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Comment by tedivm | Hacker News Reader

I switched from IOS to Android a month ago, and one of my favorite things about it is that I can use the Brave web browser (with built in ad block, tracker block, and HTTPS Everywhere) and it's been amazing. My browser experience on mobile is complete different- no more videos or audio ads taking over and stopping my music, significantly less data being used, and of course it means I don't see ridiculous ads. On top of that because Android actually lets you pick what apps you launch things with it works with all my other apps as well, without the need for some "vpn hack".

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What you are describing is much easier on iOS. The default web browser natively supports extensions, including ad blockers. The AdGuard vpn hack had the benefit of blocking ads in all apps at the cost of being so invasive.

Firefox has extensions available by default on Android. I use Ublock Origin & HTTPS everywhere. I wouldn't call it the "default browser", but it's...Firefox. I wouldn't exactly call it hard either since you just browse to the normal Firefox extension page and click the install button.

Google does do everything in its power to prevent me from using Firefox though.

> The default web browser natively supports extensions, including ad blockers

No, it only supports ad blockers, dubbed 'content blockers'.

I suppose the difference is that Android still tries to be a PC-on-a-Phone where iOS never intended to be that way. It's sort-of a Hardware+Software vs. Appliance nuance, while one is the other, the latter is not designed to become the former.

I think that hits the nail on the head. Android is the natural extension of Palm and Windows Mobile into the 21st century, a modern take on the classical smartphones. iOS is actually working backwards, starting from a "no you can't" and slowly working into a "okay I guess if you want to" as they add file management and styluses and official external keyboards.

It's probably also why people that do not (want to) make that distinction are rather polarized about their device of choice.

Considering phones now have pretty capable CPUs and 6Gb RAM turning a phone into a mini laptop is becoming quite viable.

I don't think that the concept of a phone-trying-to-be-a-PC is limited by what CPU or RAM it has. You can run complete Linux and Windows CE desktops on devices with way less resources. Doesn't mean that it's the UX the world needs ;-) On the other hand, as long as you know what you want, and know what is available, then none of it really needs to be in competition.

Not from a UX point of view. Many non technical people enjoy iOS exactly because you can't too much with it. It reduces complexity.

If you think that's cool, check out the AdGuard app for Android. It handles not just browser traffic, but traffic from every app. Not the one from the Play Store, but the one from their website -- the Play version is crippled. It'll block all those undesirable connections for the entire device, and it's GUI makes it super easy.

It is not free, however, but I believe they offer a trial still.

On my last Android device, after months of usage, I was blocking on average about 40% of all traffic on my phone -- most of that to trackers and ad networks. On Android it seems like most every app is sucking away at your device, almost none of the tracking and ad network activity is voluntary or opt-in.

I miss AdAway. I really need to root my Pixel, but the new filesystem setup they're using scares me away from rooting.

You should try DNS66 [0], which does not require root. It acts as a VPN on Android and returns 0.0.0.0 when any app tries to resolve the IP address of an ad-serving domain. Other network traffic passes through unmodified, so it's very battery friendly.

The app is also available from Fdroid [1]. It isn't available from the Play Store, since Google has banned ad blockers.

[0] https://github.com/julian-klode/dns66

[1] https://f-droid.org/en/packages/org.jak_linux.dns66/

Did you attempt to use any iOS content blocking apps? I use 1Blocker and my mobile browsing experience is similarly free of videos, audio ads, and rediculous ads. Further, because I'm also using 1Blocker on macOS, my custom blocking and whitelists is synchronized. Anyway, I don't want to get into an Android/iOS debate—they each have their pros/cons—I just want to point out that iOS provides a very workable ad/content blocking solution in my experience.

The problem is, you're beholden to Apple to allow these things to exists. I have no fear of Firefox/uBlock Origin, or any other Browser/Blocker combo suddenly no longer being on option on Google's whim, or VPNs no longer working. That, and there's ample competition amongst those solutions to keep quality and innovation going. There's 1 Web View and 1 extension API everything on iOS has to conform to, leaving very little room for innovation.

Content blockers are Apple-approved API.

iOS has supported content blocking for at least two years with the added ability to block ads in apps that use the SafariViewController (like Feedly).

Also, you don’t have to worry about a third party ad blocker having access to your browsing history.

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