There’s a significant difference in usability between the tabbed browsing experience in Safari on the iPad versus the paged browsing experience in Safari on the iPhone; with that in mind, some might prefer the former.
A new free jailbreak tweak dubbed FullSafari by iOS developer Bensge gives even iPhone and iPod touch users access to the iPad-like tabbed browsing experience in Safari, providing a more capable web browser in the palm of your hand.
After installation, you won’t find any options to configure, but if you open the Safari app, you’ll notice a couple of changes right off the bat.
One is the addition of a “+” button to the menu bar at the bottom of the app; the second is when you tap on that new button, a new tab launches before your eyes without the original tab disappearing from view.
The tabbed-browsing experience feels exactly like opening a new tab on an iPad and eliminates the need to tap on the new page button in the menu bar as you normally would have to on smaller Apple devices.
Overall, I prefer the tabbed browsing experience on the iPhone. While it takes up just a little bit more screen space, it also makes browsing feel reminiscent to how it does on a computer and reduces the amount of time spent moving between your open pages, which is a win/win in my book.
If you’re interested in trying FullSafari, you can download it for free from Cydia’s BigBoss repository. The tweak works on all jailbroken iOS 8, 9, and 10 devices and its source code is available on GitHub for anyone who’s interested in learning about what makes the tweak work behind the scenes.
Do you prefer the iPad-style tabbed browsing or the iPhone-style paged browsing? Share your thoughts in the comments section below!
