[jessriedel]

Why don't browsers tell the server whether the user has a touch screen? This seems like a perfectly reasonable thing that the website should know before delivering the page, and users who are hyper privacy focused could toggle a setting to not send this info.

[aembleton]

A touch screen has @media (pointer: coarse)

CSS can be used to style elements accordingly: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/@media/poin...

No need to get the server involved.

[jessriedel]

Thanks. Does the server really send the info to construct all possible page configurations for all possible devices? And if so, why are the websites still rendering with touch-interface objects when we doesn't have touch, as reported by OP? (The lack of touch screen ability seems like it should trump things like screen resolution.)

[ben-schaaf]

Laptops and desktops can have touchscreens too. When having a small viewport less stuff fits on screen and thus a different design is required, we may associate this with our smartphones but they also work for mouse/keyboard input.

[jessriedel]

I know large screens can have touch. I'm asking why they are sending the instructions for rendering a page requiring touch controls to devices that don't have touch interfaces. (Seems like a waste of bandwidth, but maybe it ends up being insignificant overall.)

[SulfurHexaFluri]

Because many laptop users have a touch screen.