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Comment by howzitallworkeh | Hacker News Reader

Unfortunately, you will find iOS bad in different ways.

For example: you cannot install NoScript, or anything like it, on an iOS browser. You must choose between "all JS on" or "all JS off", and third-party browsers like Firefox are crippled because Apple forces all iOS browsers to use their WebKit engine under the hood.

The myriad of Safari "content blocker" apps are also pretty dismal, and often expensive. So ad-blocking is difficult as well.

They're better about app tracking, but you might want to keep an Android phone handy if you enjoy browsing the web.

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This is what is keeping me from switching. Apple, if anyone is listening: allow a full Firefox browser on the iphone and I will switch in a heart beat

Yup, Youtube Vanced (which not only blocks ads but sponsor segments too, while iOS can barely even block the ads in a browser) and proper Firefox are the main reasons I can't consider iOS.

Yo may want to look into Newpipe

very different thing from vanced

> The myriad of Safari "content blocker" apps are also pretty dismal, and often expensive. So ad-blocking is difficult as well.

Not really. Firefox Focus is free and does a great job. Nomorobo is a call filtering service and it's $20/year, and it also does a great job of blocking ads & other objects.

ka-block does a good job and it's free.

Fun fact, Firefox Focus’ ad blocking works for all browsers. I have it installed just to block ads in Safari!

> or anything like it

You can turn JS off, which is quite similar to allowing no scripts, but more pragmatically, 1Blocker is remarkable, give it a look as one part of a phone-wide strategy. [Note: from sibling comments, you hate 1Blocker. Even so.]

Consider the iOS management profile from NextDNS along with a good set of their filter options (minimally NextDNS + AdGuard), enabling 1Blocker and learning how to tailor it, and turning on Apple’s native anti-tracking — then with all three in place enjoy browsing the web with relatively less footprint.

Firefox "Focus" browser does the trick for ad-blocking and erasing history on iOS. No tab support though.

If you install Firefox Focus, you can use its as blocking in all browsers. I use it in regular Safari. I can’t remember if this happens by default after installing Focus, but if you go to Settings - Safari - Content Blockers, you can enable/disable the Firefox Focus blocker for regular Safari.

Ad blocking works perfectly fine, wdym?

I mean that 1Blocker is terrible compared to uBlock+NoScript, and that's the best content blocker I could find after spending days researching them. Plus, it costs $3/mo or $40 for something that barely functions.

Web browsing in iOS is incredibly frustrating and privacy-unfriendly compared to Android. I recently bought an iPhone for the app tracking protection, but the difference between Safari and Firefox is like night and day.

Have you had a look at AdGuard Pro? I use it on iOS and I don’t notice any ads on the web, and it’s not really different from using UBlock Origin on Firefox in my experience.

Not sure how it compares to others, but a free option is to install Firefox Focus and enable its content blocking in regular Safari. I’m assuming since all browsers are using the same engine underneath that Firefox just installs a standard iOS content blocker and enables it for itself, but works for all browsers on iOS.

Got any recommendations for blocking youtube ads in safari?

https://adguard.com/en/blog/how-to-add-a-shortcut-to-block-y...

YouTube premium subscription. Seriously - don't want ads on your services ? Pay for it.

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