Confirmed: Nokia OVI desktop Internet browser is for real

Staska  By on 28 Jul 10

Remember that mysterious Ovi Browser thing that Nokia has set up a Twitter account for,  and also created password protected download pages on it’s site?

What the heck is it? Could Nokia be working on it’s own desktop Internet browser? And what would be the point of such browser?

I can’t answer the last question yet. But now I can confirm that Nokia is indeed readying the release of the new desktop Internet browser called, you guessed it – OVI Browser.

The confirmation comes from none other, then the biggest Nokia security service bogeyman – Eldar Murtazin, who says that he now got some playtime with the beta version of OVI browser.

(Update: If you Google translated the linked Eldar’s post – he never mentions Nokia or OVI Browser by name. I guess with all the legal stuff between him and Nokia right now, he’s a bit more careful naming names where Nokia can accuse him of “stealing trade secrets”.  But from the way he talks about the browser from “market mastodon”, connecting to “all time best app store, calendar, contacts and mail..”, and the way he wrote about Nokia before – there’s nothing else he can be talking about).

OVI browser is a WebKit based desktop Internet browser, optimized for the use of OVI services. That includes close integration with OVI Store, and direct access to OVI calendar, contacts, mail and other OVI services.

I’ll have to wait until OVI Browser is launched, and also hear the Nokia’s side of the story of why they think they need their own browser, to decide whether it’s a good idea  or not.

But I must say – they will have to surprise me a lot to make me a believer. Right now Nokia OVI Browser raises much more questions and doubts, then excited anticipation. Do they really think they will be able to compete with Google, Firefox, Microsoft, Apple and Opera in desktop browsers?

Unless, Nokia is on the way of scrapping it’s Nokia and OVI Suites, and is moving to web standards for managing their phones. Now that, if implemented well, will make at a lot of  sense.

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  • Guest

    Is it “OVI” or “Ovi”?

  • Daniel

    They should make a decent mobile browser first.

  • thewinchesterau

    Come on, that's just too obvious for Nokia to do ;)

  • Tonttula2

    By far the best part of N900 was the browser that's Nokia developed based on mozilla.
    Mozilla tried to make it's own version but got nothing against Nokias MicroB on N900.

  • Dkarageo

    An Ovi desktop browser has such a high chance of 'Spectacular Fail' that it's really going to be something to see, probably not last seen since the Microsoft Kin.

    Like you said, why would people choose this over Firefox, Opera, Chrome, Safari, Microsoft again? Oh, that's right, they won't.

  • Johnson

    Ovi Browser page is up on Nokia beta labs: its a s40 browser.

    http://betalabs.nokia.com/apps/ovi-browser

    Nice job guys.

  • http://twitter.com/brainimpact Craig

    lol its a browser for series 40 devices
    nokia just launched it, now i hope you've learnt a lesson dont believe everything you read
    http://betalabs.nokia.com/blog/2010/07/28/intro…

  • http://www.staska.net Staska

    Yep. Saw it. Let's wait and see if it's only about S40

  • emiliano

    It turns out its a browser for S40 phones!!. When are you people going to realize that Eldar is full of BS and just throws out crap? Sometimes the crap by chance turns out to be true and you think he is this phone guru.

  • Ab

    It shouldn't be too much work to make an Ovi browser for its more powerfull platform symbian^3 and MeeGo since the API for those OS include QtWebkit. In fact you can make a basic browser with it in about 100 lines of code : http://www.krizka.net/2008/10/30/qt-44-is-aweso…

  • http://www.staska.net Staska

    Whenever I see he's wrong about Nokia. About his facts facts, not
    opinions… About other stuff too.

    The fact that Nokia announced S40 browser, well…Interesting timing. Again.

    But it doesn't mean that desktop browser isn't/wasn't in the works

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