Opera Browser - My experience
RAMWolff
Posts: 10,343
Hi,
As many know I've been a HUGE fan of Firefox for years and years. They of course rewrote the engine from the ground up and claimed it was faster, lighter and easier on resources. Well that's not been my experience. Sites seem to load about the same as Chrome or any of it's offshoots like Vivaldi Browser and no faster than the Edge. PLUS many of my favorite extensions for Firefox either no longer exist or there are replacements that quite frankly DO NOT measure up to the original like TabMix Plus and others.
So one day sitting pondering this issue my little voices (I swear I'm not insane ;-)~ ) started making me remember Opera .... I thought naw, it's gotta be in even worse shape than the last time I used it.... Well I was wrong.
Opera, in MY humble opinion, IS faster than Firefox and MUCH lighter on resources. Now I still have no TabMix Plus but most other extensions I have for it but then there's this little other thing... there is a plugin that allows Opera to use Chrome based extensions just fine so I got my NoSquint back that I love. It's taken a little bit to get used to it but after about 2 weeks of using it I made it my default browser and uninstalled Firefox and won't look back until I'm sure that Firefox is up to my standards.
Just thought I'd let y'all know... *hops down off of soap box, bows and exit's to the left* 
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Comments
I also prefer Opera. Firefox and Chrome were too heavy for me.
Opera seems lighter. It also has built-in VPN, which is nice.
Settings -> Privacy and Security -> Enable VPN
Opera, like Vivaldi, is now also based on Chrome, or more precisely, Chromium.
One of the fastest browsers is supposed to be Brave. I've used it. It is fast, but there are few extensions. However, it's usually the extensions that slow it down anyway (and introduce security problems too).
Laurie
I like water fox. It is like the old firefox.
I too use Waterfox - https://www.waterfoxproject.org/en-US/
I have Opera, Vivaldi and Firefox installed as well but they are only there for testing. With my current plugins for Waterfox, like the old FF, I still have the best browsing experaince overall.
I had allot of issues with Waterfox and Cyberfox so they are not installed right now.
I have used it in the past and was very chunky back then, but with Firefox getting clunkier decided after much thinking to put Opera back on and well can say adios to Firefox..
I was a very loyal Firefox user (ever since it was Netscape) up until a few years ago when I just couldn't deal with the slowness any longer and switched to Google Chrome. Now Chrome is sort of in the same boat as Firefox was then, only there's nothing else really to go to....lol. Right now I'm on Brave (also a relative of Chrome btw), but it's VERY stripped down as browsers go. It does support my Dashlane though, which I guess is something, but there are only a handful of extensions for this browser. On the plus side, it is nice and fast. But there's only Maxthon (which is Chinese and may be sending things you don't want to send and being sneaky) and all the rest are very new or very obscure browsers. I don't use Pale Moon, Waterfox or Cyberfox because they are developed by very small teams that may miss or be slow to adapt important security patches. Choices are getting slim ;).
Laurie
Interesting. I was looking at Opera last week, but was put off by the thought of trying to find the equivalent FF add-ons and extensions. Believe it or not, I'm still on FF31. I've tried at least 5 newer versions since then and every one gave me weird problems. I installed FF60 two weeks ago and had no bookmarks. I spent hours googling the issue, tried everything, and still couldn't import them, so I gave up and went back to good ole FF31. And I have to say, I've noticed little or no speed increase with any later versions.
I refuse to use Chrome. Tried it twice and hated it. But I may look at Waterfox, and if it doesn't measure up, try Opera. At the worst, FF31 will do until a newer version comes along that actually works for me.
I've been using Opera for years but the new team that have taken it over seem to think it is for children and have added stupid animations to error pages, other than that it has been fine.
There is one very useful thing that Opera does that I don't know if Chrome does but know that Firefox does not... if your watching something on YouTube you can hover over the video and there is an out arrow at the top of the video (only shows when you hover so it's not there normally)... click that and it pops out into it's own player frameless window, you can move and resize it to your liking. It remembers it's position and size so the next time your on YouTube you can click that little OUT arrow and it pops out in the same position and size. Very useful for old tired eyes and watching tutorials.
I like water fox. It is like the old firefox. I have Firefox and chrome but not a fan of them.
I do not set a default browser on the computer. Two reasons for that. One I do not care enough to put in the effort but also I do not let myself use just one browser. I do not want to settle for just one browser.
I used Firefox for years, was an outstanding browser, nut with each update began getting sluggish, now I use Chrome, may look into Opera.
I installed Opera, but I'm not impressed. The first issue is that it keeps telling me it's imported my bookmarks from FF, but they're nowhere to be seen, despite multiple tries. Secondly, on opening AND closing Opera, I get the wait cursor for several seconds. It's no big deal, but I've never had that with any other browser.
I also installed Waterfox and it's not bad, although I'm not exactly sure in what ways it's different from Firefox. Mind you, at least it imported my bookmarks, which FF 60 is incapable of doing.
@maclean
Click on the Menu, top left beside the O, and go down to Bookmarks, they should all be there. Opera opens and closes fine here. What can happen though is it takes a second or two to save your configuration so that it loads the next time Opera is opened, clicking to open Opera too soon after closing it makes it slow opening.
Opera fangirl here. I've been using it for years. Yes, it seems to be getting better and better as the years pass.
I've been using Opera since before their free blog days. I don't mind FF. Haven't tried it in a while. I do have it at work though.
The one thing I don't like about Opera is that sometimes it will open the last or second last site you had open before you closed all your tabs the next time you launch Opera. So be careful if you're surfing some "questionable" sites (or just stuff you want private like online banking) and others are around next time you launch Opera. lol And yes, this happens even if you close all tabs first.
That's just the problem. They aren't there. And I'm talking about normal opening and closing - not quick-fire stuff. Actually, after seeing your post I opened Opera and went to Bookmarks in the hope something had changed. From the moment of opening Opera, clicking on the O and going down to Bookmarks in the menu, I had the waiting cursor the whole time - 5-6 seconds.
There is something either not right with your installation or it is looking for the bookmarks to load and can't find them. In all the years I have used Opera, on various Windows from 98 to my present 7 and I also have it on my Tablets and phones, I have never had a problem.
I think it's also clearing out the cache for a faster load when closing. The bookmarks are easy to adjust. I just went into the settings and turned on the bookmark bar and then into the bookmarks and dragged my main bookmarks onto the bookmark bar so I have a nice clean bookmark configuation... See screen grab below...
If your bookmarks are not importing then go to your old browser, Bookmarks, export Bookmarks to your desktop, back to Opera and import. A note to be wary of, like all browsers the bookmarks will be imported under the "Other" or "Unsorted" or "Imported" bookmarks. You'll need to drag the mess of them up to the normal Bookmarks header to see them as you expect. Took me about 1/2 hour to get it all sorted to my liking but I'm happy with the browser and the bookmarks now. ...