[bug] Pop-up window creation is blocked in webviews no matter what permissions are set

[phenomen]

Describe the bug

Since some of earlier updates to Tauri or some plugin, webviews are unable to open detached pop-up windows and it blocks many authentication flows (Google, Apple) and other use-cases. I've tried to set all possible local and remote permissions, but nothing helps.

Reproduction

1. Create a webview of any website that uses pop-ups, i.e. Anthropic

	const webview = new WebviewWindow("anthropic", {
		title: `Anthropic Console`,
		url: "https://console.anthropic.com/login",
		width: 1280,
		height: 800,
	});

2. Click on "Continue with Google"

Expected behavior

A pop-up with Google auth should open. Instead, there is an error:

Here is what I get in Foundry VTT when trying to create a detached window for character sheet:

It's just a couple of examples but I encountered it on many websites and apps.

Full tauri info output

[✔] Environment
    - OS: Windows 10.0.26100 x86_64 (X64)
    ✔ WebView2: 141.0.3537.57
    ✔ MSVC: Visual Studio Build Tools 2022
    ✔ rustc: 1.90.0 (1159e78c4 2025-09-14)
    ✔ cargo: 1.90.0 (840b83a10 2025-07-30)
    ✔ rustup: 1.28.2 (e4f3ad6f8 2025-04-28)
    ✔ Rust toolchain: stable-x86_64-pc-windows-msvc (default)
    - node: 22.20.0
    - npm: 10.9.3
    - bun: 1.2.23

[-] Packages
    - tauri 🦀: 2.8.5
    - tauri-build 🦀: 2.4.1
    - wry 🦀: 0.53.4
    - tao 🦀: 0.34.3
    - @tauri-apps/api : 2.8.0
    - @tauri-apps/cli : 2.8.4

[-] Plugins
    - tauri-plugin-fs 🦀: 2.4.2
    - @tauri-apps/plugin-fs : not installed!
    - tauri-plugin-updater 🦀: 2.9.0
    - @tauri-apps/plugin-updater : 2.9.0
    - tauri-plugin-shell 🦀: 2.3.1
    - @tauri-apps/plugin-shell : 2.3.1
    - tauri-plugin-dialog 🦀: 2.4.0
    - @tauri-apps/plugin-dialog : 2.4.0
    - tauri-plugin-global-shortcut 🦀: 2.3.0
    - @tauri-apps/plugin-global-shortcut : 2.3.0

Additional context

It cause a lot of issues in my Tauri app so currently I have to use very outdated Tauri and plugins versions where this issue does not exist.

phenomen/flc#86
phenomen/flc#87
phenomen/flc#88
phenomen/flc#89

[FabianLars]

since your discord thread i learned (remembered) that this is now "hidden" behind https://docs.rs/tauri/latest/tauri/webview/struct.WebviewWindowBuilder.html#method.on_new_window (no guarantees that it works as i didn't see it in use yet). At least i think that's the relevant change.

unfortunately this means that it won't work with the JS api :/

ref #13876

[phenomen]

It works fine in Tauri 2.2.0 (and appropriate plugin versions). Anything newer breaks pop-ups. It looks like a regression bug since there is no workaround/migration available.

[FabianLars]

wait what, it doesn't work in 2.3.0?? i don't see any relevant changes there 🤔

[phenomen]

It happened somewhere after 2.2.0. I'm not sure about the exact version that broke it... It was tricky to downgrade due to plugins requiring very specific tauri and tauri-build versions, so I was unable to test every possible build. What I'm sure is that it also didn't work in 2.6.0.

[FabianLars]

hmm that;s so weird. i don't see any relevant changes before 2.8 but you're not the only one who reported this i think.

[ManaHime]

I wonder if this is related to #14090
I've also be unable to get popups to show up since I updated Tauri.

[FabianLars]

possibly, would you mind giving the rust api above a try? so instead of creating the window in js or in tauri.conf.json you do what's shown in the rust example, it hopefully is copy paste-able.
Edit: nevermind, easier example:

use tauri::{
  utils::config::WebviewUrl,
  webview::{NewWindowResponse, WebviewWindowBuilder},
};
tauri::Builder::default()
  .setup(|app| {
    let app_ = app.handle().clone();
    let webview_window = WebviewWindowBuilder::new(app, "core", WebviewUrl::App("index.html".into()))
      .on_new_window(move |url, features| {
        NewWindowResponse::Allow
      })
      .build()?;
    Ok(())
  });

[phenomen]

@FabianLars I just tested and it works when invoked from Rust. Here is my updated function. Though, it would be great to expose it to JS API.

[lucasfernog]

I think this was changed because now we always register the newWindowRequested listener: https://github.com/tauri-apps/wry/pull/1601/files#diff-163891e9e6609b4518c33c67e661accfafa543fe6de3657dd981308f2c97b45dR694

which means the window creation is not allowed by default (matching behavior of other platforms)

perhaps we could add a few options on the webview builder JS API, like onNewWindow?: 'allowNative' | 'createTauriWindow'