14 DAY TRIAL // Opera Software has just announced that it has kicked off a beta testing program for an interesting tool for Android devices called Opera Max. Those who use Opera’s browsers, now available on most platforms, will be surprised to hear that this application is more than a browser.
Opera Max is not only a browser that, once again, promises to compress your data as much as possible, but it also acts as a VPN that can measure all that’s going through an Android device in terms of mobile data.
“Opera Max uses a Virtual Private Network, or VPN, to measure all the data usage on your phone. Once Opera Max savings is enabled, all data requests are sent through our compression servers that optimize video, images, and websites to use less data. We only measure how much data you use and how much data you’ve saved.”
For the time being, a select number of applications are compatible with Opera Max, so depending on which one you use, Opera Max can compress the data that comes to your device from these apps.
According to Opera, the developer only provides savings for HTTP non-encrypted data usage and does not save user’s data on apps that use HTTPS encrypted or other protocols.
Basically, this means that Opera Max will never save data on encrypted apps such as Facebook, but it will save data on most of the applications and any content that is not encrypted.
Opera Max is still in beta testing in the United States and developers are currently looking for Android users willing to test the application.
Keep in mind though that this is a limited beta that is available thorough Opera Google+ Community (Google+ account needed). All the necessary information required to become an Opera Max beta tester is available on Google+ Community page.
Opera Max is now available for download via Google Play store (US only) and should be fully compatible with all devices running Android 4.0 and up.