Chrome for iOS Switches to Modern Web View API

Big news from Google’s Chrome for iOS team today: the app has moved from the legacy UIWebView API to WKWebView, promising notable speed improvements and 70% less crashing.

Here’s Andrew Cunningham, writing for Ars Technica:

Chrome’s stability on iOS should also see a big improvement. The UIWebView process in older versions needed to run within the Chrome process, so if a complex or badly behaving page made UIWebView crash, it would bring the whole Chrome browser down. With WKWebView, Google can move the process for individual pages outside of the app, better approximating the process isolation that Chrome uses on other platforms. Now when a page crashes, you’ll see the standard “Aw, Snap” Chrome error page. Google estimates that Chrome 48 will crash 70 percent less than older versions.

Apparently, Google worked with Apple to fix some of the bugs that prevented them from using WKWebView in Chrome before iOS 9. Developers have long been positive about the benefits of WKWebView (see my story on iOS web views from last year) and it’s good to see Google moving to a faster, more stable engine.

I’m curious to know if Google’s dedicated search app has been or will be upgraded to WKWebView as well. I don’t use Chrome (I like the unique perks of Safari, like Safari View Controller and the ability to access webpage selections with action extensions), but I prefer the Google app for traditional Google searches – it has a native interface for the search box with handy suggestions and links to past queries. Not to mention Google Now, which I’ve grown to like to track shipments, get weather reports, and receive time to leave notifications.

An important note for VoiceOver users: today’s update seems to break support for this key accessibility feature in the app.

→ Source: arstechnica.com