Opera adds a built-in ad blocker

There has been a lot of talk about mobile ad blocking lately, but on the desktop, this is an old phenomenon. Until now, however, desktop ad blocking was all about plugins. But Opera is about to change this and the latest developer release of the company’s desktop browser now includes a built-in ad blocker.

Opera argues that blocking ads can speed up load times by as much as 90 percent (though in my own experience, the results aren’t quite as dramatic). By using a built-in ad blocker instead of a third-party plugin, the company is able achieve another speedup on top of this. Opera says it’s seeing sites load an extra 40 percent faster compared to third-party solutions.

Opera itself owns an online advertising firm, so this move is definitely a bit of a surprise. The company, which is currently in the process of being acquired by a consortium of Chinese firms, argues that it is doing this to improve the web-surfing experience for its users, though.