What’s the best ad blocker for you? - Firefox Add-ons Blog
What’s the best ad blocker for you? - Firefox Add-ons Blog
So you’ve decided to do something about all those annoying ads you’re barraged with online. What pushed you over the edge? Auto-play video ads? Blaring banners? Tired of your music interrupted by a sudden sponsorship? Was it the realization they intentionally make the ‘Close’ buttons [x] on ads supe...
uBlock Origin
183In short: all are Crap, use UBlockOrigin
(ABP is worse, Adguard "intelligently shows ads", Ghostery is spyware)
68... I had an IT tech from our old MSP tell me her knowledge/recommendation of ABP is what got her the job.
I knew her boss, and doubt that was the reason (probably more because she was cheap entry level labor), but that some people have that take in a professional setting shocked me. I don't think your ad-blocker recommendation will ever be what lands you a job, but I do think it's possible for it to be the reason you don't get a job.
7Didnt get the last part
2
Gotta source about ghostery?!
4- https://www.dr-datenschutz.de/tracking-blocker-ghostery-in-der-kritik/
- https://www.heise.de/news/Kritik-an-Werbeblocker-Ghostery-1890879.html
- https://lifehacker.com/ad-blocking-extension-ghostery-actually-sells-data-to-a-514417864
I dont find the actual article but in the past they sent every site you visit to their servers. Which is simply stupid.
Same goes for FlagFox, Internet Archive addon, TOS;DR and other addons.
11
Got a source about Adguard? I use it on my phone, and I don't get any ads.
0Literally the linked website
3
I only use ublock origin
65Agree, it's literally all I need for my browser in terms of add-ons. NoScript is nice to have but not essential.
2I would add KeePassSC add-on as well..
2
extension design and strong content filters make AdBlock for Firefox a solid choice for people who don’t necessarily despise all ads
Do these people exist and if so, have they been checked for brainworms?
The rest is also stupid, ublock origin can and does block trackers, and can be made to block more stuff if you want. It's strictly better in every way than the competition, which lets through more stuff, and/or sells your info. The article would be very short though if they just said that.
42Either the article's author has an editor who made the change, or the author knows what side his bread's buttered on.
3I'm not opposed to allowing ads, but until there are enforceable limits it's too risky. If a service that serves a malware ad or a scam ad risks its entire system being blocked across all sites, then maybe we could get somewhere.
We'd need something like ad server whitelists and fast-acting disqualifications. No ad server anonymity or rapid name changes, no adding backdoors for your friends. If your break the guidelines, you loose the ability to do business anywhere for at least a day.
1
You should only use Unlock Origin in my opinion... But I'm open to other propositions
33I also would vote for uBlock Origins. This is by far the best solution on the market. It blocks more than just ads and trackers. uBlock blocks also malware sites, popups, miners and other annoyances. Or you can also use it as an URL shortener tool to get rid of the tracking parameters in the URLs.
Something I've also been looking at more closely for a few days now is Arkenfox to hardening my Firefox more effective. Does anyone here has some experiences with Arkenfox?
27ublock Origin + pihole.
For my pihole I use these lists: https://github.com/sefinek24/Sefinek-Blocklist-Collection
24I like Adguardhome better.
Adaway on rooted Android is pretty amazing and blocks a lot of ads in apps.
SmartTubeNext for ad free YouTube on TV. And S0undTV for ad free twitch on TV.
Revanced Manager for ad free YouTube and more on Android phones.
5
I see all the Ublock Origin love, I also want to bring up Privacy badger (while not an adblocker I use it and would love for people to confirm it's relevancy to me).
Should be part of the basic user extension kit afaik
15IIRC if you're running uBlock Origin there's no need for Privacy Badger.
6What does it do
1
As well as origin the EFF has some great browser plugins and tools that have held up for over a decade https://www.eff.org/pages/tools
14uBlock Origin + NoScript + Toggle referrer (+ SponsorBlock for YT).
NoScript can be a pain to manage occasionally but even on pemit-all-by-default mode you can block some of the more ubiquitous insidious trackers like Google and Facebook without impacting your functionality at all.
11uBlock Origin + default Firefox tracker blocker on 'Strict'
8Ublock origin + web annoyance ultralist
8uMatrix + uBlock Origin
Edit: For YouTube there is also SponsorBlock, but I don't use YouTube directly anymore. It's part of FreeTube, so you could add SponsorBlock to the list too if you want. More Edit: yt-dlp also supports SponsorBlock for downloaded videos.
7Umatrix was awesome but is unfortunately not maintained anymore since July 21, 2021. Ublock origin is a perfect replacement though and can be deeply configured behind its simpler appearance. Coupled with the LibRedirect add-on in the Librewolf browser and I can navigate ad and tracking free.
13Dang, I was not aware uMatrix was not maintained anymore. But it does still its job and has its own usefulness. I like the interface and how everything is layed out easily, where I can allow or deny specific domains or categories back and forth. It shows in a table which domain requests what category (and how many). So this is to me invaluable and a good companion alongside uBlock Origin. I can also just allow only images for a certain domain in example, not just its entirety. Its easy to see and work from this table to me. Like in this screenshot:
7umatrix was forked. The fork is called nuTensor. I only use nuTensor.
Disclosure: Not associated with nuTensor, just a gullible user
Last commit: 2023-07-25
3
Linux: firefox/waterfox + uBlock + UnboundVPN on OpnSense Router (via wireguard if not at home) + YouTube premium (1$ a month payed via india)
iOS: safari + 1Blocker(lifetime) + UnboundVPN on OpnSense Router (via wireguard if not at home) + YT premium (1$/month)
4On Safari for iOS and macOS, I prefer Wipr instead of 1Blocker.
It’s lighter, easier to use, cheaper, scores more on d3ward’s ad-block test (but that may fluctuate).
E: added specific browser.
2
My typical recommendation would be:
Normie: uBlock Origin
Techie: uBlock Origin + uMatrix
Security Critical/Paranoia/Just Hate Yourself: uBlock Origin + uMatrix + NoScript
I use the last option at work, and the middle option at home, and the first option for my wife's computer.
For me, a lot of it isn't about ads, it's more about the security risk of cross site scripting. Typically, if I'm visiting a site, I probably trust it, but I have no trust for people they sell ads to. I don't mind sites I trust having a few non-intrusive ads, but of course that's not the reason I use blockers; if a site has so many ads it is unusable, I just don't ever visit it again (plenty of 'don't show articles from ' flags in my google news feed for this very reason. I'll never know if you redeem yourself, because I will just never visit your site again.).
2If XSS is your concern, check out Firefox's Container Tabs. They allow you to set up tab groups that restrict access to cookies to only tabs in that group, so you can just, eg, set up a group for your bank and restrict it to just your bank's site. Your session cookie etc are then not available to any other tab groups.
I pair that with the Temporary Containers extension, so any random tab I open is in its own container. Everything is always separate.
2i still miss the original noscript from the xul days :(
1
pfBlockerNG at the network edge and ublockorigin on devices.
2DNS blocking with DNS over TLS (DoT) with OpenBSD unwind + disabling javascript
- userscripts where javascript is required and the site is cancer (youtube, twitch, other corpomedia)
- disable/compile without DNS over HTTPS (DoH)
- I'm not sending my DNS requests to cloudflare, and I want my DNS to be system-wide
always disable DNS prefetch
works in any browser (system-wide actually), not just in Firefox/Chromium
2A contrarian take, but nextdns. It may not block youtube ads, but eeeh it works really well for most cases.
1I've been using AdBlock Plus for at least ten years. Never had an issue
-23Nah, they tried to sell their own "non-intrusive" ads after blocking the sites' ads.
37
I don't really trust these adblockers... Has anyone tried using Greasemonkey or any of the equivalent script environments for adblocking? I know it's posdible, but I could not find any good scripts available? Has anyone found any good scripts on github (or other places) for this?
-25Why would you trust Greasemonkey and some random script over uBlockOrigin?
Also it might be possible to do it partly but performance would inevitably be worse and I'm not sure every functionality would be implementable.
20Content blockers like uBlock use filter lists which list every single element that needs to be blocked across the entire web. I currently have nearly 700000 of these filters active. That is very far outside the scope of a simple script. Basically all ad blocking userscripts are site-specific and they still usually block significantly less than uBlock would on the same site. Also, userscripts are not safer than extensions.
6Why do you trust Greasemonkey and some random script? That's far less safe than just installing uBlock Origin.
2
