Browser development from the major vendors continues apace. Yesterday saw the release of the Opera 10 beta. This new version of Opera is interesting for a few reasons, not least of which is a brand-new (and much improved) interface designed by the talented Jon Hicks. Opera Software prides itself on the standards-compliance of its browser, so you’d expect the new version to be good in this department. Indeed, the new version gets a perfect 100 on the Acid3 tests (compared with 93 for Firefox 3.5 beta 4, and a paltry12 for IE 8). The beta supports goodies like web fonts (check out Aliza’s interview with Opera CTO Håkon Wium Lie for a demo), has integrated email and chat, visual tabs, and a new “Opera Turbo” mode with compression technology that should improve performance when stuck on slow and laggy connections.
Opera passes Acid3 compliance test
Opera claims that the new browser is much faster on resource-intensive pages. Performance is a vital attribute in modern browsers as we become increasingly reliant on JavaScript-heavy web apps like Gmail. Running it through Webkit’s Sunspider JavaScript benchmark test on my machine — which measures a browser’s performance by testing it with a series of real-world, resource-intensive tasks — Opera 10 beta scores a time of 5800 ms. This isn’t a bad score, and beats IE8′s score of 8500 ms, but it is still greatly lagging behind speed demons Firefox 3.5 beta 4 at 2500ms and Google Chrome 2 with a blistering 1500ms, both of which boast massively improved JavaScript engines. In real-world use, the Opera 10 beta certainly feels fast, definitely faster than the previous version of the browser, although not as zippy as Chrome.
Time to complete Sunspider JavaScript tests in ms (lower is better)
Opera has many fans, but it’s still very much a niche browser. Just 1.5 percent of the readers of this blog use it, according to Google Analytics. For comparison, even though it’s still fairly new, Chrome is used by 7.5 percent of WWD readers. Even with improved performance, a new design and some interesting features, I’m not sure that this new version will change that usage statistic very much. While it’s great to see Opera championing standards compliance and introducing novel features to keep the other vendors on their toes, this new version of the browser won’t tempt me away from my current favorites: Chrome 2 and Firefox 3.5 beta 4.
Opera 10 beta is free to download, and available for Windows, Mac and Linux.
Let us know your thoughts on Opera 10 beta in the comments.
3123.6ms
I use Firefox because of its plug-ins such as AdBlock Plus. Tried using Chrome and am kind of liking it. IE sucks big time… I hate it.
[...] not quite as snappy as Google Chrome (by far the quickest browser available, which scores 1500 ms, according to my benchmarks), this new version of Firefox is still a very fast browser. This improved performance, coupled with [...]
Your graph lack Google Chrome 3.
If you are to compare the latest “betas” or “alphas” from web browsers editors, take at least the latest ;)
I have found only one huge drawback to Chrome 3, it crashes sometimes you don’t understand why. However, it is still faster than Chrome 2
[...] lagging behind its competitors in terms of speed, customizability and standards compliance (see my post on Opera 10 for tests on all the major browsers for JavaScript perfomance and standards compliance), and so [...]
Good short review, but do note that Opera has included email for longer than I rememebr, and chat for just a little less.
[...] I reported back in June when the public beta became available, Opera 10 has impressive standards compliance, scoring a [...]
[...] Running the Chrome 4 beta through the same SunSpider benchmark test, I got a score of 1122 ms, which beats Firefox by a considerable margin and is even faster than the last version of Chrome that I tested. [...]
[...] 3.5, the launch of Mozilla Collections, Google Chrome Mac Developer Preview’s debut, and the launch of the beta of Opera 10. Gear-wise, the Palm Pre debuted, although Charles wasn’t that impressed. Google Voice neared [...]
[...] fast browsers, otherwise the web will begin to feel very sluggish. When Opera 10 was released, I pointed out that while its JavaScript performance wasn’t bad, it couldn’t match the speed of Chrome [...]
[...] fast browsers, otherwise the web will begin to feel very sluggish. When Opera 10 was released, I pointed out that while its JavaScript performance wasn’t bad, it couldn’t match the speed of Chrome [...]