Opera Wants You To Pay $20 a Month For Its AI Browser (techcrunch.com)
- Reference: 0180361491
- News link: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/12/11/1430237/opera-wants-you-to-pay-20-a-month-for-its-ai-browser
- Source link: https://techcrunch.com/2025/12/11/opera-wants-you-to-pay-20-a-month-to-use-its-ai-powered-browser-neon/
[1] https://slashdot.org/story/25/10/05/026207/opera-wants-you-to-pay-1990-a-month-for-its-new-ai-browser
[2] https://techcrunch.com/2025/12/11/opera-wants-you-to-pay-20-a-month-to-use-its-ai-powered-browser-neon/
Optimistic or stupid? (Score:3, Interesting)
Are they just optimistic that their product provides enough value that they can justify charging almost $250/year? Or have they simply not learned a single damn thing from the last 30 years of their existence? Chrome has Gemini integrated whether you like it or not, and for free. Pin a ChatGPT tab and boom, saved you $20/month.
Re: (Score:2)
> Chrome has Gemini integrated whether you like it or not, and for free. Pin a ChatGPT tab and boom, saved you $20/month.
Yes, because that's precisely how monopolies work.
Chrome effectively has a 20-year monopoly in the Internet search/ads/SEO business, which they use to leverage their other products.
Why pay extra for choice (regardless of whether it's truly differentiated or simply performative) when you can get the existing monopolist product for free?
Re: (Score:2)
The only other thing they provided was a third engine to render standards-compliant HTML against. Then they went to Chromium. I would say fourth, but Chromium is really just forked Webkit, which is really just forked KHTML. They are different but not different enough over the amount of time.
Somehow Opera still had users before this. If anyone would pay for it, it would be these people.
Re: (Score:2)
"Somehow Opera still had users before this. If anyone would pay for it, it would be these people"
I'm one of "these people". I think i was using Opera when i created my 1st Slashdot account & paid for a license back in the day.
Still use it today but it hasn't been my main browser in a long time.
And, no, Hell NO, I would not pay for this.
get screwed for free (Score:5, Funny)
use Perplexity browser
Back when (Score:4, Interesting)
BLINK and animated GIF were being abused by so-called web "designers" I paid for Opera since it could freeze the spaminationed GIF after one cycle. I stayed with Opera for year. Then the Marketeers took over and I stayed with an older version for far too long... and shopped around for a while, being continually disappointed (no, Firefox was not good enough.. not then anyway). When Vivaldi showed up.. ragged, experimental, but with the RIGHT attitude... I at least had it as an option. Today, I run Vivaldi snapshot as main, stable as backup and Firefox only for Special Cases. Opera... died long ago, alas. It just has't stopped twitching yet.
Ha ha ha ha (Score:2)
"Opera Wants You To Pay $20 a Month For Its AI Browser"
Ha ha ha ha, good one, Opera! I needed a chuckle this morning.
I Must Be Getting Old (Score:2)
I have no desire to operate my computer through questions and hints and nods.
If I was going to pay for a browser... (Score:3)
... I might pay for the feature that eliminates or hides all AI features, including on the websites I visit .
If I'm paying for a browser then it's going to be more customizable, and easier to customize, than Firefox. Charging for a locked-down browser that has AI - and therefore additional spying - baked in? No thanks!
These days, it seems that everybody and his dog is jumping on perpetual-revenue SaaS offerings. I consider those offerings to be burnt. This move by Opera is clearly just an 'excusortunity' to turn browsers into rentware. Fuck them.
Re: (Score:2)
Blame it all on Salesforce.
Shoud be "the Chinese owned, Norway-based company" (Score:4, Informative)
James Yahui Zhou, the controlling shareholder of Kunlun, is both Chair of Opera's Board and its CEO: "As of the date of this annual report, Kunlun, a Chinese public company listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, indirectly owns 68.8% of our issued and outstanding ordinary shares.
Re: (Score:1)
> James Yahui Zhou, the controlling shareholder of Kunlun, is both Chair of Opera's Board and its CEO: "As of the date of this annual report, Kunlun, a Chinese public company listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, indirectly owns 68.8% of our issued and outstanding ordinary shares.
[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opera_(web_browser)
Norway based? (Score:5, Informative)
This is the first I've heard of that. By all accounts they are based in the Cayman Islands and a subsidiary of a Chinese owner Kunlun Tech. Also is it really a browser anymore? The Chinese parent calls the entire subsidiary an "Overseas information distribution and metaverse platform". I wish I was kidding. [1]https://www.kunlun.com/en/# [kunlun.com]
[1] https://www.kunlun.com/en/#
The times when Opera wasn't a complete shit (Score:2)
are long gone, so long, that I doubt they ever happened.
That'll Be The End Of Opera (Score:2)
In a world where we have Edge, Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Brave, and all the other derivative browsers - all free - there is no opportunity for a paid browser.
Zero chance. No shot, as the kids say.
In future "deals" (Score:2)
> Pay $20 a Month For Its AI Browser
People will have to pay $20/month for a browser w/o AI. :-(
No, thanks, Opera (Score:2)
I can give you a big middle finger though.
Thy will make a fortune if they simply reverse it (Score:2)
Ie you Pay $20 a Month For Its AI free Browser, Ie what the people actually want!
NO! just fucking NO! (Score:2)
Jesus these companies are all in on AI. Ya, I use for some tasks, and I have a Claude subscription, but I want to use it when I want to use it. I want the control without it everywhere.
Pay me 20 bux? (Score:2)
To do what? Watch advertising that puts 30 or 40 but in their pocket? No thanks, you call it the cost of doing business I would call it NOFUCKINGWAY
No thanks (Score:5, Insightful)
Are they offering an "AI" free version?
I don't need their little synopsis (et al.) generator... For starters I can read.
Re:No thanks (Score:4, Funny)
Yes, but unlike the $20 a month version with AI, it costs $40 a month... /s
Re: (Score:2)
> Are they offering an "AI" free version?
> I don't need their little synopsis (et al.) generator... For starters I can read.
Well, the "AI-free" version of Opera Neon is ............ Opera
The free, _thirty_ year old web browser. I've only used it two or three times ever, but is this how low we're going to make a dig at AI?
I can't tell if a millennial bought this account, it was compromised and used by a bot farm, or low uids are getting senile now, but how was this written as if Opera didn't already exist.