging on an actual Safari environment. It is also useful for inspecting mobile versions of Safari, which will provide a true-to-life experience based on multiple real-world use cases.
However, it also comes with major disadvantages, like the requirements for physical Apple devices, which can, in turn, elevate the cost of the overall testing process. It is also limited to users with access to Apple hardware.
Best Practices for Ensuring Consistency
Finally, we would like to divert our attention towards some of the most important practices that we recommend the testers to incorporate within their Safari testing processes:
●Develop with Cross-Browser Compatibility in Mind
Right from the start of the development process, we suggest the testers to consider how different browsers, including Safari, will handle CSS, media, and JavaScript elements. You should also avoid relying on browser-specific features unless absolutely necessary. Finally, it is useful to implement fallbacks when working with modern web technologies.
●Conduct Regular Browser Testing
It is also important to test your website or web app on multiple browsers and devices at a regular interval. This will help you to identify issues in the earlier phases, which can, in turn help to avoid larger inconsistencies later. It is also useful to automate these test scenarios using tools like Selenium which will help boost the compatibility at every stage of the deployment process.
● Optimize Performance for Safari
The performance optimization techniques available in Safari are slightly different compared to the other browsers in the market. So, you must ensure that your website performs well on Safari by optimizing the images, reducing JavaScript payloads, and maintaining CSS complexity. You can also utilize tools like Lighthouse which can help to evaluate the performance and provide actionable insights for improvement.
● Monitor and Adapt to Browser Updates
Like all other major browsers, Safari also goes through frequent updates that add or remove certain features. So, you must remember that these updates will also have a massive impact on the behavior of your web application. So, we suggest the testers to keep an eye out for the browser updates and test the website after significant releases. These approaches will help you to ensure continued compatibility.
The Bottom Line
Based on all the areas that we analyzed in this article, we can safely conclude that running Safari on Windows is important to ensure a consistent user experience across multiple platforms. By understanding the challenges posed by this implementation and employing the right tools and techniques, the testers can ensure that users of Safari on Windows receive the same seamless experience they expect on Mac or iOS.
With the increasing importance of cross-browser compatibility testing, developers must adopt all the best practices for testing and optimization. This approach will ensure that their apps perform seamlessly across all platforms.
Even without the native support, ensuring compatibility with Safari on Windows is another step towards achieving this process. This will also help you to maintain a unified high-quality user experience across multiple platforms. Factors like this go a long way in building a positive relationship with users and creating a good brand reputation.