This is the most likely theory.
The notion that Apple was purposefully trying to kill PWAs never made sense in light of their significant investment in supporting PWAs over the last four years, down to recruiting industry rockstars such as Jen Simmons.
Nobody who was screaming bloody murder ever tried to reconcile that incongruence, much less succeeded.
What’s more likely is that Apple’s lawyers went with the most careful interpretation of the DMA, concluded that they’d have to facilitate Home Screen install for other browsers as well, figured it wasn’t worth the engineering effort, especially on short notice, and instead just deactivated it for Safari as well.
Then, after all the bloody murder that was being screamed about, the EU started to inquire[0] both with Apple as well as developers about the consequences for PWAs. Apple was told that their interpretation was too strict (or that they will be given more time to implement it for other browsers, but less likely because such decisions are typically made public) and that they’re fine (for now) with PWAs running in WebKit.
0: https://9to5mac.com/2024/02/26/apple-blocking-web-apps/
The notion that Apple was purposefully trying to kill PWAs never made sense in light of their significant investment in supporting PWAs over the last four years, down to recruiting industry rockstars such as Jen Simmons.
Nobody who was screaming bloody murder ever tried to reconcile that incongruence, much less succeeded.
What’s more likely is that Apple’s lawyers went with the most careful interpretation of the DMA, concluded that they’d have to facilitate Home Screen install for other browsers as well, figured it wasn’t worth the engineering effort, especially on short notice, and instead just deactivated it for Safari as well.
Then, after all the bloody murder that was being screamed about, the EU started to inquire[0] both with Apple as well as developers about the consequences for PWAs. Apple was told that their interpretation was too strict (or that they will be given more time to implement it for other browsers, but less likely because such decisions are typically made public) and that they’re fine (for now) with PWAs running in WebKit.
0: https://9to5mac.com/2024/02/26/apple-blocking-web-apps/