Vivaldi 7.9 Delivers a Minimalist New Auto-Hide Mode

Vivaldi 7.9 is a major update to the desktop web browser that delivers an excellent new Auto-Hide feature that removes all the browser chrome–the toolbar, tabs, status bar, and so on–so you can focus on the content you’re viewing.

“Vivaldi launches 7.9 with a genuinely new way to reclaim your screen and a new tab feature that will become part of your daily browsing,” Vivaldi founder and CEO Jon von Tetzchner writes. “Once you’ve tried it, it will feel completely obvious.”

You can toggle Auto-Hide using a new button in the Vivaldi status bar or by typing Ctrl + F11 (on Windows and Linux) or Cmd + F10 (Mac). When you do, the content in the browser extends to all edges of the app window and the surrounding UI chrome–in Vivaldi, the Tab bar, Address bar, Panel, and Status bar–all disappear.

You can get to any of the normal UIs by mousing over to a window edge. For example, if you mouse over to the left, the Panel will appear. These UIs float in this mode like mini-windows and when you mouse away, they disappear again. You can go back to the normal viewing mode by clicking the Status bar-based button or using the keyboard shortcut again.

You can also configure how Auto-Hide works in Vivaldi settings. For example, you can determine exactly which UIs disappear when in Auto-Hide mode, and whether to always enable this feature when the browser is in Full screen mode.

Vivaldi 7.9 also comes with a new Tiled Follower Tab feature that lets you keeps the current tab in place and then opens new links in a tiled view right there so you don’t lose track of where you are, and several new features to Mail, like the ability to open the New mail composer in a separate window.

“Every update, big or small, reinforces what makes Vivaldi different,” von Tetzchner adds. “We don’t have investors demanding features that benefit them instead of you. We don’t harvest your data or track your behavior. We’re simply building a browser that serves you. Your choices, your workflow, your privacy.”

You can learn more and download Vivaldi 7.9 for Windows, Mac, and Linux from the Vivaldi website.