Opera Software today announced that Opera Mini users have surfed one billion Web pages since the browser’s official launch seven months ago. The most popular sites are Google search, community and dating sites, e-mail and domains for more grown-up entertainment. The little browser has been embraced by more than five million active users worldwide, and is increasingly pre-installed on mobile phones from leading operators and mobile phone manufacturers across the globe.
The aggregated statistics reveal that Google search is the most popular .com site, followed by Gmail.com, Friendster.com, MySpace.com, Yahoo Messenger and hi5.com. This suggests that finding information and staying connected while on-the-go are the two most popular activities for people when using the Opera Mini mobile browser. Other popular sites include news, maps and entertainment such as USAToday.com, news.bbc.co.uk, mapquest.com and eBay in the United States, UK and Germany.
Most Opera Mini usage comes from Russia and the United States, closely followed by India, Scandinavia and the UK. Countries with low PC penetration but high mobile phone penetration, such as South Africa and Bangladesh, also rank high on the list. This may confirm the importance of having a mobile friendly Web that is accessible from mobile devices for the millions of people who do not have access to a PC, but own a mobile phone.
Many leading operators and handset manufacturers have already realized the great potential of Opera Mini. T-Mobile is pre-installing Opera Mini on selected handsets as part of its Web’n’Walk offering in Europe, and several other leading mobile players are signing up to deliver the Opera Mini Web experience to mobile phone users around the world. A long list of mobile content providers are promoting customized versions of Opera Mini to customers in order to increase usage and customer loyalty. The free browser has become one of the world’s most popular mobile Java applications in just seven months.