Latest Opera update arrives with flipped vertical tabs, extension side panels, and macOS fixes

Opera just pushed out a new update for its desktop browser and is rolling it out to users as version 135.0.5973.123 in the stable channel. If you use vertical tabs in the browser, you’ll notice a big change in how Opera handles them after the update.

When Opera first introduced vertical tabs in July, it followed other browsers by placing the New Tab button at the bottom of the tab list.

It turns out that the implementation doesn’t exactly make for an effortless user experience. In a fresh announcement, Opera says it ran an internal survey and found that 73% of users admitted that they click the button instead of using a keyboard shortcut to create a new tab.

This means that if you have a 1440p or 4K monitor, you’d have to drag your cursor over a thousand pixels down to click the New Tab button, and then drag it all the way back up to the address bar to begin typing again. Not exactly ideal.

So the company admitted that “placing the ‘New Tab’ button at the bottom was a mistake.”

With the latest 135.0.5973.123 update, the New Tab button has been moved to the top of the tab list. When you create a new tab, it’ll show up under the button instead of at the bottom of already-existing tabs.

If that doesn’t sound like something you’d want, you’re not forced to use it either. The browser still lets you get back to the old layout if you don’t want to retrain your muscle memory.

The team published a whole video talking about the change. You can watch it below.

Tab Islands are getting some needed love as well. You can now drag and drop tabs into each other to start a new group, and hovering over an island reveals a dedicated plus icon to drop a page straight into it.

Apart from the changes to how tabs work, Opera has also added support for Chrome side panel extensions, giving third-party add-ons a permanent home on the side without eating up window space.

Mac users will also be happy to know that the update addresses crashes tied to vertical tabs, stops the traffic light buttons from acting up on hover, and even resolves that annoying bug where the bookmarks bar would vanish after leaving full screen.

The update is rolling out right now across Windows, macOS, and Linux, complete with a backported security patch for CVE-2026-87491 to keep things tidy under the hood.

I’ve still not got the update on my Mac, but I suspect it’ll be here sooner rather than later.

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