A look at Opera’s data compression history

November 10th, 2014

For almost a decade now, our compression technology has helped you get the content you want, even with limited data plans or a bad internet connection. Data compression involves us shrinking data before you receive it on your phone, meaning that content is served faster.

Let’s take a look at the history of mobile compression at Opera.

Compression technology in Opera browsers

Opera has long played an important role in the history of mobile-data compression. In 2005, we launched the Opera Mini mobile web browser. In Opera Mini, webpages are compressed to as little as 10% of their original size. That’s a very big help in saving data and, in turn, saving on phone bills. Just think: up to 90% data savings from your usual data usage.

We’re proud and happy that, now, Opera Mini’s user base has grown to over 250 million monthly users, worldwide. We’re helping more and more people get connected on their phones.

In 2013, we added compression technology to our Opera browser for Android, with Off-Road mode. If you’re using an iOS phone, you can choose from two Opera Mini compression modes – Opera Mini data-savings mode or Opera Turbo data-savings mode. In addition, you can also enable Opera Turbo mode in the Opera browser for computers when you’re on a bad network connection.

Video compression and a new data-savings app

In February 2013, Opera Software acquired Skyfire. And, thanks to Skyfire, video optimization is now possible in Opera products.

In early 2014, we launched the data-savings app Opera Max. It’s the first of its kind, because it not only compresses data from browsers but also from other apps — Opera Max compresses text, image and video data across most apps on an Android phone.

Video boost in the new Opera Mini for iOS

This week, we launched Opera Mini for iOS which features video boost, based on Skyfire’s video optimization technology. Video boost means users can watch more videos, with less buffering time.