Opera/Channel 24
Opera, which develops the browser of the same name, has announced the introduction of an emoji-based web address. According to the creators, “this will bring the Internet to a new level of creativity.”
In this initiative, Opera is collaborating with Yat Labs. Launched in February 2021, Yat Labs is an “emoji-based auto-identification solution”.
Emoji instead of address
- It’s very simple: this innovation will allow users to navigate the web by typing emoji into the address bar, rather than letters or numbers.
- Traditional URLs, especially short ones that are easy to remember, are becoming more and more valuable, so they getting harder and harder to get.
- Meanwhile, emojis are more popular than ever. According to statistics, more than 10 billion emoticons are sent every day in social networks and messengers, and 95% of Internet users have used them at least once. That is why they decided to find a more practical role.
Emoji in the address bar of the browser instead of traditional letters and figures/Photo Opera
Whether such an innovation will take root among users and site owners is too early to judge.
it needs to spread to more popular browsers – Chrome, Edge, Safari – and reach more users for the feature to fully work.
However, it is already being seen hidden potential. The fact is that, as mentioned above, short and recognizable addresses are in great demand, as they allow, for example, the company’s customers to easily remember and find shopping sites. Therefore, those who bought domain names in the early days of the Internet ended up making a fortune later.