Due to Apple's security limitations and additional work required, few developers are bothering to port Chrome extensions to Safari, despite WebExtensions API
still, Apple's insistence on relying on Xcode and the Mac App Store is a major roadblock. https://sixcolors.com/...
Context & Ripple Effects
This report lands in the middle of a decade-long pattern: Safari has trailed other browsers on standards since at least 2015, and coverage of Safari's slow feature adoption and refusal to engage on contentious APIs frames the browser as chronically behind. The WebExtensions API was supposed to close the gap on one front — extensions — but Apple's requirement that ports go through Xcode and the Mac App Store is keeping developers away.
The stakes are sharpened by two developments in the related coverage: the browser makers' joint W3C forum to standardize extensions across Chrome, Safari, Firefox, and Edge, which assumes Safari will be a real target, and Apple's later move to allow default third-party browsers and engines in the EU with iOS 17.4 — pressure that makes Safari's thin extension ecosystem harder to defend.
First-order effects
- Safari users are the immediate losers: despite Apple shipping the WebExtensions API, few Chrome extensions actually arrive, so the browser's add-on catalog stays sparse relative to Chrome's.
- Extension developers face a cost-benefit decision skewed against porting — maintaining an Xcode build and Mac App Store submission for Safari's smaller user base rarely pays, so most simply don't.
Second-order effects
- Chrome's extension ecosystem becomes a deeper moat: every developer who skips Safari reinforces the user expectation that real browser customization lives in Chromium-based browsers.
- Apple's insistence on App Store distribution for extensions hands ammunition to critics who argue its security framing functions as gatekeeping — the same critique running through coverage of its declined Web APIs and WebKit delays.
Third-order effects
- If the W3C cross-browser extensions effort matures while Safari remains a marginal porting target, the industry splits into a rich Chromium extension economy and a constrained Apple one — making regulatory interventions like the EU's engine-choice rules more consequential for Safari's relevance.
The trend: Browser extension development is consolidating around Chromium as Apple's tooling and distribution requirements keep Safari a second-class porting target despite shared API standards.