Firefox for iOS now has a native adblocker

270

ppentagrama about 4 hours ago 106 commentsRead Article on support.mozilla.org

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Discussion (106 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews

ahmetozer•5 minutes ago

I hope, i will be see gecko engine at IOS

https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/firefox-ios/issues/19063#i...

internet2000•about 3 hours ago

In case anyone here missed it, there's a native Ublock Origin for Safari. It works great → https://apps.apple.com/us/app/ublock-origin-lite/id674534269...

simcop2387•about 2 hours ago

Mostly so, it's got all the limitations of Manifest V3 which prevents it from doing a good bit of blocking, https://ublockorigin.com/#manifest-v3-section

In particular:

* Cannot use all filter lists simultaneously (rule limits apply)

* No cosmetic filtering in the default mode

* No scriptlet injection by default

* Limited dynamic filtering capabilities

* Requires broader host permissions upfront

But it's definitely still better than no adblockers

GeekyBear•about 1 hour ago

> it's got all the limitations of Manifest V3 which prevents it from doing a good bit of blocking

The only mainstream browser left that can still run the full version of uBlock Origin is Firefox.

All the others have the same limitations imposed by Manifest V3.

dawnerd•about 1 hour ago

iOS Firefox the same though.

HeatrayEnjoyer•about 1 hour ago

Brave said they will be keeping its functionality.

armadyl•about 2 hours ago

Regarding the cosmetic filtering and scriptlet injection, are these even relevant? Most uBO users already give full access to the extension, so they'll probably do the same to uBOL to (most permissions + complete filtering mode). So basically they will have these features anyway.

armadyl•about 2 hours ago

FYI uBlock Origin Lite on iOS is inferior to AdGuard and (I think) Wipr as it's just a WebExtension, so it'll only block ads within Safari itself.

AdGuard and Wipr use both the Web Extension and Content Blocker APIs, so they'll block ads in all web views system wide on top of within Safari itself.

However as far as trustworthiness goes, uBlock is (imo) #1.

Barbing•about 2 hours ago

wBlock by an MIT student is open source and seems (just!) about as trustworthy as uBlock, though of course without the track record. Light & fast, especially to update.

  “wBlock runs entirely within Safari's content blocking API. There's no data collection, no tracking, and no system-level extensions that can monitor your browsing.“

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/wblock/id6746388723 / GH: https://github.com/0xCUB3/wBlock

On AdGuard: can act as your PiHole and allow you to see network requests when run in non-native mode.

armadyl•about 1 hour ago

Nice, last time I heard about wblock felt like years ago and I'm not sure why I didn't consider it.

These days I don't run on-device adblock, I just do DNS filtering for the most part but I'll check it out, not sure I wanna keep tunneling all my DNS queries to ControlD perpetually lol

Aboutplants•about 2 hours ago

Thanks for the link, I like it so far

anon7000•about 1 hour ago

I think Wipr is also very trustworthy. It’s developed by an indie dev who’s responsive over email, and gives you a lot for free. And it has a $5/yr subscription (or one time payment) that unlocks system-wide ad blocking, not just in web views.

I’ve found it to work exceptionally well after trying other free adblockers.

ronjouch•about 2 hours ago

uBOL bug report: https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uBOL-home/issues/438 , from discussion https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uBOL-home/discussions/408#di...

    uBOL doesn't work in apps, it works only in Safari, it's a pure browser extension, the "app" part of uBOL is an Apple requirement just for the sake of installing the extension.

    Copied from #408:

    uBOL will stay a webextensions-based browser extension, I do not plan to go further than this, I do not have the time and motivation to take on more work than I already do.
    What people may ask though is that Apple maybe supports webextensions in WebApp, if that is possible at all.

I hope this changes, it’s what keeps me on AdGuard :-/

yesb•about 1 hour ago

I have been happy with my workaround for this issue which is using uBOL along side the AdGuard content blocker extensions (main AdGuard web extension disabled).

odo1242•about 2 hours ago

Also, if you use Orion Browser, they did implement the full Manifest v2 extension spec on top of WebKit, which lets you use full uBlock origin directly.

anon7000•about 1 hour ago

I try Orion periodically but always find it to be buggy

jorvi•about 1 hour ago

Does that really matter if virtually no one is going to develop extensions according to the Manifest v2 spec?

Developing for that spec means your extension is incompatible with idk, 98% of the browser market?

SoftTalker•about 1 hour ago

This is why I started using the Orion browser. It's not perfect, I've had a few freezes and occasional weird behavior but well within the "tolerable" range for me, and not noticably worse than the glitches that any ad blocker causes on some sites.

Nextgrid•about 2 hours ago

This is not a true uBlock Origin. It's a best effort attempt at converting UBO rules to Apple's declarative blocking framework, but is nowhere near as capable as actual UBO.

NegativeLatency•about 2 hours ago

Works well enough for me

Cider9986•about 2 hours ago

Does it work on YouTube?

lapcat•about 1 hour ago

> It's a best effort attempt at converting UBO rules to Apple's declarative blocking framework

uBlock Origin Lite uses the cross-platform DeclarativeNetRequest extension API: https://developer.mozilla.org/docs/Mozilla/Add-ons/WebExtens...

Google invented this API for Chrome, and the other web browsers are adopting it. uBlock Origin Lite does not use Apple's content blocker API.

VCFundedGenYer•about 4 hours ago

Technically, Firefox Focus (a separate browser for iOS) includes an adblocker feature that can be applied system wide via iOS's content blockers subsystem. This was released in the late 2010s.

Firefox including it is likely just reducing the steps required.

HeadOfProbing•about 1 hour ago

Love Firefox. But I always thought it was terribly misguided product direction of them to ever release this as a separate iOS app.

brightbeige•about 3 hours ago

If you search the App Store and don’t find it, it’s called Firefox Klar in some markets

adityeah•about 4 hours ago

Yes and not only that, one can enable that as a safari extension and get an ad-free experience on safari too.

petilon•34 minutes ago

Blocking ads wholesale is a terrible idea and unnecessary. What needs to be blocked is ads that execute client-side javascript (consuming your memory and cpu), ads that consume too much network bandwidth and so on. Ads are necessary so that content producers can generate income, without it they won't produce quality content. When you block abusive ads (as opposed to all ads), advertisers are encouraged to make their ads less abusive. Content producers get paid and you get to enjoy the content for free. Everyone wins.

Gareth321•19 minutes ago

> When you block abusive ads (as opposed to all ads), advertisers are encouraged to make their ads less abusive.

Ads were made abusive, malicious, and dangerous WELL before ad blockers existed. Ad blockers are a response to abusive, malicious, and dangerous advertising. Sadly there are very few reliable ways to whitelist trustworthy advertising. Google and Facebook et al. have all served harmful advertising at some point.

It's too late to turn this around. All trust is lost with advertisers, and to be honest, I'm not sure a system based on trust was ever going to work anyway. Content creators must now create new ways to derive value from their work. Perhaps we go back to an internet where people wrote blogs and posted pictures not for money, but as a hobby. I think that was a better internet.

kromokromo•22 minutes ago

No. We need to think in other ways than the ad economy. I’d gladly pay for good content if there was a decent system set up for it.

awepofiwaop•22 minutes ago

I care about having a general purpose web content blocker. I use it for blocking all kinds of things that aren't ads, like YouTube comment sections, random noisy useless cruft I don't care about, etc.

JimBlackwood•26 minutes ago

I’d be happy for a content producer wide subscription that would disable ads on all participating sites. As long as that doesn’t exist, I’m happy with my adblocker.

Next to that, my device, my choice what I get to see and what I don’t get to see.

davkan•18 minutes ago

No. I will not discriminate between which ads I block when neither the site operators nor the ad networks discriminate on what they host. The moment i turn off my ad block I’m up to my eyeballs in lies and scams and garbage. No. Thanks.

This ad funded internet needs to die. As long as enough of the general public continues to not Adblock I’ll enjoy my free ride.

Neywiny•32 minutes ago

I wish that were true

temp0826•about 4 hours ago

What's the current excuse for not supporting extensions on iOS? Orion on iOS does and it's the reason I dropped FF ages ago.

TheDong•about 4 hours ago

Apple themselves do not allow using anything other than WebKit unless you move to the EU or Japan: https://developer.apple.com/support/alternative-browser-engi...

Firefox addons target gecko, not webkit.

What Orion's doing is horribly hacky and prone to cause issues with a multitude of addons, and of course Mozilla shouldn't bow to Apple's incredibly anti-competitive behavior.

You pay apple for a phone that can act more-or-less as a general purpose computer with apps. Apple should let you install the apps you want, and that they don't do so is insulting.

The fact that the EU and Japan ruled it illegal, and Apple responded by only changing it in those two countries instead of all countries is doubly insulting.

Nextgrid•about 2 hours ago

> unless you move to the EU or Japan

Not only that, but the "entitlement" (Apple lingo for code-signature flag that grants capabilities) needed to publish a browser effectively requires to be an established company, ensuring hobbyists can't really get there with an open-source project even though the sources of Firefox are available and could technically be ported.

Gareth321•7 minutes ago

It goes well beyond requiring an established company. It's so onerous that no company has yet successfully navigated all the gates required - even Google. Apple is maliciously complying with the EU's Digital Rights Act, and many years later, the EU has not concluded its investigations. I am incredibly disappointed.

yoavm•about 3 hours ago

> Firefox addons target gecko, not webkit.

Are they? I've built a few Firefox extension and I cannot recall any part of the API that is Gecko-specific. While parts of the API aren't entirely browser-agnostic, they definitely seem to be engine-agnostic.

enos_feedler•about 2 hours ago

It’s not the part you see, its what they see to implement the features you see.

prinny_•about 2 hours ago

Can you please expand on why what Orion does is hacky and may cause issues with other add ons?

Tryk•about 2 hours ago

*EU is not one country

benoau•about 2 hours ago

The law that requires allowing alternative browsers, the DMA, applies to the entire EU.

But I believe there are still zero third party browsers, to publish their browser in the EU Mozilla need an EU development team because developers outside the EU are unable to install it, and Mozilla cannot publish it as their existing app. Enforcement is taking years.

wbl•about 3 hours ago

Not all markets or manufacturers will have the same degree of vertical integration and that's ok.

Grombobulous•about 3 hours ago

It’s okay if you’re in a healthy market with many competitive choices.

It’s not okay if you’re a duopoly where over 95% of people buy your product as a prerequisite to functioning in modern society.

grepex•about 3 hours ago

Read: not all markets and manufacturers will have the same respect for their customers.

close04•about 4 hours ago

Until recently Apple only allowed Webkit on iOS. In the EU and Japan now they allow proprietary engines. But this means Mozilla needs to put in all the extra effort to maintain yet another branch for iOS with all the features, for an even more limited user base in those regions alone.

user43928•about 2 hours ago

While technically allowed, Apple's terms are extensive: https://developer.apple.com/support/alternative-browser-engi...

VCFundedGenYer•about 3 hours ago

As always, it's Apple neutering their own platform. They don't allow a lot of things on iOS. Non-WebKit browsers is one of them (Which is asinine).

The EU forced them to allow other browser engines in their regions, but it's not global, and therefore fragmented.

tcfhgj•about 3 hours ago

what's the current excuse for buying a device which doesn't allow you to control what software you use on it?

temp0826•about 2 hours ago

My current excuse? Android (the only current realistic alternative; I don't have the time nor care to fiddle with technical details on a device that I need to be a reliable tool. I'm not afraid of going deep on something less standard, Linux has been my daily driven OS for literally decades) is trash and untrustworthy in my experience. Browser extensions alone are not nearly enough to tip the scale for me to go back to it. As mentioned I use something that provides extension support already (from a browser that has far fewer developers working on it!), which is why I find it stupid that Mozilla won't figure out a way to do it themselves.

confusedbucket•about 2 hours ago

Where do I buy this device that does let me run any software I want?

Most Android phones don't even let users unlock the bootloader anymore. And if you do unlock the bootloader, now Google Pay doesn't work, among other things. I don't really feel like being in control of what software I use when the software I actually want refuses to run. F-Droid homepage is also concerning.

Linux phones barely handle the basic functions.

seba_dos1•about 2 hours ago

> Linux phones barely handle the basic functions.

The one I'm typing this on right now reliably handles all the functions I need and lets me run any software I want. While not everyone's needs will be met by it, let's not paint a picture that hasn't been generally true for many years now already.

whstl•about 3 hours ago

1. Not wanting to.

2. Caring about other aspects of the device.

I don't personally agree with Apple's decisions, but you "vote with wallet" people need to have at least some modicum of empathy before you start demanding that people have a lot for you and join your cause.

tcfhgj•about 3 hours ago

you are reading a lot into almost nothing

> 1. Not wanting to.

obviously you DO want to if you want to use extensions but cannot use them because you actually cannot control the software on your device

cogman10•about 2 hours ago

As a mobile device? There are like 3 of them on the market right now and you'll run into huge headaches at every turn if you try and use them.

Shank•about 3 hours ago

> Ads shown on search engine results pages, including Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo and other search providers

There are many subpar adblockers available both built into browsers on iOS and as extensions. uBlock Origin Lite for Safari remains the best mobile adblocker on iOS, I suppose.

anon7000•about 1 hour ago

Wipr is the best adblocker on iOS that I’ve tested. Indie dev, gives you a lot for free, has a way to block outside of web views too. Big fan, I never had consistent ad blocking experience on iOS until I used it

Cider9986•about 2 hours ago

UBlock lite extension on Safari blocks ads on YouTube? Is Brave not better?

HexDecOctBin•about 1 hour ago

So they still don't support the Content Blocker API? Wouldn't that have been easier? Then I could use whichever lists or providers (Adguard, uBlock, etc.) that I want.

michimagdesign•about 3 hours ago

Paying for Wipr 2 + Filtr is still the gold standard on apple platforms imo. But it’s not open source and there are no custom block lists.

anon7000•about 1 hour ago

Also a big Wipr fan, and generally a fan of the indie dev behind it too because it works so well. They’ve been responsive over email so you might be able to request a feature

Barbing•about 1 hour ago

Challenger appears, one positive feedback so far: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49321078

Sha1rholder•25 minutes ago

But advertising is the source of funding that many content creators rely on to make a living... Of course I don’t want Meta and Google profiting from mind-manipulating ads, but where is better business model? Crypto micropayments?

upboundspiral•12 minutes ago

With AI I am reconsidering my stance on micropayments.

I recently loaded up a few dollars on Deepseek to try it out, and the value I got out of it far surpassed my balance lost (tens of cents). If this is a sustainable business model for Deepseek (I'm not sure yet), then this shifts the economics: in this scenario I feel totally fine paying pocket change for something valuable.

We already know google's searches cost orders of magnitude less than serving an AI model, so there is no reason to believe micropayments couldn't work there too. Of course, advertisements make Google a lot more money than micropayments, so they never tried it, but I suspect that while they might not work in all scenarios they are underexplored as a monetizing strategy.

I feel like website owners could band together and along with search engines figure out tiers for people viewing their content (free, minimal fee, larger fee, etc).

And some publishers would choose that, others would form different coalitions and say: get a subscription and you get access to xyz content, just like with streaming etc. It would need cooperation, so maybe the idea is already dead in the water, but the web being the realm of advertising is not set in stone.

hosteur•about 2 hours ago

Why did it take so long?

nashashmi•44 minutes ago

Firefox was a mainstream browser. After it stopped being one, it did what all the other browsers did: bake adblock within. Even now they do so with trepidation.

rrgok•about 3 hours ago

It this still only DNS blocking or does cosmetic blocking too?

HelloUsername•about 3 hours ago

"Firefox blocks many types of advertising at the network level. It uses a filter list based on EasyList to block many ads before they load."

I guess still all DNS it seems? For which NextDNS is much more useful.

jamesforestwest•about 3 hours ago

Well, not bad. But it's not uBlock, and Safari's blocker is already working fine for me. Brave's also been doing this for years. But at least it's something.

ImJamal•about 4 hours ago

> Firefox does not block:

> Ads shown on search engine results pages, including Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo and other search providers

> Sponsored content on the Firefox Home or New Tab page

So block ads unless it impacts their revenue sources.

pmkary•about 3 hours ago

Ads are bad! Blocking ads on our own homepage? How do you expect us to keep the lights on?

WarmWash•about 2 hours ago

The correct way to avoid ads is to not visit pages that use them.

JacobKfromIRC•11 minutes ago

Is this actually feasible? How do you tell when a page uses ads? How do you find pages without ads when you search for something?

lakkal•about 2 hours ago

> Sponsored content on the Firefox Home or New Tab page

Not ideal, but (at least on desktop) you can set the Home page to a blank page, and there is an extension called 'Blank New Tab' that I've been using for quite a while.

NicuCalcea•about 2 hours ago

> You can manage the sponsored content on the Firefox Home and New Tab page in your Homepage settings.

rvz•about 3 hours ago

Mozilla knows not to bite Google’s hand, who is the one that actually feeds them hundreds of millions of dollars.

charcircuit•about 3 hours ago

Mozilla is the one who is funneling billions of dollars worth of traffic to Google.

EbNar•about 2 hours ago

So, is Mozilla promoting a search engine monoculture? Yeah, "Google bad, but..."

rvz•about 2 hours ago

Google's only reason for keeping Mozilla on life support is to avoid the argument of being a total and complete browser monopoly.

Firefox's global traffic market share is less than double digits [0] and is less than 5%. Google technically doesn't need traffic from Firefox and Google is roughly paying half a billion ($585M) a year for it. [1]

[0] https://gs.statcounter.com/browser-market-share

[1] https://stateof.mozilla.org/pdf/Mozilla%20Fdn%202024%20-%20A...

add-sub-mul-div•about 4 hours ago

It doesn't have those limitations on Windows or Android, so it must be an Apple requirement or limitation.

smallerize•about 3 hours ago

Easylist does not block those things on any platforms.

I'm not aware of any adblockers that can block the ads on the built-in New Tab page. (You can just disable them in settings anyway.)

eviks•about 3 hours ago

"better than nothing"

righthand•about 1 hour ago

Unrelated but:

Firefox on iOS has a terrible problem with its autocomplete (I think they replaced the algo with a janky Llm-style autocomplete). When I type “news” into the url bar, it will suggest one of it’s marketing partners (or whatever) but incorrectly such as: newsyorker.com

I dont ever visit The New Yorker but even after clearing caches and site data the problem still persists. I can delete the app and the problem goes away for a short while.

I left a review on the App Store about this and the person (bot?) they hire to respond to reviews asks me to open a ticket. No! How about you port my review over as a ticket and fix your damn software.

shevy-java•about 1 hour ago

That may give firefox a bit of percentage back, since some folks can not stand ads anymore. Google garnered a lot of opposition to its evil rule by destroying ublock origin (on chrome).

owebmaster•about 1 hour ago

What I need is a better PWA installer

ramijames•about 2 hours ago

If you haven't been using Firefox, what are you even doing with your life?

nashashmi•42 minutes ago

A chrome version of Firefox is Brave.

A chrome version of Opera is Vivaldi.

A chrome version of MSIE is MS Edge.

After FF kept breaking extensions with their switch to XUL, I stopped using them.

ramijames•5 minutes ago

Except now you can just install standard extensions in Firefox.

I don't want a chrome version of something. I want an independent browser that isn't effectively some version of adware.

I'll never understand why people don't get on board with migrating away from adware.

Cider9986•about 2 hours ago

Using Brave on desktop and Vanadium on my phone. They are more secure and private which is why I like them.

hh2222•about 1 hour ago

Cross platform bookmark support is my favourite feature.

ramijames•4 minutes ago

I also use Firefox on my mobile device. I have to admit: I'm not a huge fan of the interface. Super clunky.

EbNar•about 2 hours ago

I've been using it for 20 years and switched 4 yearso ago to something else. My life is fine, thanks.

EDIT: so, the downvotes are because what, exactly?