Both Mozilla and Google are working on non-WebKit based iOS browsers

guest · Feb 7, 2023

Google begins effort to run Chrome’s Blink engine on iOS in place of Apple’s WebKit
By Kyle Bradshaw @SkylledDev - February 6, 2023

A new experimental effort in Chrome aims to run the proper Blink engine on iOS instead of Apple’s required WebKit engine.
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On iOS, all web browsers, including third-party ones like Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox, are required to build upon the same WebKit browser engine as Apple’s Safari browser. By comparison, Android (among many other platforms) allows any and all alternative browser engines. Proponents of the open web have long argued that Apple’s limitation stifles any meaningful competition among web browsers on iPhones and iPads.
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A new project, spotted by The Register, is poised to shake up the status quo of browsers on iOS, or at the very least lay the foundation for future change. In a publicly visible post on the Chromium Bug Tracker, the team announced on January 31 that it was beginning an effort to port Chrome/Chromium’s full Blink engine to iOS.
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Notably, Google’s Chromium team has moved full steam ahead on porting Blink to iOS, introducing dozens of related code changes in the past week. At the pace things are progressing, we may have our first look at the browser engine for Chrome — and Microsoft Edge, Opera, and more — running on iOS in the coming weeks.
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guest · Feb 7, 2023

Mozilla, like Google, is looking ahead to the end of Apple's WebKit rule
Work on a Gecko-based version of Firefox for iOS is underway, again
By Thomas Claburn @ThomasClaburn - February 7, 2023

UPDATED Mozilla is planning for the day when Apple will no longer require its competitors to use the WebKit browser engine in iOS.
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Mozilla conducted similar experiments that never went anywhere years ago but in October 2022 posted an issue in the GitHub repository housing the code for the iOS version of Firefox that includes a reference to GeckoView, a wrapper for Firefox's Gecko rendering engine.

Under the current Apple App Store Guidelines, iOS browser apps must use WebKit. So a Firefox build incorporating Gecko rather than WebKit currently cannot be distributed through the iOS App Store.
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As we reported last week, Mozilla is not alone in anticipating an iOS App Store regime that tolerates browser competition. Google has begun work on a Blink-based version of Chrome for iOS.
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If Apple does allow other browser engines within iOS ecosystem, Google and Mozilla will be able to compete with Safari through technical differentiation that's already evident in the desktop versions of these browsers.

While the requested Firefox for iOS settings page for toggling GeckoView could be for internal browser testing, it appears to be something more. The brief public discussion of the GitHub issue suggests Mozilla has anticipated that Apple's rules may change – something sought by Mozilla and others through ongoing regulatory lobbying.
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Updated to add
In an emailed statement, a Mozilla spokesperson said, "We abide by Apple's iOS app store policies, and are simply doing some exploratory work to understand the technical challenges for Gecko-based browsers on iOS if those policies were to change. We hope the day will come when people can freely decide to use the browser of their choice, including the opportunity to select the engine that underpins it."
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Both Mozilla and Google are working on non-WebKit based iOS browsers

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