Now that Google has released Chrome for Android, the company finally has a feature-rich browser on their own mobile platform. But don’t forget about the competitors that have been besting Android’s stock browser for some time—they’re still around, still innovating, and are available on more than just Android 4.0. Over the weekend Opera released Opera Mobile 12 for Android and Symbian, and while the update doesn’t come with a lot of obvious new features, under the hood it’s prepped for the future of mobile web browsing.
Here’s what you should know about Opera Mobile 12 and the new Opera Mini 7 for iOS.
Opera Mobile 12 is all about HTML5, and includes the team’s Ragnarök parser to enable better web apps and handling of HTML5 sites. The Android version also includes support for camera use within the browser, CSS3 and CORS web standards, and WebGLhardware acceleration—the tech that’s brought us a number of impressive desktop browser demonstrations.
The Opera team also released version 7 of their minimalist, server-backed Mini browser for iOS, which adds support for file uploads and juggling more than nine “visual bookmark” Speed Dials. Mini now has its own developer channel called “Opera Mini Next” for anyone that wants a look at in-the-works features.