Back in February, Opera announced an in-built messaging service for its Opera Mini browser. Hype, as it is called, was launching in Kenya as its first pilot market. Today, the company has announced it will be adding new features to the Chat service.
According to Opera, the service is fast-growing and is reshaping the concept of mobile browsers, providing users with a personalized, engaging browsing and chatting experience – without compromising speed or driving increased data consumption.
The new features that are being brought in are:
- Built-in meme creator
- Link Previews
- GIF support
“When we first released Hype, we raised the bar by redefining the feature set a browser should have. With Opera Mini and a Hype account, users can enjoy a browsing and chatting ecosystem tailored to their needs,” said Jørgen Arnesen, Executive Vice President of Mobile Browsers Business Unit. “Today we are raising the bar even further by adding new engaging features such as unique built-in meme creator, GIF support and link previews to make chatting even more fun.”
The built-in meme creator
Memes are an essential part of internet culture. People not only use existing memes as a form of expression, but also wish to create and spread their own. Until now, creating memes has been a difficult process as the user had to switch apps, download and upload files, and take many additional steps.
That is no longer the case. With today’s Hype update, Opera is introducing the first meme creator built directly into a browser’s messenger! Users can choose memes directly in chat in Hype. Once chosen, users can edit them by changing the text and experimenting with fonts, colours and placement – more easily than ever. This comes in handy as users no longer need to copy links from websites and switch between apps to share the memes they want. Additionally, beyond making their own memes quickly and easily in chat, users can simply edit and resend the memes they receive from friends.
GIF support in chat
The way people communicate is constantly evolving. New generations rely on formats like memes and GIFs to express themselves, often relating to pop culture references and the internet content they find. To make this easier and more fun, Opera has brought GIF support to Hype chat. Making the right choice of GIF is now much simpler with Hype’s search capabilities and scrollable GIF grid. To help users choose the one they want, a GIF preview and full screen view are also available.
Link previews
It is always good to know what’s hiding behind a link we’ve sent or received. The newest Hype update comes with a link preview feature. Snapshot, website header and description will automatically appear in chat. This function is also available in encrypted chats and on metered networks.
Stickers by local artists and WebSnap
Hype was initially released with a bunch of creative features that suit the needs of Kenyan users, offering a series of unique stickers that reflect their everyday expressions. The sticker collections were created by Kenyan artists Brian Omolo and Lulu Kitololo, making Opera the first major browser to integrate African pop culture into its products.
Moreover, Hype comes with WebSnap, a feature that is well-known from the Opera desktop browser, which allows users to take snapshots from the web. Once a websnap is captured, users can edit it by adding colors, text, and emojis to make it fun and entertaining before sharing it with others. WebSnap also allows users to smoothly share the link of the original website from which they took their snapshots.
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