Opera Reports on Mobile Web Trends in Africa

Opera Reports on Mobile Web Trends in Africa

This month's Opera State of the Mobile Web Report examined Africa, which is currently in the midst of mobile web browsing transformation. With less legacy fixed-line infrastructure, not only do more people have mobile phones, but mobile phones are the most popular means for Africans across the continent to access the web.

“Two hundred million people use Opera Mini and Opera Mobile to connect to the world around them. For many of them, a browser is more than a tool to ‘browse the web’. Sometimes it’s a school when you can afford none, sometimes it’s the only line to an outside world shut off by an oppressive regime. Providing a service that reliably and cheaply delivers critical information to just about everyone with a phone is the reason Opera makes browsers. We want to make a difference in the world, not only on the web,” said Lars Boilesen, CEO, Opera.

Among the highlights of the report include the fact that 25 of the 53 countries (47%) have access to international news sites as being their most popular news source. The report also shows that the mobile web has made a comeback recently, as 36 countries have more than doubled their Opera Mini user bases in just one year. As a result, the number of Opera Mini users had risen by 600% in one year, page views had grown 744% and data usage increased by 760%. Across Africa, data growth seems to outpace page-view growth. This fact suggests that Africans are browsing larger pages and mostly likely using richer and more advanced websites.

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