WebAssembly Reference Types

Category: WebAssembly
Type: New or changed feature
Status: Enabled by default (Chrome 96)
Intent stage: Shipped

Breaking change: No
Enterprise impact: None
Spec maturity: Published standard
Web Platform Tests: Yes

WPT details: Tests are available as part of the WebAssembly spec tests: https://github.com/WebAssembly/spec/tree/master/test/core

Summary

Allow WebAssembly modules to hold references to JS/DOM objects, passing them as arguments, storing them in locals and globals, and storing them in WebAssembly.Table objects.

Standards & signals

Specification: https://github.com/WebAssembly/reference-types
Firefox: Shipped/Shipping
Safari: Positive
Web developers: Positive
Tracking bug: https://bugs.chromium.org/p/v8/issues/detail?id=7581

Ecosystem

Web Platform Tests: https://wpt.fyi/results/?q=test%2Fcore
Chrome Platform Showcase: https://chrome-platform-showcase.paulkinlan-ea.deno.net/features
GenDN reference: https://gendn.paulkinlan-ea.deno.net/features
chrome.dev demos search: https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Achrome.dev+WebAssembly%20Reference%20Types
MDN Web Docs: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/search?q=WebAssembly%20Reference%20Types
Baseline status: https://webstatus.dev/?q=WebAssembly%20Reference%20Types

Docs: https://github.com/WebAssembly/reference-types/blob/master/proposals/reference-types/Overview.md

Explainers: https://github.com/WebAssembly/reference-types/blob/master/proposals/reference-types/Overview.md

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