mobileu.co.uk

Opera Mini iPhone app reaches 1 million downloads

It has been revealed that over one million people have downloaded the Opera Mini iPhone application since it was approved on Tuesday.

This makes Opera Mini that most downloaded free app on the Apple App Store in 22 countries throughout the world, including the UK, the US, Australia, Germany and Japan.

The app was launched by Opera at the Mobile World Congress in February of this year. The company claimed that the app would offer browsing speeds six times faster than Apple's Safari and that it would cut down on pay-per-megabyte and roaming charges due to compression technology.

The chief executive of Opera, Lars Boilesen, was upbeat about the success of the app, saying that it was not surprising due to the benefits it offers iPhone users: "Today, iPhone users have a choice and, as the numbers show, they are eager to explore new and faster ways to surf the web on the iPhone, especially during heavy web traffic."

Tony Cripps, an analyst at Ovum, said that the figures demonstrate that many iPhone users would like to move away from Apple's Safari browser to see whether Opera can "deliver a better browsing experience."