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Is there a way to create an Android Web Application like on the iPhone?

Using the "apple-mobile-web-app-capable" meta tag in the head element of an HTML page, it informs the Apple iOS that the application can be installed to the users springboard so that it starts the Safari Mobile browser without a menu bar.

ThinkingStiff
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Zymotik
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    Irony is apple has dropped such expicit support for PWAs and Chrome/Android has taken it to next level.Situation around PWA after a decade later in 2021. – Ravinder Payal Jul 13 '21 at 22:43

4 Answers4

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Chrome on Android now supports a meta-tag mobile-web-app-capable:

Since Chrome M31, you can set up your web app to have an application shortcut icon added to a device's homescreen, and have the app launch in full-screen "app mode" using Chrome for Android’s "Add to homescreen" menu item.

For details about the mobile-web-app-capable meta-tag, scroll down to "Supporting homescreen-installed apps prior to M39":

Since M31, Chrome will look for the following meta tag in the element of the web-page (if there's a manifest with display specified, this is ignored):

<meta name="mobile-web-app-capable" content="yes">

The name attribute MUST be "mobile-web-app-capable" and the content attribute must be "yes" (case in-sensitive). If there is any other value in the content attribute the web app will be added as a regular bookmark.

While I don't have any devices running Chrome M31 that I could test with, I interpret this to mean that full-screen web apps, with an icon on the device's homescreen, are supported as far back as Chrome M31, provided you use that mobile-web-app-capable meta tag.

Josh
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    I realize this is an old question, but it was the first search result for me when I came here looking for the answer to this question. I continued my search and found the answer [elsewhere](http://www.html5rocks.com/en/mobile/fullscreen/), and thought it my duty as a good internet citizen to come back here and make sure the next searcher would find the answer here. – Josh Jan 14 '15 at 20:02
  • Same josh. 2019 – Lucas Vazquez Aug 19 '19 at 20:40
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Since Chrome31+ home screen web apps are also supported on Android. See here.

Ludis studio
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I don't believe so.

However, it would be fairly trivial to detect if a browser is an Android device, and show a link to a Android Market app (or directly to the APK)

As Android has a WebView widget, it's pretty trivial to write an app that loads a dedicated website, or that somehow wraps offline content (either downloaded at first-launch, or shipped in the assets folder)

Phil Lello
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    The downfall with this approach is being tied into an ecosystem and having an app that may go out of date. Headaches enough with web dev. Thanks though. – Zymotik Sep 06 '12 at 16:09
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You can create shortcuts to bookmarks (=any web page) on the homescreen.

molnarm
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    True, you can create a shortcut on the home screen, but it is simply a bookmark. On the iPhone/iOS, the 'bookmark' (WebApp) has special abilities like opening without a menubar, a loading image and a custom icon. It is also loaded into an isolated copy of Safari, so if the browser is locked under restrictions, the web app will still load. Is this possible on Android? – Zymotik Jan 08 '11 at 08:45