Opera 10.50 Review: The fastest browser in the world

Speeds

Technology Blogged rendering speed: 0.9 seconds

Download + install time: 50 seconds

Start up speed: 1 second

These speeds are very fast. Considering that IE8 has a TB rendering speed of 1.4 seconds, Firefox has a TB rendering speed of 1.2 seconds and Google Chrome has a TB rendering speed of 1.2 seconds, Opera 10.5 has these browsers firmly beaten when it comes to speed. This browser is running at default, with no skins and no gadgets to slow it down.

I Liked

The new UI is beautiful and vibrant, and the drop down tabs are a hugely welcome transfer from 10.1. Opera Turbo works a treat, and I loved the Opera Unite function which is built in. Highly community based, Opera also amazed me with its web page rendering speeds and download time, which destroyed Safari (the other ‘apparently’ fastest web browser in the world) at my speed tests. I also liked the latest widget support for Opera, which includes web developer tools, highly fun sketch books and the Google translator. Although not as vast as Firefox’s array of add ons, Opera’s ‘gadgets’ are as good as in some respects, and as such Opera could be considered a direct alternative for a web developers platform.

I disliked

To save space at the top of the browser, the actual tabs which are apparent on IE and Firefox, with navigation to bookmarks and history etc. is at the side – although it is not visible until the ‘panels’ button has been prompted. It seemed a little bit out of the way, and the bookmarks somewhat distant. Whats more, when clicking on the ‘get gadgets’ tab when the panel button has been prompted, the gadgets web page renders itself in place of the tab you were just viewing, which can be frustrating – this can be remedied by just opening a new tab before clicking the get gadgets tab.

Overall

Opera has made a big leap forward with their new browser. It is more modern, more visually appealing and 50 times more functional than the previous version. 10.5 is a welcome addition to the web browser line up, and if you are after speed then this web browser is the best possible option. Will it replace everyday use of Firefox or IE? Yeah, to an extent. Opera has always been a more ‘quick browsing session’ type browser than a hardcore power using browser, but this edition is different. Everything seems more polished and more shiny, and with the new array of gadgets available, a lot more practical too.