Silverlight not Supported in Safari 12.0

We debated trying to recover back to a pre-update TimeMachine backup, but both of these workstations do other tasks, so the issue was then copying what needs to be kept, etc.

FWIW, i found the SeaMonkey browser (built off of the Mozilla Gecko engine) and it is working far so well.

https://www.seamonkey-project.org/

Other that having to allow it to launch via System Preferences -> Security & Privacy -> General -> "Allow" it is working well with Silverlight.

I have this issue as well. I've been trying to downgrade back to 11.1.2 to restore the functionality but so far have not been successful. I've got 11.1.2 running, but I can't get into preferences nor can I expand my safari window past a certain point horizontally anymore to make it take up more of the screen.

We are having issues with this as well on a couple of iMacs that had auto-update turned on.

Our PACS (medical imaging viewing software) used Silverlight on the desktops (native iPad app on the iPads) and Safari 12.0 has removed support for Silverlight. Strangely, Adobe Flash seems to be unaffected.

Safari 11 is fine.

I suspect the issue stems from this item that isn't seen unless you expand the Safari 12.0 update in the app store: "Improves security by discontinuing support for most NPAPI plugins". I'd wager that Microsoft Silverlight is an NPAPI plugin which explains why it no longer works.

After a bunch of work in the recovery console I was able to get 11.1.2 back up and running which restored Silverlight. However, I now get a frequent crash popup for "SafariBookmarksSyncAgent" quitting unexpectedly. While annoying, I don't use safari bookmarks, no less require them to be synchronized anywhere so I'll just move that popup window into the bottom corner of my screen and ignore it after each reboot. Super annoying, but at least I got the plugin back for now.

I've also reported this issue and thread to Apple's senior advisors in the hopes they can get some engineering eyeballs on it. However, I suspect they are going to say this is now Microsoft's responsibility to update Silverlight to not be an NPAPI plugin.

Hi,

A work around for me - log into https://virgintvgo.virginmedia.com/en/tv/watch-tv.html on Chrome. When you click to watch a channel, it thinks it is a new device, so you have to 'swap' from Safari to Chrome. Works fine now.

Annoying - but at least I can watch Virgin on Mac now.

Hope this works for you.

Please stop spreading incorrect information. First of all, the latest version of High Sierra is 10.13.6, not 10.13.1. And second of all, Safari version 12.0 has removed support for NPAPI plugins. This means Microsoft Silverlight will not work regardless of what version of macOS you are running so long as you are running Safari version 12.0 or greater.

Again, please stop spreading incorrect information. Safari version 12.0 has removed support for NPAPI plugins. This means Microsoft Silverlight will not work regardless of what version of macOS you are running so long as you are running Safari version 12.0 or greater.

ted.underhill wrote:

The most surprising part of this reply is learning that Netflix is using Silverlight to deliver content over the web.

Indeed, particularly given this from Wikipedia's article on Silverlight:

Silverlight was also used by Amazon Video and Netflix for their instant video streaming services, but Netflix said in its Tech Blog in 2013 that, since Microsoft had announced Silverlight's end-of-life, they would be moving to HTML5 video.

Chrome & Firefox have both dropped support for Silverlight. Strange that it has worked in Safari for so long, and that Netflix et al haven't already moved on. I get a weird error code trying to access Netflix in Safari 12 here, plus references to HDCP, but it works perfectly in Chrome on the same machine. 😕

tt2

I spoke with both Apple & Netflix last night. Apple says they gave Netflix & Microsoft plenty of time during the beta period to figure out how to make things work. Netflix says to use another browser. It seems few people, including Netflix support, realizes that Chrome & Firefox stream Netflix at 720p - Safari was the only way to get 1080p.

Is there a way to force Safari/Netflix to use HTML5 rather than Silverlight?

I don't stream Netflix via a browser, but https://help.netflix.com/en/node/23742 claims you should be able to use HTML5 for Netflix in Safari. Maybe contact Netflix support to figure out how to do so?

I found the answer to my HTML5 issue. Since Silverlight is a blocked plugin, the browser should default to HTML5, but it does not. The reason, as I've figured out, is that Apple uses the hardware API, so h.264 video decoding is done in hardware (the CPU), rather than software. Chrome & Firefox use the software API, so video decoding is done in software. Well, lucky me, still hanging onto my old 2010 Mac Pro with Westmere XEON's, which don't have h.264 decoding in the CPU. This was introduced in 2011's Sandy Bridge architecture. SO, if you have anything older than 2011-2012, no HTML5 Netflix decoding.

Hi,

I've been facing the same problem. I found a very good browser that is still supports silverlight and found it faster than others till now, It is called Brave and this is its web site:

https://brave.com/

Best regards,

P.s. Don't forget to install silverlight after installing Brave and to restart your Mac Os after it.

Walkaround for this issue is to use: https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases/51.0b14/mac/en-US/ instead of Safari 12 on macOS for Silverlight pages. On Firefox version 52+ there is the same issue. Hope it helps 🙂.

Thanks!

I have a work-around: Download the free SeaMonkey browser and use it to access sites that use/require Silverlight. I did this today and it works fine.

The version I got is: SeaMonkey 2.49.4 (The SeaMonkey® Project)

The macOS version I am on is: macOS 10.13 (High Sierra)

Hope that helps --

UPDATE: I just realised that the communities page I was looking at did not show me all replies, just the "most helpful" and at on September 18th onc_photo had already suggested this work around! I wish I noticed that earlier as it would have saved me an hour or so... !