Do not download the app, use the website

You don't use a car app to unlock your vehicle? Fitness app that talks to a watch? Your kids don't have robots or whatever with tablet integration? No bank apps that integrate with NFC? Bubble level gadgets that need the accelerometer? Navigation apps with GPS and gyro integration?

All that stuff works in a browser everywhere else but iOS. Your argument isn't that it's useless, because you clearly use it and love it. You just don't think the rest of us should have it. Which is great if you're Tim Cook, I guess. But I doubt you are.

It is possible to avoid using a browser app when accessimg websites on a phone.

For example, via the Termux app or "HTTP Shortcuts" app from F-Droid or Github.

Sometimes corporate apps use resources from their public websites, not a dedicated "endpoint" set up for the app. For example, a weather app that uses pages under a folder called "widgets" from its website, or a grocery app that sources product images from an images folder its website's www subdomain. In testing I have accessed such resources outside the app, outside the mobile OS, from another computer, using any software.

But Termux and HTTP shortcuts are apps, and subject to all the corporate mobile OS restrictions.

There is no sysctl, nftables, iptables, tcpdump, etc. on the "phone".

The kernel is generally not under the control of the phone's owner.

As such, _for me_ the corporate mobile OS even coupled with impressive phone hardware, is inferior to a computer that it's owner, who is not working for a so-called "tech" company selling ad services, can control, by compiling and installing their OS of choice. That includes the kernel.

Using Termux, I could submit this reply to HN from a phone using the 59-line shell script I normally use on a computer. It's possible. But I prefer the computer with the kernel I compiled myself.

If I'm going to use a website instead of an app, I would prefer to do it on that computer, not a "phone".

> password is known

What password?

> It disproves

I take it you're not a stats major.

> It's indeed Apple's fault that those PWA APIs don't work in Safari

A tiny percentage of apps use features that aren't available in Safari, ergo ipso sum, 100% of apps cannot use PWAs on any platform. Do you understand how utterly nonsensical this noise is?

I understand this thread is overwhelmingly dominated by rhetorics, seemingly by people who have zero experience in the industry, so have your nonsense.

> your objection isn't technical, you just don't like the idea of portable web apps working on iOS.

Your take is laughably nonsensical.

>You have points, I agree that web technology is well suited in 2025 to make interactive applications. I agree that web apps are being held back from expressing their true potential. And while Electron is largely skewered for being bloated and heavy, the web can be fast and fluid.

The main topic originated through OP's "why some users demand a 'native' app when the web app should be enough" for which I provided explanations as to why web apps haven't lived up to their potential i.e. conflict of interest and the corresponding sabotage by a gatekeeper in contrast to the manufactured narrative of "they are unpopular because they suck". That's a false narrative which I've explained in many comments:

- "A Progressive Web App, if allowed to reach its full, un-sabotaged potential, is the technological manifestation of the Digital Markets Act's goals. So it would be utterly absurd for Apple to pour hundreds of millions of dollars into fighting the DMA, just to let PWAs pass which achieves the exact same goals."

- "The reason I focused on Apple is because its actions are one of a profit-maximizing gatekeeper actively defending its most lucrative business against an existential threat that is PWA. Every bug, every delayed feature, and every artificial limitation imposed on PWAs on iOS is a calculated strategic move in this defense of its walled garden that makes maximum taxation possible."

Since you've stated that "I agree that web apps are being held back from expressing their true potential" you confirmed my thesis. That's why I stated: "I already responded to any of your points that are RELEVANT to the CORE DISCUSSION"

>But you haven't proven that web apps don't feel janky, fragile, and out of place.

That's not even part of the core issue and it has still been explained in my post anyway, which you even confirmed by saying "I agree that web apps are being held back from expressing their true potential" and is also expressed here:

- Apple's ban of third party browsers on iOS is deeply anti-competitive, STARVES the Safari/WebKit team of funding and has STALLED innovation for the past 10 YEARS and PREVENTED Web Apps from taking off on mobile. (https://open-web-advocacy.org/blog/apples-browser-engine-ban...)

-Deep System Integration

Web Apps need to become just Apps. Apps built with the free and open web need equal treatment and integration. Closed and heavily taxed proprietary ecosystems should not receive any preference.

- Web App Equality

All artificial barriers placed by gatekeepers must be removed. Web Apps if allowed can offer equivalent functionality with greater privacy and security for demanding use-cases.

These are all factors that have already been mentioned and they fix all the real issues that are not the product of active sabotage.

Furthermore, I'm using many web apps like Discord and Visual Studio Code and they do not feel janky, fragile or out of place, that's your subjective perception. And even if that were an objective fact, which they are not, it would still not be relevant to the core discussion since they are not inherent to the technology but product-management related trade-offs that can be improved and fixed.

>The web's internet-native status means a bad internet connection or a brief crossing through a dead zone will kill almost any web app. Yes, there's strategies around this with web workers nowadays, but those are quite complex to implement for even simple applications and often aren't worth the effort to do anything more than pop up a branded "you're offline" page.

Your first claim is just factually wrong, but you admit that in the following statement which contains another claim that is also wrong. Those are exactly the kind of problems that PWAs solve and the user experience in that regard has been steadily improving (see also https://www.inkandswitch.com/essay/local-first )

>An app can be completely cut off from the internet, it doesn't have that base assumption of network connectivity and isn't built from the ground up from network-based parts.

That's just straight up nonsense. Any native or web app that relies on internet connectivity will be equally affected. Any native or web app developed with a local-first or local-only approach will work perfectly fine without internet. You clearly have outdated knowledge on the matter. (see https://whatpwacando.today)

So I really had addressed your points that were relevant to the core issue, but you just wanted to nitpick details that had already been partially or fully addressed and are also insignificant in the bigger picture of the topic and technological progress in general. Those ones you listed are based on your subjective experience, your outdated knowledge on the tech or simply a transitory state of software that can be easily improved since they are not an inherent technological limitation.