I was surprised to find a single-ended forward converter in a Mean Well SP-500-24, a 500W 24V power supply.
Switching transistors are two 2SK3878 in parallel. If I remember correctly it connects the clamp winding and diode through a capacitor to the power winding/mosfet drain to effectively clamp turn-off voltage spikes.
I measured switching frequency and it was 62 kHz.
PWM controller TL3845P.
PFC controller LT1249.
SP-500-24 is out of production since a few years back, but I wonder if the PSP-600-24 in current production with the same form factor is similar (or if they went to a two-transistor forward maybe?).
Hard-switched half bridges are definitely not as popular as they used to be with that self-starting BJT circuit found in almost all AT and old ATX power supplies. The topology doesn't lend itself easily to current mode control without special arrangements and more or less requires a current transformer to monitor switch currents and not blow up during overload.
And as switching frequencies rise and transformer flux-swing becomes limited by core losses rather than saturation, the bipolar excitation isn't much of an advantage any more either.
While the winding utilization is less in a forward converter because of the non-power-transferring DC current component in the windings, at the same time the DC current isn't subject to skin/proximity effect losses. As DC resistance can be quite a bit lower than AC resistance, the DC current in the winding doesn't cost that much either.
I think these reasons - easier current mode control and current sensing in addition to that unipolar excitation and DC current in the windings don't give much disadvantages at higher switching frequency - are what has led to the widespread adoption of different types of unipolar-drive forward converters (dual switch, active clamp, single switch) and the decline in use of hard-switched bridge converters.