Opera Software has released Opera Mini 5.1 for Android. It’s available from Android Market or at m.opera.com. The iPhone version of the browser was downloaded 1m times in the first 24 hours after it launched.

Opera Mini for Android offers improved page layout on high-end Android handsets with large screens. Data is compressed by up to 90 per cent before sending content to the phone. This results in significantly improved page loading speed and reduced data costs for the user. For example, says Opera, a normal mobile web browser will display a BBC.com news page roughly once, compared to nine times with Opera Mini, for the same cost. Other features include tabbed browsing, password manager, bookmarks and Speed Dial, which is built into the browser to deliver easy web access while on the go. 

“Opera Mini 5.1 for the Android platform is the next step in bringing the worlds most popular mobile web browser to all major platforms, offering improved performance and great web experience to almost any handset,” says Opera Software CEO, Lars Boilesen. “Opera Mini is used by over 61m people on more than 3000 handset models and with todays release Opera continues its mission to provide the best web experience on any device and on any platform.”