Opera just turned 30, and instead of a boring corporate press release, it built something far more fun.
To celebrate its browser’s 30th anniversary, Opera launched “Web Rewind”, an interactive nostalgia trip through three decades of internet history. It is weird, playful, loud, and honestly kind of perfect.
Opera Web Rewind feels like a flash-era time capsule
Opera calls it:
“A time machine for the internet’s finest and weirdest moments.”
That description is not exaggerating.
Web Rewind is a keyboard-driven, animated experience that feels like it was ripped straight out of the Flash era. You navigate by holding or tapping the space bar while exploring 31 different artifacts from internet history.
If you are on mobile, especially an iPhone, you may want to switch to a desktop or laptop to fully experience it. This thing was clearly designed for a proper keyboard.
A nostalgic tour through 30 years of the web
The interactive timeline includes some truly iconic internet milestones, such as:
- Dial-up internet complete with modem handshake sounds
- Early email days featuring AOL’s “you’ve got mail”
- Chain emails
- The birth of Google
- Peer-to-peer file sharing
- The rise of MySpace
And more.
What makes it special is not just the references, but the presentation. It captures that chaotic, experimental era of the web before everything became minimalist, algorithmic, and optimized to death.
There is something refreshing about a website that just wants to be fun.
A chance to visit CERN
Opera is also running a contest tied to Web Rewind.
Users can submit their favorite internet memory from the past 30 years for a chance to win a trip to Switzerland to visit CERN, described as “the birthplace of the web.”
That alone is a clever way to tie internet nostalgia back to its scientific origins.
Since 1995
Opera has been around since 1995. That means it existed before:
- Social media as we know it
- Smartphones
- Streaming
- AI powered search
In a world where most browser updates revolve around AI integration and performance metrics, Web Rewind feels like a reminder of how strange, creative, and unpredictable the internet used to be.
And honestly, that is what makes it charming.
Whether you lived through dial-up, AIM away messages, and MySpace profile songs, or you only caught the tail end of those eras, Opera’s Web Rewind is worth a few minutes of your time.
It is not just a celebration of a browser. It is a celebration of the internet’s personality.
