PayPal API Broken on iPadOS
‘Pay with PayPal’ functionality on websites is broken for me and has been across updates of both Firefox and iPadOS for as long as I can remember at this point. I’m using an iPadPro running iOS 16.7.2 with Firefox for iOS version 120.4 (36613). When I’m checking out at e-commerce sites (e.g., J Crew), and I click on the PayPal button when selecting a form of payment, a new tab opens, but it’s literally blank — nothing even tries to connect or load. This happens across e-commerce sites. It doesn’t happen with Firefox on my PC/Windows laptop or on my iPad with other browsers (Chrome, Safari). I have tried everything that I can uninstall/reinstall, deactivate, or toggle, and nothing seems to fix this. I have cross-site tracking disabled in iOS. Some people have suggested that websites are not fully supporting Firefox any longer or that there is a problem with Firefox and Apple’s proprietary rendering engine. I’m really at the end of my wits about this. After having used Firefox faithfully since Netscape disappeared, I’m honestly on the verge of giving up. Please help.
All Replies (4)
Hi Annemarie
Thank you for your question and I am sorry to hear that you are having this issue.
What level of enhanced tracking protection do you have set in Firefox for iOS?
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/enhanced-tracking-protection-firefox-ios
Reducing the level of enhanced tracking protection may help make that website element work correctly.
I hope that this helps.
Hi Paul,
Same issue with Tracking Protection disabled. 😔
Annemarie
Hi Annemarie
I am sorry to hear that. I have raised your question with our developers and am waiting for a response.
Hi Annemarie,
Thank you for reaching out with this issue and trying to do some troubleshooting with Paul. After looking into this a bit with Paul and some other folks here, this issue you are noting is easily reproduced specifically for PayPal while using Firefox on an iPad in the current version of the browser.
We did a bit of exploring and found that only certain implementations of PayPal generate this blank tab issue. It seems some sites implementation for PayPal is to stay within the same tab and surface the login to PayPal. That instance does not run into an issue.
We also tested some of the other common payment options on a few e-commerce sites which use a similar implementation to route through a new tab to log into they payment system, these other payment systems seem to work fine with the new tab popping up correctly and showing the login page.
Lastly, we weren't able to reproduce this on an iPhone (The Firefox browser on iOS between iPhone and iPad is mostly the same) going to the same e-commerce site. The new tab comes up and PayPal access established.
In any case, we are providing these details to our engineering team and will be looking to understand if this problem is an issue we need PayPal to review or something we can address in Firefox to resolve.