WebKit Features in Safari 18.5

May 12, 2025

by Jen Simmons

Safari 18.5 is here, with Declarative Web Push on macOS and more. After the massive set of new WebKit features and fixes in Safari 18.4, this release is far more modest. It includes bug fixes and follow-ups to the last release.

Declarative Web Push on macOS

Declarative Web Push is now available on macOS. This new approach to push notifications on the web doesn’t require Service Workers — which makes it far easier for you as a developer to implement. And saves battery life for your users.

Every notification uses a standardized JSON format:

{
    "web_push": 8030,
    "notification": {
        "title": "Webkit.org — Meet Declarative Web Push",
        "lang": "en-US",
        "dir": "ltr",
        "body": "Send push notifications without JavaScript or service worker!",
        "navigate": "https://webkit.org/blog/16535/meet-declarative-web-push/",
        "silent": false,
        "app_badge": "1"
    }
}

Because Declarative Web Push doesn’t have the potential for misuse that original Web Push does, there’s no need to enforce limitations and penalties for failing to display a notification. It’s more private and more energy efficient by design. And it can be used today with an elegant backwards compatibility path for browser engines that haven’t yet added support.

Learn all about it in Meet Declarative Web Push.

Bug Fixes and more

Editing

  • Fixed some errors in finding the caret position from a click or tap on iOS in vertical writing modes. (146512180)

JavaScript

  • Fixed processing of an alternation of strings. (147776512)

Lockdown Mode

  • Fixed a logic error present in iOS 18.4 and aligned releases that caused Lockdown Mode-exempted websites and apps to incorrectly restrict image formats. (149401615)

Networking

  • Fixed an issue where using WebSockets within a WebWorker could cause the entire worker to freeze by preventing the worker’s run loop from executing during the send operation. (149070944)

PDF

  • Fixed VoiceOver focus popping out of the text field or getting stuck. (148340058)

Rendering

  • Fixed an issue where text incorrectly overflows in width: max-content grids with min-content columns due to incorrect min-content sizing during track sizing, ensuring the grid properly accommodates the item’s max-content width. (149095793)

Sandboxing

  • Fixed an issue where the WebContent process would not respond to notifications due to a missing entitlement, ensuring notifications are properly forwarded by conditionalizing the sandbox rule. (148108994)

Service Workers

  • Fixed Service Worker downloads being prematurely interrupted. (143065672)
  • Fixed moving a download file to its final destination. (146326574)

Web Extensions

  • Fixed declarativeNetRequestWithHostAccess permission removing site access even though the extension already has permission to inject scripts. (145484265)
  • Fixed the Permissions API to return either <all_urls> or *://*/* match pattern depending on which was requested by the extension. (149003428)

Updating to Safari 18.5

Safari 18.5 is available on iOS 18.5, iPadOS 18.5, macOS Sequoia 15.5, macOS Sonoma, macOS Ventura, and in visionOS 2.5. To get the latest version of Safari on iPhone, iPad or Apple Vision Pro, go to Settings > General > Software Update, and tap to update.

If you are running macOS Sonoma or macOS Ventura, you can update Safari by itself, without updating macOS. Go to  > System Settings > General > Software Update and click “More info…” under Updates Available.

Feedback

We love hearing from you. To share your thoughts, find our web evangelist online: Jen Simmons on Bluesky / Mastodon, Saron Yitbarek on BlueSky, and Jon Davis on Bluesky / Mastodon. You can follow WebKit on LinkedIn. If you run into any issues, we welcome your feedback on Safari UI (learn more about filing Feedback), or your WebKit bug report about web technologies or Web Inspector. If you run into a website that isn’t working as expected, please file a report at webcompat.com. Filing issues really does make a difference.

Download the latest Safari Technology Preview on macOS to stay at the forefront of the web platform and to use the latest Web Inspector features.

You can also find this information in the Safari 18.5 release notes.