With the flop of Opera’s Unite (browser w/ embedded server) finally behind us, the Norwegian company debuted their free Opera Mini browser for iPhone today. I’m pleasantly surprised Apple approved the app (for now) and loving the upgrades from Safari:
- Full-screen browsing (see settings)
- Dial-pad start page for quickly opening sites
- Find-in-page searching
- Site compression (a band-aid solution for AT&T’s crap 3G network)
I’ve run across many first-time users complaining about the default Opera interface and all of its flourishes, but I’m guessing they didn’t bother to poke around to discover the unique features the app offers. A simple tweak in the browser’s settings (the crescent wrench button) allows toggling full-screen browsing! For that alone, I’ll discard Safari, but there’s more…
Browsed pages are compressed by Opera servers before being sent to your phone for decompressed display, thus achieving faster browsing — it appears notably faster than using Safari over 3G and Opera reports an average compression of 63.6% (peaking at 90%).
Opera’s server-side compression system is mentioned as a feature of both WinMo Mobile and Mini, but implemented differently — Mini uses compression automatically and Mobile requires the Opera Turbo Add-on:
Using Opera to browse the Web with your mobile phone can save you money on your phone bills, by reducing your data usage substantially. Opera Mini uses only a tenth of the bandwidth of other browsers, compressing Web pages by up to 90%. On Opera Mobile, turning on Opera Turbo compresses data up to 80% or leave Opera Turbo off to get full Web site data, as you would on a PC.
Opera Turbo Add-on:
http://www.opera.com/business/solutions/turbo/
Opera Flash Add-on: psych!
See ya in Trash Bin Hell Safari.
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