I don't think it is fair to discount battery life, memory usage, and performance so heavily. Looking at the http://caniuse.com list there are plenty of features supported by Safari and not supported by Chrome including Audio Tracks, Video Tracks, ES6 modules, SVG Fonts, Animated PNG, CSS regions. Safari is actually the first to 100% ES6 compliance; Chrome sits at 89%.

I would also remind everyone that Google chose to fork Webkit to create Blink. They could have contributed their IndexDB engine to webkit at any time but chose not to. They could have contributed to the process isolation refactor but chose to do their own thing instead. They could have collaborated on JSCore instead of creating V8. That isn't wrong or right but it is the truth and it does mean duplicated effort.

Some of the features supported by Chrome are interesting to web-only developers I'm sure, but I don't want the browser on my mobile phone running service workers eating my battery in the background. With great power comes great responsibility and the JS-advertising-infested web has a really poor record on handling responsibility.

If you give a web developer media playback, they force auto-playing media on you.

If you give a web developer responsive layouts, they steal your ability to zoom.

If you give a web developer cookies, they inject tracking bugs to invade your privacy.

If you give a web developer service workers they will absolutely drain your battery.

(Yes not everyone but it will be widespread enough that browsers will be forced to invent countermeasures.)

>Google chose to fork Webkit to create Blink

Wasn't this because the amount of work required to co-operate with the WebKit project made it not worth it for Google?

I find it more likely that Apple and Google's views on key topics (e.g. privacy/advertising) were diametrically opposed (not to mention Android vs iOS).

Note: Chrome exists for many OSs - Safari is only found on Apple ones.

They had Safari for windows at some point…

That's only the newest version of Safari, before that it was pretty shit (on par with IE). Can't expect the mind share to change overnight, especially when it has lagged for years.

It's really weird to see this myth about Safari being the new IE6. At no point did Apple abandoned WebKit or add proprietary features to the extent that Microsoft did. They've continued to plug away adding new functionality and as has been mentioned they are ahead of Chrome/Edge in some areas and behind in others.

Some features in particular service workers Apple has deliberately chosen to take a firm position on because they value battery life and security.

All the things xenadu02 mentioned have shipped in previous Safari releases. In some cases last year, in other cases weveral years ago.

Still no CSS scroll snap points & CSS regions under Chrome.

Safari has always been ahead of Chrome for design & user experience. I'm not sure what the benefits of Chrome are?

[cite needed]

Chrome chrome dev tools still beats out Safari. If I'm going to use a browser to develop with I might as well use it all the time.

I would love to switch to safari full time though. The battery gains are pretty nice.

Yeah, I left Safari when they rebuilt their dev tools. Should have stuck with the original WebKit dev tools.

Which is bad for developer centric product design but what about user centric product design?

Honestly feel like I'm back in the IE era at times as I go over to devs and point out something isn't working only to be told "try it in Chrome".

Only difference between the IE era and the Chrome era is the self satisfied grin that they're on the cutting edge when something only works in Chrome.