Glossary
Progressive enhancement is building so the core content and functions work with HTML alone, then layering JavaScript on top. The page is useful before the enhancement arrives, and remains useful if it never does.
The modern argument is different: scripts fail for ordinary reasons (a flaky connection, a blocked CDN, a parse error, a crawler that does not execute them), and a page whose content only exists after JavaScript runs has no fallback for any of those.
Many AI crawlers execute little or no JavaScript, so client-rendered content is invisible to exactly the systems increasingly deciding whether a business gets recommended.
More than before. The argument is no longer old browsers but failure modes and machine readers: flaky networks, blocked scripts, and AI crawlers that execute little or no JavaScript.
No. It means the content and core actions do not depend on it. Interactivity is layered on top, so a failure degrades the experience rather than removing the page.
Progressive enhancement is building so the core content and functions work with HTML alone, then layering JavaScript on top. The page is useful before the enhancement arrives, and remains useful if it never does.
