Opera GX now includes a button you can hit when your embarrassing browsing session risks exposure to prying eyes. It’s designed to quickly mute playback from all tabs and switch to a new window of safe content during an, ahem, unexpected drop-in or when your boss catches you watching too much Twitch when you should be glued to Excel.
Opera’s gamer browser now has a ‘panic button’ for when you’re caught in the act
Opera GX lets you mash the F12 button to fend off prying eyes and unexpected drop-ins.
Opera GX lets you mash the F12 button to fend off prying eyes and unexpected drop-ins.
Image: Opera
is a senior correspondent and author of Notepad, who has been covering all things Microsoft, PC, and tech for over 20 years.
The new panic mode can be activated using the F12 button on a keyboard, so all you 60 percent keyboard lovers will need to bind the one function key nobody (apart from developers) uses right now. Opera lets you pick a website to designate as your safe tab, with pre-installed options for YouTube, Twitch, and Wikipedia. You can press F12 again once the coast is clear to bring back your tabs.
To enable the panic button you’ll need to toggle the “early bird” option in the settings of the Opera GX browser. It’s part of the latest level five update to Opera GX, which also includes a guest tabs feature and improvements to Twitch logins.
Opera first started shipping its GX “gaming browser” in 2019, a version of Opera that’s been customized to appeal to gamers. You can set limits on CPU and GPU usage, and it also has a useful sidebar where you can quickly access Twitch, Instagram, WhatsApp, and other web services.
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