satlus / webview2test

WPF WebView2Testing

WPF tabbed Desktop Window UX that renders multiple webview2 instances.

This is proof-of-concept code, ugly, and shouldn't in any way be used in production

Dev Machine

• CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5800x
• RAM: 32GB DDR4-3200
• GPU: RTX 3090

Observations

• WebView2 renderering seems to use significantly less memory than chromium/electron
• Initial loading of the webview content is reasonably fast, but may require UX treatment to feel seeamless in certain cases; this could be managed at the container level with the appropriate hooks
• Resizing windows is jank, and does not feel smooth; other approaches (off screen rendering, transitions) may be needed
  • After updating to the latest webview2 controller and setting webview2.DefaultBackgroundColor this is looking much better
• More complete tab switching UX (drag & drop), is not implemented. It needs to be implemented to assess performance impact
• A comparative analysis should be done between WPF-WV2, CPPWIN32-WV2, ELectron-Chromium, and MAUI-WV2 to understand framework overhead and perf characteristics

Considerations

• Performance: CPU, Memory, and overall responsiveness for non-trivial DOM based UIs (Grids, Animation, WebGL)
• UX: loading, resizing and tabswitching "perception" of snappiness
• Ease of implentation and maintenance

Test Methodology

• WPF window with three tabs, and custom UX so the title bar contains tabItems (similar to vscode's UX)
• Load 4 instances of webview2 renderes within each tab that can auto-resize to parent window. Make sure they are non-trivial in terms of DOM/CPU
• Load, tab switch, and resize to measure and assess performance and UX
• Compare/contrst similar UX in electron, and potential WebView2 with win32/cpp or Maui bindings

Test Plan

• Custom title bar with tab UX, min/max/close
• 4 WebView2 renders loaded per tab
• Resize and container window drag
• Offscreen rendering on resize
• Transitions on resize
• Tab drag and drop, re-ordering
• Window "tear out"
• window re-parenting
• Comparitive analysis vs
  • Electron
  • win32/cpp WV2
  • Maui WV2