'Opera Coast' Browser for iOS Gains Discover Feature, Turbo Data Compression

[MacRumors]

The Opera Coast webkit-based browser for iOS was today updated to version 4.0, adding Opera Software's Turbo data compression technology to make browsing websites on the iPhone and iPad much faster on congested networks.

With Opera Turbo data compression, each website a user visits is compressed down to a fraction of its original size, which both speeds up loading times and uses less data. According to Opera, its data compression techniques are useful when browsing on slow cell phone networks or on crowded Wi-Fi hotspots. Opera Turbo is enabled by default and will kick in whenever a user is on a GPRS or Edge network.

On the iPhone 6 Plus, there's a new widescreen layout, and the update brings support for landscape mode. There's also a new "Share" button that makes it easier for users to share content from the browser to various social networks like Facebook and Twitter, and Opera Coast supports Handoff, letting users seamlessly switch between the iOS app and Opera for Mac for the first time.

Opera Coast can be downloaded from the App Store for free. [Direct Link]

Article Link: 'Opera Coast' Browser for iOS Gains Discover Feature, Turbo Data Compression

 

[Coprolite]

Looks promising. Has anyone tested it?

PS, it is GPRS

 

[Steve121178]

Opera Coast is a decent browser, but I still don't see a reason to use anything other than Safari on my iOS devices. What's the point?

 

[jmcrutch]

Opera Coast is a decent browser, but I still don't see a reason to use anything other than Safari on my iOS devices. What's the point?

Sounds like it might be useful to people like me who have T-mobile and find themselves on an Edge network occasionally. I assume that Safari attempts to load all the data on a page whereas Opera Coast will sense the slow network and compress it, so it loads faster than Safari would. Just an assumption at this point.

 

[Dayv]

[crickets]

 

[Steve121178]

Sounds like it might be useful to people like me who have T-mobile and find themselves on an Edge network occasionally. I assume that Safari attempts to load all the data on a page whereas Opera Coast will sense the slow network and compress it, so it loads faster than Safari would. Just an assumption at this point.

No, that's a fair point. I used Opera Mini for years on my old Nokia 'feature phones' that had this feature, although I found that if I was on GPRS/EDGE then pages still loaded very slowly, if at all.

 

[jmcrutch]

No, that's a fair point. I used Opera Mini for years on my old Nokia 'feature phones' that had this feature, although I found that if I was on GPRS/EDGE then pages still loaded very slowly, if at all.

Interesting to hear. I switched to TMobile a few months back and "rediscovered" the joy of Edge (not where I live but along a 2 hour route that I drive occasional). After years of AT&T 3G/4G/LTE I had forgotten what it was like back in 2007 with Edge.

I may download this browser just to see it helps but your experience makes me think it won't matter. I think web pages are simply more complex nowadays with so much media embedded within them.

 

[ArtOfWarfare]

I may download this browser just to see it helps but your experience makes me think it won't matter. I think web pages are simply more complex nowadays with so much media embedded within them.

Pretty trivial to write a browser that downloads the HTML page and then just doesn't download the embedded media...

Could go through a good amount of effort to write one which downloads the HTML but then shows gray squares in place of all the media with a "tap to load" like Click To Plugin.

Actually... I wonder if this kind of performance enhancement could be added to Safari in iOS 8 via Extensions...

 

[Vasilioskn]

Does this browser auto refresh pages as much as safari?

 

[MasConejos]

Pretty trivial to write a browser that downloads the HTML page and then just doesn't download the embedded media...

Could go through a good amount of effort to write one which downloads the HTML but then shows gray squares in place of all the media with a "tap to load" like Click To Plugin.

Actually... I wonder if this kind of performance enhancement could be added to Safari in iOS 8 via Extensions...

Opera's compression works by opera acting as a proxy server. Opera downloads all the content, then zips it (I think images are converted to lower resolution versions, but I may be mis-remembering). The client (Coast in this case) then unzips and displays the information.

I do not believe https connections are eligible for compression, so if your use case only involves those types of connections (as opposed to general web-browsing), Opera's compression may not do much for you.

I'll often switch to opera mini or coast on really slow connections, and usually (say 60% or more of the time) have good success with Turbo.

 

[iolinux333]

Looks promising. Has anyone tested it?

PS, it is GPRS

I've been using it since 1.0 and it has been my main browser since the day it was announced. It's the most interesting browser of the last decade IMO but takes some getting used to. I wish there was an Android version.

Also the scrolling was faster in previous versions. I don't like that they slowed it. I guess they were getting complaints from people with slow reflexes or reading speed.

 

[sunking101]

Does this browser auto refresh pages as much as safari?

Yes. All iOS browsers use the same Safari engine, and the same RAM quota.

 

[TimelessOne]

Opera Coast is a decent browser, but I still don't see a reason to use anything other than Safari on my iOS devices. What's the point?

Uses less data. A hated for safari.
Lastly safari is not a Web browser tested on very often and normally not concerned by devs.
Chrome and IE are almost always the ones tested on.
Me I just use chrome and have it compress data for me.

Does this browser auto refresh pages as much as safari?

Yep joys of Apple overly aggressive memory management.