Opera Mini for iPhone Hands-on: Fast and Tab Friendly

There’s plenty of debate as to whether Apple will approve the Opera Mini browser for the iPhone. But Opera itself seems fairly confident, posting a countup on its site of the time passed since the app was submitted. We got a glimpse of the app last month, while it was still being finalized and now, based on what we saw tonight, we hope Opera Mini is approved. Not only is this browser fast, thanks to server-side rendering, it could mean the difference between you getting to that Web page or giving up. As you’ll see in the video, the browser downloaded most of NYTimes.com in about 10 seconds over what would normally be an painfully sluggish EDGE connection.

What we like most about Opera Mini is the way it handles tabs. You can easily swipe between multiple open pages towards the bottom of the screen without exiting the article you were reading. And you get the same convenient speed dial feature for favorite sites that Opera is known for. Multitouch is not supported, but the browser did zoom in fairly quickly with a tap. Do you think Opera Mini would be a good Safari alternative? Check out the video and gallery and let us know what you think.