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Comment by Tomte | Hacker News Reader

I thought with the new iOS and its support for alternative default web browsers I'd switch over in a heartbeat.

I didn't. There's one thing I absolutely demand and which I hadn't thought they would leave out: support for ad blocking.

I'm using Firefox Focus as my ad blocker in Safari. Why can't I use it (another Mozilla product!) in Firefox?

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You can in Android. If its not available in iOS its because Apple forces them to use Safari's Webkit and it does not have the API for it.

You can use the Firefox Focus browser in iOS, which has ad blocking built in, but can't use it as an adblocker for the main Firefox browser.

I suspect that's due to the app sandboxing - there's no way for Focus (as a standalone app) to intercept and modify requests for Firefox (another standalone app).

Mozilla could ship a copy of regular Firefox with the Focus features built in, but seem to want people to just use the Firefox Focus Browser instead (though that lacks the full feature set of Firefox).

I think Chrome can use Focus for ad-blocking. Am I wrong?

I thought the content blocking API was open to other browsers.

Firefox for iOS has a suite of tracking protection features built in, including a strict ad blocking service.

I've not gone to compare them both -- are you sure that what's in Firefox Focus for iOS isn't also in Firefox?

I'm using Firefox Focus as my default browser. It's really nice, because when I use global search or just click on a link, in 99% I want to quickly check sth and then forget about it. Firefox Focus suits that use case almost perfectly. Sadly it's a bit buggy.

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