I’ve been using Opera for a few years now and I’ve been enjoying its features, UI and everything. However, I (surprisingly to me) haven’t noticed many people mentioning it. Also, when I was on Reddit and mentioned that I use it I got downvoted which left me somewhat confused haha.
So I’m wondering if there’s anything wrong with it and/or if I should give another browser a go (I noticed Firefox is mentioned a lot on here)
It was the best, most full-featured browser until it (effectively) died after Opera 12 in 2013, now it’s just a Chrome skin.
Use Firefox, it’s not just (in my opinion) the best browser now but it helps protect against a Google monopoly on web standards.
Pin comment and close thread! :)
Opera is just chromium with extra spyware and shit. Firefox is mentioned a lot because it is foss, and my favorite browser for that matter.
Sadly this is the truth these days, opera certainly has had it moments in the sun in the past (especially on lower spec devices) but I would personally stare clear these days
Firefox is really the only true alternative
Small shout-out to edge browser’s built in pdf editing functions though, this is really handy on PC at times
My opinion on Opera is that it’s an outdated piece of adware.
Please don’t use Opera (or any other proprietary browser). It contains a lot of on-by-default spyware and it’s hard or impossible to disable everything.
https://www.kuketz-blog.de/opera-datensendeverhalten-desktop-version-browser-check-teil13/ (post in German, but you can see what the browser transmits. It’s a lot. Including the domains of all sites you visit). The best way to increase your privacy with Opera is to uninstall it. Apparently, this is how they make their money nowadays. They used to sell their browser, but it’s free since a while. So users pay with their data.
Also, try not to use Chromium based browsers (not even if they are purely open source, based on the open source Chromium base). Its development is very much steered by Google and their interests and you can see the effects e.g. with their Manifest v3 which cripples ad blocking extensions, for example.
I loved Opera 20 years ago when the built in RSS reader, email client, mouse gestures and unique rendering engine that was either faster than the others or completely incompatible with websites. Now I don’t give it much thought, all the chromium browsers feel the same.
I remember the mouse gestures, they were a really neat feature. I don’t think any other browser has had anything close to it since then.
There are extensions for Chromium browser’s that do the same thing now :) I use it at work because my mouse doesn’t have buttons for navigating back and forward, it’s great.
I loved their speed dial when that came. Just having a home page with a grid of your favorite websites was so innovative at the time.
Yes I forgot about this! Speed Dial was a killer feature, we just take it for granted now.
Please try and use non chromium based browser.
It’s owned by the Chinese government
I used Opera back in the day, but I don’t trust the new development anymore.
I’d recommend using Firefox instead.
Opera 12 was my main browser until it died and was replaced by a completely unrelated and terrible browser called Opera 2013. Opera 12’s spiritual successor is Vivaldi, and that’s what I still use now.
Vivaldi is the only browser that has all of the UI features that I want… No amount of extensions and customization of Chrome, Edge, or Firefox has been able to come anywhere close to matching it.
Nothing wrong with Opera. It’s based on Chromium, which means it’s based on the same engine as Chrome and Edge. It has a built-in VPN function; so, you can have that sort of privacy protection built in to your web browsing, depending on your trust for the company behind Opera (also called Opera). They have been involved in some questionable dealing in the past; but, there is no evidence that they are harvesting data with the VPN. The tl;dr is that it’s another way to have Chrome without directly using Google Chrome.
As for FireFox. It’s a great browser, I use it myself. It’s based on it’s own engine, Gecko. The Mozilla Foundation seems to care more about privacy and web standards than any other browser author. Though, this has pros and cons. On the plus side, FireFox can be configured to be very privacy preserving and some extensions (e.g. UBlock Origin) tend to be better at privacy on FireFox than Chromium based browsers. That said, some websites will expect Chromium and may break on FireFox (though, this is often because of explicit by web site developers. User agent spoofing often shows that the problem is fictitious).
I use it on mobile for the fast action button (basically fancy gesture controls). I know its ownership is pretty sketchy, and I’d prefer to be using Firefox or some other browser, but I haven’t found any other browser with similar gesture controls.
Opera for mobile is the best mobile browser by far in my opinion. For desktop, I stick with Firefox.
My opinion as well. Edge is actually being pretty decent (I’m required to use it at work), but at home it’s Opera on mobile and Firefox on the desktop.
This was my exact opinion in probably 15 years ago when I’m still using my Sony Walkman phone and my first laptop. Not anymore now. I’d stick with Firefox for both desktop and phone, and use Chrome if necessary as last resort.
The Opera of today is not the same as the one from back in the days! The original company sold all their code and rights to a chinese consortium in 2016. Since then it’s basically a variant of chromium, with some propriatary features and tracking added. I don’t know the new owners, so I don’t trust them with my browsing data!
Back when they still had their own browser engine it was the greatest browser at the time. HTML5 was rolling in hard and Opera was always the first one to implement these new features. It was also faster than any other browser, had customizable UI (with full MDI instead of just tabs), builtin E-mail client and good tools for Web developers.
But as an open source person using it always felt a little bit wrong, because of it’s closed source nature. Now that it’s just an alternative UI for Chrome and owned by some shady Chinese company I wouldn’t touch the damn thing with thousand foot pole.
Opera sold out to China years ago, stop using it ASAP. I you wanna stay in chromium use the original devs new thing, Vivaldi.
