Opera Mobile 10 features tabbed browsing, disses WinMo

Symbian freaks, do we have a treat for you! While all your WinMo-lovin' friends are out there with Opera Mobile 9.5 (or possibly 9.7), a beta of version 10 has just been announced exclusively for Nokia / Symbian smartphones. As well as being as speedy as ever (fifty percent faster than previous Symbian versions, or so it's been claimed), this release features a new-and-improved user interface and a "speed dial" page that displays all your fave sites as icons. Not too shabby, eh? Hit the read link to get the thing for your Symbian/S60 phone -- but not before peeping the video after the break.

See more video at our hub!

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Opera Mobile 10 beta brings powerful features to world's most-used smartphone platform

Oslo, Norway - November 3, 2009

Opera Software today unveiled the beta of Opera Mobile 10 for Nokia and other Symbian/S60 handsets. Most notable in the new Opera Mobile 10 beta is a sleek design, which Opera first introduced to the world in the recent release of Opera Mini 5 beta. The crisp, new look introduces the Speed Dial, tabbed browsing and the always convenient password manager to Opera Mobile. Opera Mobile 10 beta is optimized for both touchscreen and keypad-style navigation and is available for free from http://www.opera.com/mobile/next/.

Performance was prioritized in this beta. It is twice as fast as the previous Opera Mobile released for Symbian/S60, and users will discover significant speed improvement when downloading pages, zooming and panning. Opera Turbo is also integrated, saving end users both time and money with its server-side compression technology.

"Today's powerful smartphones deserve an equally powerful browser, like Opera," said Jon von Tetzchner, CEO, Opera Software. "This beta continues our work to extend the desktop Web experience to mobile phones, allowing users to surf the Web without limitations, even while on-the-go. No matter the device in use, Opera delivers a faster, easier and hassle-free Web experience."

Fresh design

Alongside the new Opera Mini 5, Opera has revamped the look and feel of its mobile-browser portfolio to ensure that it is simple and intuitive, making mobile Web browsing easier than ever.

Desktop favorites on the mobile phone

Opera desktop feature favorites, including tabbed browsing, Speed Dial and password manager, make it easier for you to surf on the go by reducing the time and effort it takes to get to a Web site.

Advanced compatibility

Opera Mobile 10 beta uses the very latest generation of the Opera browser engine, ensuring that all your favorite Web sites and applications work exactly the way they do on a desktop computer.

Availability

Opera Mobile 10 beta is available for Nokia, Sony Ericsson and Samsung smartphones running Symbian/S60, 3rd and 5th editions. The beta is free to download to your computer from http://www.opera.com/mobile/next/ or directly to your mobile phone from http://m.opera.com/mobile/.

[Matej Bajan Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:39PM]

Finally!

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 5th 2009 1:49AM]

Nokia is the best especially N900!;)

[Steveorevo Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:58PM]

Exactly, next to iPhone's Safari, this is the best, user friendly browser. Why M$ continues to make the world's worst non-compliant piece of cr@p IE browser is beyond belief.

I.E. creates tons of headaches and stiffs users of progress without their knowledge of it. So sad.

Thank you Opera, for bringing progress back into style!

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:10PM]

Good for symbian users.
I am surprised Engadget was 2 days late in reporting this news. Generally they are quite fast.

[Ameen Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:14PM]

Yeah, Symbian gets to crow at WinMo now !

Wait WHAT !? A "Finally" comment instead of first?? I'm disappointed in you. You are not a true Engadgeteer ! ~_~

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:57PM]

@ Anthony

Actually its a video and it's a girl

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:57PM]

Yes! And it is lovely. Puts the browser on my 5800 to shame. (it even puts the opera mini I was using on it to shame!)

[Endadget Posted Nov 4th 2009 4:11PM]

Duda: Yes, I'm guessing this will make browsing on the 5800 a very pleasant experience. I'm afraid the final version won't be free, tho. I hope to be proven wrong...

[LAY Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:39PM]

Disses WinMo?

Like Opera isnt going to make it available for it eventually anyway.

Now where can we get version for the iPhone? Oh yeah...

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:53PM]

Don't worry its just another Engadget digg at WinMo. They must have gotten direction from someone (Josh) to hate on it. Who owns Engadget anyways? Do you guys get paid from advertising or do the tech companies pay you directly? Did Microsoft not renew their ads with you or something?

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:55PM]

@Ardentra, don't bring Josh into it, he actually stays pretty non-biased (even though he is). The writers appear to have a pretty open range in their articles here, so direct it at the one that wrote it (plus it's based on ad views so a little controversy is needed).

[fatslug Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:05PM]

Ardentra - AOL owns this 'tech blog', talk about a joke. AOL for crying out loud - the guys who run a dialup network that is pure sh8. This type of 'journalism' can be expected from AOL flunkies. tech blog, bahahahahahah AOL tech blog - biggest joke ever

[DirtyVegas Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:36PM]

It's a joke people, easy now.

[superhobothemillionthaccount Posted Nov 4th 2009 4:47PM]

Doesn't diss Android or WebOS or the iPhone at all.

In fact if you open up Opera Mobile 10 on your Nokla smartphone and go to about:opera, you see this:

"Winm0 sux lol"

See? Engadget is not biased at all!

[Malkmus Posted Nov 4th 2009 8:39PM]

@ardentra

Have you already forgotten the massive hyping Engadget has been doing for the HTC HD2?! You guys sound like a broken record every time Engadget has anything negative to say about a company that isn't Apple, then feign surprise when they write something negative about the fruit. Just like how the next time Engadget criticizes a Symbian device, the Symbian freaks will have suddenly forgotten about this article and state that Engadget gets paid off to write bad things about it.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:41PM]

Can anyone tell me if this version supports HTML5 and specifically Geolocation? Having trouble finding any documentation on this....

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:06PM]

Does it support HTML5 Geolocation??? Safari for iPhone and Android do...

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:30PM]

give me a link to a website that uses it and i'll try.

i doubt it works though

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:37PM]

tried with http://maxheapsize.com/static/html5geolocationdemo.html and it indeed does not work.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:49PM]

Doesnt work here either:

http://merged.ca/iphone/html5-geolocation

On a verizon device - ive confirmed this demo on Safari (iPhone)

What carrier are you on?

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 16th 2009 10:47AM]

IIRC, Opera Mobile implements Geolocation (since version 9.5) not by means of the HTML5, but the Google Gears API. See http://labs.opera.com/news/2009/02/20/

[kjb434 Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:41PM]

Opera Mobile version 8 did tabbed browsing also. Nothing new here.

[Flix C Posted Nov 4th 2009 5:12PM]

WRONG !
Tab browsing was invented (or at least patented and made culturally acceptable) by Steve Jobs for Safari8.4... oh wait

[N900 Posted Nov 4th 2009 5:23PM]

lol

[kjb434 Posted Nov 4th 2009 5:56PM]

HAHA!

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:45PM]

Hmm, I'm gonna have to check this out on my E71. I'm happy with 9.7b1 though on WM.

[MarkAnderson Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:43PM]

I downloaded it. It's nice but needs a bit of work - it won't recognise Engadget as a full site by default even with 'Mobile Site' switched off.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:20PM]

Ehrm...
If engadget.com shows you mobile site then it's engadget's fault. A browser doesn't have (in practice anyways) any means to decide whether it shows a "full site" or "mobile site". It's the server who decides which page to serve (probably by looking at the user-agent the browser sends)...

[MarkAnderson Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:27PM]

Aha.

Get it sorted, Engadget.

Or maybe I need to fiddle with my 5800's settings.

Hmm...

[soydeedo Posted Nov 24th 2009 2:19AM]

@MarkAnderson

I have the same problem with the Windows Mobile version.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:47PM]

Unfortunately not working with my UIQ2.1-based Motorola A1000

[PhoenixFox Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:47PM]

Uhm...

I have tabbed browsing on Opera 9.5...

[Sarig Posted Nov 4th 2009 4:13PM]

Yeah, it seems the peeps at Engadget aren't really familiar with too many mobile browsers.

[ramifications Posted Nov 4th 2009 8:18PM]

You mean any mobile browsers that don't start with "s" and end with "afari" ?

[Teerim Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:49PM]

Chrome Mobile Browser is the ish.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:50PM]

Wasnt it called Opera 5?

[cayton Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:54PM]

Opera Mobile 10 beta != Opera Mini 5 beta

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:58PM]

ah I just figured out.. Opera mobile 10 is an enhanced version for touch phones with better performance but the same user interface as opera mobile 5

[Alan Strangis Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:06PM]

Opera Mini has its pages rendered by Opera proxy servers and sent to your device.

Opera Mobile is a full web rendering engine with no intermediary unless the user turns on Turbo mode (don't know if that is in the version 10 beta).

So no, they're NOT the same thing.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:10PM]

Opera Mini is not the same product as Opera Mobile! And Opera Mobile is not just for touch devices.
Opera Mini is using proxy servers to fetch site and send it in binary format to your mobile. Opera Mobile is normal browser and fetches the pages directly to your phone i.e. it is capable of doing Javascript / Plugins / etc. Mini is also capable of doing some amount of Javascript but not that much as it is not a "real" browser.

Opera Mobile is not free product either like Opera Mini.

[YpoCaramel Posted Nov 4th 2009 10:27PM]

Turbo mode is included in the Opera Mobile 10 beta, yes.

It is confusing how Mini 5 and Mobile 10 looks so alike. Part of it was really the amazing job they did on Mini despite its Java roots.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:53PM]

Looks like mobile safari with top sites added

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:13PM]

Except that Opera Mobile has also features like Opera Turbo (like Opera Mini), Opera Link (syncs bookmarks, speed dial, etc. between your devices), etc.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:19PM]

I was referring to the interface and screenshot

[Endadget Posted Nov 4th 2009 3:33PM]

No. Mobile Safari's "Top Sites" look like Opera's "Speed Dial", since Opera was the first to introduce that feature. (Amongst many other features, which were copied by other browsers.)

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 4th 2009 4:08PM]

@Toreil:

haha, thanks for pointing that out. I love that fanboys think that Apple invented the smartphone, touchscreens, music on a phone, etc etc etc etc.....

[Endadget Posted Nov 4th 2009 4:21PM]

Just to correct myself, I saw now that Mobile Safari actually doesn't have Speed dial...err.. "top sites". So, that would apply to the regular Safari.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 5th 2009 5:33AM]

@Jan Bit quick there aren't you? When did I say that apple invented anything along those lines? And if you actually take a step back and look at it subjectively the inclusion of the google search bar is identical to its implication in mobile safari. So before you start calling me a fanboy get your fact straight.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 5th 2009 12:20PM]

"the inclusion of the google search bar is identical to its implication in mobile safari"

Or rather, the search bar in Safari is identical to the one in Opera. Opera introduced the search bar, remember.

[Philippe Posted Nov 4th 2009 2:55PM]

She's one hell of ventriloquist