Despite Apple's investment in AR, its lack of Safari support for web-based AR lags browser providers like Google and Samsung, who have supported WebXR for years
“AR is going to change the way we use technology forever.” For the past five years, Tim Cook has used every possible opportunity … Tweets: @mikarv , @zeh , @jank0 , and @protocol . Thanks: @jank0 Tweets: Michael Veale / @mikarv : @s8mb how about rather than the death of the 100th spyware flashlight app, we talk about how apple is hurting innovation in areas like AR by using its platform power to strangle the Web & open APIs? yet you are on record denying need for ex ante competition law https://www.protocol.com/... Zeh Fernando / @zeh : We need a 3-word expression (akin to “Embrace, Extend, Extinguish") to describe Apple's culture of kneecapping technology that is already viable in their platform simply because they can't fully control it. “Reject, Reduce, Relax” or something. https://www.protocol.com/... Janko Roettgers / @jank0 : Apple's ARKit was a game changer, and its AR glasses may well be the same. However, industry insiders allege that the company has been holding back AR by not supporting the WeXR standard. My latest for @protocol https://www.protocol.com/... tip @Techmeme @protocol : “Apple has been a drag on innovation in WebAR.” https://www.protocol.com/... Thanks: @jank0
Context & Ripple Effects
The gap is a five-year arc closing on itself. In 2017, early ARKit demos like a virtual measuring tape made Apple look ahead of Google's Tango in bringing AR to the masses. Since then, Apple has doubled down on native AR — including a mixed-reality headset reportedly built for short bursts of use rather than all-day wear (per Gurman's reporting) — while its browser fell behind: Google, Samsung, and Opera have shipped WebXR for years, and mobile Safari still does not support it.
This is not an isolated omission. Apple previously declined to implement 16 proposed Web APIs in Safari on fingerprinting grounds (the 2020 API rejections), and HTTP Toolkit documented how Safari's slow feature adoption and refusal to engage with contentious proposals was harming the web platform broadly. The WebXR gap reads as the same governance posture applied to AR specifically — and critics like Michael Veale argue it amounts to using platform power to strangle open APIs.
First-order effects
- Web developers cannot ship browser-based AR experiences to iPhone users at all: any AR reach on iOS must go through App Store-distributed native apps, while the same code runs directly in Chrome, Samsung Internet, and Opera on Android.
Second-order effects
- Developers targeting both platforms are pushed toward native ARKit builds for iOS, which reinforces Apple's App Store distribution and commission position precisely where Tim Cook says AR will 'change the way we use technology forever'; Google and Samsung gain a differentiator for their browsers among AR-curious developers.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, spatial computing splits along the same line as the rest of the mobile web — rich open-web experiences on Android, app-store-gated ones on iOS — strengthening the case from critics like Veale that ex ante competition rules, not just privacy rationales, should govern browser API decisions.
The trend: As AR moves toward mainstream hardware, the browser is becoming the next battleground over whether immersive experiences run on the open web or inside platform-controlled app stores.