The new WebKit Opera for Android has been released. “Opera 14 for Android is built on top of Chromium 26, with a total overhaul of the UI in native code, making it fit well with the latest Android design guidelines. Go get the build from Google Play or point your browser to m.opera.com, and give it a spin!”
The end of an era, and the beginning of a new.
Thanks opera for all your hard work, hope this pans out as planned.
Cool. now we just need the desktop version to appear
no tablet version.
Edited 2013-05-21 19:04 UTC
OK, why does this seem faster than Chrome? I’m a Chrome fan having used it since the day it came out. But the Android version of Chrome is slow. I like the features, but speed is a problem.
Depends on the hardware you run it on! I use Chrome on my S3 all the time because it is the quickest and most accurate to desktop browser I can find for it. Yes it crashes once in a while when I overload it, but so does the desktop version (and ie for that matter)
Should be a boon for those stuck on Android 2.3, which Chrome doesn’t run on… too bad the old default browser has never gotten its own updates.
(There’s also Firefox, which runs on 2.2 as well.
I ran Opera on my phone since I bought it over a year and a half ago, until maybe a couple weeks ago. The main reason for uninstalling it was to find something that doesn’t take up all my storage. Still, I wouldn’t mind trying the new Opera… but, it’s not compatible at all with my phone. I’m not surprised, because Firefox doesn’t run on it and (the dead giveaway) neither does Chrome. Oh well. At least the old Opera Mini and Opera Mobile both ran on my phone, which is more than I can say about any of the major web browsers these days.
I am not usually this blunt but this latest version of Opera compared to its immediate predecessor is utter pants (Galaxy S2, Android 4.04):
UI: why is the default screen in use the view of one’s history, seemingly?
Constant hanging
Can’t deal with webforms
Copy and paste is borked
To name but the most obvious cock-ups.
Honestly, it’s so bad I have reverted to the stock Orange/EE browser, which is actually *better* now in comparison!
I have supported Opera for years. I am very sad.
It isn’t. The default is the speed dial thing.
It’s possibly the fact that I am dim as they come but each time it booted up, there was the history. However, if I requested another screen, *then* I got the speed dial thing. That’s my experience, and I am sticking with it ^^
If only offload mode had text wrapping it would be excellent
I’ve used previous version (13) of Opera for the single reason that it remembered my Google’s developer account password – unlike the chrome/chromium either on desktop or on the smartphone. It may be on purpose, but typing the password every time just to check how sales progress is very inconvenient, esp. with onscreen keyboard.
Firefox remembers the password, but is SLOOOW on my Galaxy Note. I’m very sad that Opera developers, by using the Chromium kit, they ported also this “feature”. Reverting back to Firefox.
I prefer Opera on my Android phone, been using it since I got the phone. Tried Opera Beta (with Webkit/Blink engine) but removed it within a few days. The page reformatting via double-tap was broken. Trying to read osnews or slashdot was frustrating due to the changing font size with every level of quoting, but only the text not the headers! There were a few other issues, but not being able to easily read websites with threaded conversations made me remove it.
If they haven’t fixed that rendering issue, I’ll be sticking with this last version of Opera for ever, I guess.