Ad blocking for iPad Safari?

November 17, 2021 6:47 AM

Are there any ad blockers out there that are compatible with iPad Safari, totally plug and play, and ideally free or nominally priced?

I am not a particularly technologically savvy person. However, through reading comments from you lovely knowledgeable people, years ago I installed ad blockers (uBlock and Ghostery) for my MacBook Air Chrome, and between them, they have created such a wonderful web browsing experience that I have been encouraging my husband to do the same (or allow me to do it for him) for his iPad Safari. He has agreed. I naively thought I could just install the same blockers on his device, but it turns out I am totally wrong.

In doing my own research into ad blockers for iPad Safari, I am not confident that I can pick a simple blocker that is free and doesn't require a ton of (or, ideally, any) user configuration -- my husband is even less tech savvy than I am, and some of the reviews of various blockers suggest that I could inadvertently make things worse for his browsing experience rather than better!

What are the ad blockers for iPad Safari y'all are using these days?

posted by tentacle to Technology (10 answers total)

I’m pretty happy with AdMop on my iPhone.
posted by ShooBoo at 7:03 AM on November 17, 2021

Wipr is a good choice for a not particularly tech-savvy person, though like with a lot of these one-person-shop kind of apps, there's always a risk that the developer will stop updating it. AdGuard is a little more complicated, but also a little more feature-rich.
posted by box at 7:05 AM on November 17, 2021

Firefox Focus. It's a web browser on its own, but you never have to use it. You just set Safari's content blocking to "Firefox Focus", and continue using Safari.
posted by 2uo at 7:28 AM on November 17, 2021 [3 favorites]

2nding Firefox Focus. Works really well on both iPad and iPhone.
posted by General Malaise at 7:48 AM on November 17, 2021 [1 favorite]

Better Blocker is an option from a small privacy-oriented org with good principles.
posted by antinomia at 7:53 AM on November 17, 2021

Thanks everyone for the Firefox focus tip - that was a new one to me. I came here to mention Next DNS. It doesn't get rid of every ad, but it has made browsing the web on my iPad a lot better.
posted by phil at 8:26 AM on November 17, 2021

I like Wipr on the desktop but already had Crystal on my iPad and it's still mostly working for me. Every now and then it misses the content mill "around the web" garbage but it gets almost every basic ad unit otherwise.
posted by fedward at 9:17 AM on November 17, 2021

Try Hush. It’s free and works well.
posted by vitout at 2:33 PM on November 17, 2021

I use Better Blocker too.
posted by fabius at 5:46 AM on November 18, 2021

This question reminded me that I actually have an iOS ad blocker installed. It's Hush, and I still see ads all the time, so consider that an anti-recommendation. Just installed Better Blocker and it's looking great so far.
posted by duien at 4:54 PM on November 18, 2021