Opera is working on a fresh browser aimed at enhancing focus, balancing life, and minimizing stress. These are ambitious promises for a web browser, but Opera has incorporated several features into its upcoming “Opera Air” browser that emphasize mindfulness. Currently available in early access, Opera Air is open for download and, at first glance, appears to be a robust everyday browser with some genuinely beneficial features for mindfulness and mental well-being.
Browsers stand as some of the most widely used apps across almost any platform. Generally speaking, Google Chrome holds the lead in browser market share, although Apple’s Safari enjoys a solid user base. According to StatCounter, Chrome maintains a 67.05% market share, and Safari holds 17.96%, leaving all other browsers vying for the remaining 15%. Developers must find innovative ways to distinguish their browsers, such as enhancing security or introducing unique browsing experiences.
Opera has taken a distinct path with Opera Air. The app offers the typical browsing features you’d anticipate, like an ad blocker, an integrated VPN, and general web compatibility. Nonetheless, its distinguishing characteristics revolve around mindfulness.
Opera Air includes shortcuts to smart exercises, meditation, and “Boosts” directly within the browser. Among these, the Boosts have attracted the most interest. Opera Air presents a collection of audio with sounds crafted to “stimulate various brain waves.” Central to these Boosts are binaural beats, which employ slightly different frequency tones to create the perception of a third frequency.
While I’m no medical expert and can’t vouch for the physical effects of a “Theta 6Hz” audio file aimed at enhancing creativity or any other Boosts included in Opera Air, as an average user, these Boosts seem to perform as claimed. The “Creativity” Boost, for example, felt calming without making me drowsy. A practical feature of the Boosts is the ability to adjust various sound elements, such as the volume of the binaural sound or ambient noise.
It’s important to note that Opera doesn’t own exclusive rights to neck exercises, guided meditations, or brain-stimulating audio. However, integrating all these features into one interface means you can access them without scouring the internet or juggling multiple open windows. It is an innovative approach that has certainly caught attention. My colleague Stephen Warwick, who writes for TechRadar, has already switched from Chrome to Opera Air for personal browsing. However, since our parent company heavily relies on Chrome, both Warwick and I need to keep it around for work purposes.
