By Browser preferences are a very personal thing and many people tend to be pretty die-hard about their browser of choice. For Opera users with Android devices, this has been rather frustrating. The company announced the beta of their Opera Mini for Android browser back in March, and updated the app in July, but still lacked many features of standard Android browsers like pinch to zoom. Not anymore.
At Up North Web, the company announced they were hard at work on Opera for Android and would launch the browser within a month.
The release comes with 3 main improvements:
- A new name: Opera for Android sounds a lot better than Opera Mini 5.x if you ask me
- Pinch to zoom: previously there were only two levels of touch and zoom in/out
- Hardware acceleration: essentially allows Opera to run at “lightning speed” so they’ve improved performance
You can’t quite download Opera Mobile for Android yet, but they assure us that it will be available “within a month”, so mark November 14th on your calendar and if you haven’t heard anything by then, let the inevitable complaint storm begin.
even with the multi-touch patents apple just won?
this should be interesting…
I have been begging them to do this for months. Thank God they were actually working on it all along! Add to that they revealed that Opera 11 will have extension support and my day just brightened up a whooooooooole lot.
Pinch to zoom thank you!!! I’ve always wanted this feature. Opera mini is my favorite browser for android. Beats out everything else, this will just widen the gap :P
I don’t think you understand the distinction between Opera Mobile and Opera Mini. They’re two different products from Opera. Opera Mini (which we have now) is not a real web browser. It lets you request a web page, have it rendered on Opera’s servers, and have it delivered as a binary blob to your phone. Your phone displays this blob.
Opera Mobile is an actual web browser, on the same footing as the default Google browser and Firefox Mobile. It renders HTML directly and runs javascript.
So it’s not a new name for Opera Mini that they announced. It’s an entirely different product that’s been available on other platforms for a long time.
Sounds like you are confusing Opera Mini and Opera Mobile. Opera for Android is the full Opera Mobile browser, NOT Opera Mini.
Opera Mini is fundamentally different from Opera Mobile. Please correct this story.
I think I’d prefer Opera Mini though. Obviously I can’t say until I’ve used it, but right now I like having the two different types. Opera Mobile will just become another browser – Mini has certain advantages (and disadvantages of course) from the others. It’s great for when you have low signal, use pages that auto refresh (but you don’t want it to) or want to keep a few pages in memory.
(I also understand that this product won’t replace, nor force me to delete Opera Mini)
So will it go to the right titty pics now?
@DanGrover Opera Mobile has that compression technology built in it, too – just like Opera for desktop has it. You can use it anytime you want to.
Btw, Phandroid! Can you guys get a proper commenting system in here? I’d like to be able to reply to people directly.
Use Disqus or livefyre.
Its called Opera For Android to differentiate it from Opera Mini which is a great browser for any java enable phone and Opera Mobile which was primarily for Windows Mobile. There was work towards getting Opera Mobile to Android but in the end I heard that basically they needed direct access to the hardware which only carriers could give(ie OEM install). So that went away. Nice to know this is coming. Opera is great in the mobile space.
It’s called “Opera Mobile”, not “Opera For Android.”
Gadget information fills the websites every day. People look for information of this kind.
@ comment 9 I agree…about time phandroid updated there commenting system so commenting would be easier….phandroid woolf only grow bigger with such a improvement….y0
Only thing left after they update…there system to allow direct comments would be for us to make sure the spell corrector thing on our dam phones doesn’t screw up our post….