Opera Mini 4 beta out now

Opera Software has released a beta of version 4 of its popular Opera Mini browser for mobile phones, which integrates features the company designed for its Nintendo Wii browser. Now, users can see an entire Web page in "overview mode" and zoom in to specific parts.


When zooming, Opera Mini snaps to content so scrolling is smooth. A virtual mouse cursor aids users in moving down a page and selecting links, although the software resizes text and images to reduce the amount of scrolling required.


Opera says the new Mini is twice as fast as any other mobile browser, and compares its offering with the capabilities of Apple's new iPhone in a spoof video. Because it is based on Java, Opera Mini can work on any handset, anywhere in the world, and is free to use, the company points out."We are excited to share the beta with the fast-growing community of Opera Mini users," said Opera CEO Jon von Tetzchner. "The feedback from the beta users will go to make Opera Mini even better and we thank the community for their efforts. Opera Mini has succeeded only due to the support of the people who have made it the most popular mobile browser available today."


Opera says more than 15 million people have used Opera Mini since its worldwide debut in 2006. For more information on Opera Mini 4 Beta, and to download the software directly to a phone, visit the browser's homepage. Palm and Blackberry versions are available for manual download and installation.

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10 reasons to love Opera Mini 4 beta

*www.operamini.com/images/beta/01-start.gif1) Surf the Web in style

The Web. Period. You can get any site, anywhere, at any time. It's your Web, to go.

*www.operamini.com/images/beta/02-x.gif2) "X marks the spot" — start at the right place

When you load a page, Opera Mini will automatically suggest a place to begin reading. When it's time to dive into the page, Opera Mini zooms in and cleanly focuses on the content you want.
*www.operamini.com/images/beta/03-snap.gif3) Stay at the right place

Opera Mini dynamically changes the size of text and images to make it convenient to read without a lot of unnecessary scrolling.
*www.operamini.com/images/beta/04-arrow.gif4) A mouse!

We included a virtual mouse to make it easy to scroll in any direction. The mouse cursor will look for content and links, and snap the view to them.
*www.operamini.com/images/beta/05-scroll.gif5) Power scrolling

Scroll faster using the keypad. Simply hit 2 to go up, 4 to go left, 6 to go right and 8 to go down. Opera Mini will snap the view to the content. Hit 5 to zoom in and out.
6) Fast and cheaper browsing

As always, Opera Mini delivers the pages you want, quickly. In doing so, Opera Mini makes your data bill cheaper, too. Opera Mini loads pages more than 2x faster than other mobile browsers.
*www.operamini.com/images/beta/06-transfer.gif
*www.operamini.com/images/beta/07-ssr.gif7) Good old Small Screen Rendering

Is it just too much scrolling for you? Turn on "Fit to width" and enjoy the pages in the Small Screen Rendering view. In this view, the structure of the Web page is changed into a single vertical column, removing the need to scroll horizontally while browsing.
*www.operamini.com/images/beta/08-context.gif8) Quick access to key functionality with the context menu

Hit 1 to open the context menu, where you can turn on Small Screen Rendering (Fit to width) or reload the page. When focusing the cursor on a link you can see where the link really will take you, or choose to open the linked page with images turned off. When browsing with images off, you can choose to load the images in a page by selecting "Load images". You can even load the image in its original size and uncompressed, high quality by choosing "Open image".
*www.operamini.com/images/beta/09-css.gif9) Web designers go wild

We included all the cool CSS support you need to make your mobile web pages look pixel perfect.
*www.operamini.com/images/beta/10-more.gif10) It's just the beta

More crazy stuff will arrive shortly.

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