Progressive Web Apps are web pages that are designed to function like native apps. They're increasingly gaining traction on the web, with Google reporting a whopping 270% rise in web app installations last year. PWAs, as convenient as they are, have a lot of room to grow. One major limitation of web apps is that they don't support a tabbed experience. In other words, a web app can't open multiple pages in a single window. But that may change soon.
According to a recent update on Chrome Platform Status, Google is working on adding a tab strip for web app windows. The proposed tabbed mode will allow web apps to open links and pages in tabs in the same window. Currently, when you click on a link in a web app, it opens in the web browser, with the web app fading into the background. This will change with the tabbed mode.
Currently, PWAs in a standalone window can only have one page open at a time. Some apps expect users to have many pages open at once. Tabbed mode adds a tab strip to standalone web apps that allows multiple tabs to be open at once.
A screenshot shared by a Chrome team member showcases what the tabbed experience will look like. Note that the feature is still in development, so the UI may not be finalized. Google also notes that they're only building this feature for the desktop for now. There's currently no plan for Android support.
As you can see in the screenshot, the tabs look a lot like browser tabs, except that all tabs belong to a single web app.
Chrome users can currently try out the experimental tab strip UI by enabling the following feature flag: chrome://flags/#enable-desktop-pwas-tab-strip.
Source: Chrome Platform Status, Google Groups
Via: Windows Latest