bug(material select): Accessibility iOS VoiceOver looses focus when selecting options

[yannyannyann]

Is this a regression?

• Yes, this behavior used to work in the previous version

The previous version in which this bug was not present was

No response

Description

WCAG issue.

Issue seen with iPhone and VoiceOver.
Issue not reproduced 100% of the time.

The main issue is that after a double tap on the dropdown (action to select an element when voice over is enabled), when swiping between elements, the focus continues to move outside the select, instead of browsing each element in the select.

The issue is not reproducible on Mac, nor on a classic desktop, and is restricted to VoiceOver use on an iPhone.
The issue is not reproducible on Android/Talkback neither.

Reproduction

Angular Material Example page: https://material.angular.dev/components/select/overview
StackBlitz link: https://stackblitz.com/run?file=src%2Fexample%2Fselect-reset-example.ts&startScript=start

Steps to reproduce:

1. activate VoiceOver on your iPhone/iPad device
2. Visit the stackblitz demo URL
3. play with the select menus having options list that overlap other focusable DOM elements (another menu, a heading, etc...)

Expected Behavior

Expected: The screen reader focus should go back to the menu where the option is selected.

Actual Behavior

Actual: After selection is done in the menu, the screen reader focus is pointing to the element behind the chosen material-option.

Environment

• Angular: 19
• CDK/Material: select
• Browser(s): Safari/Chrome
• Operating System (e.g. Windows, macOS, Ubuntu): iOS