this post was submitted on 14 Sep 2023
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Privacy
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To all you uBlock Origin fans: Any reason why nobody ever recommend AdGuard over uBlock Origin? Anything questionable about it? Or is it just that uBlock is well-known?
AdGuard being ran by a for-profit company and some of the functionality being locked behind a paywall probably doesn't help its case compared to uBlock Origin, though AdGuard is definitely the next best option currently. I also just find uBlock Origin supports more advanced features.
(Edit: Apparantly the paywall only applies to the Safari extension and their desktop app, but not the extension on most platforms, see the reply below, my other points still stand)
Googling it and according to one answer the only difference between uBlock Origin and AdGuard browser extensions is that uBlock has a feature where they can hide stuff instead of completely blocking it. Two comments said AdGuard was the more techy one, and most users would prefer uBlock Origin because of that. A bunch of comments are people who obviously havent tried them both. Some are confusion about the difference between AdGuard desktop program and AdGuard browser extensions.
Maybe better if I just test it for myself.
The entire desktop app, yes. That does DNS blocking. Not the browser extensions, no blocked features there.
Does AdGuard have anything equivalent to uBlock Origin's advanced blocking modes? That's mainly what I meant by "advanced features".
I know their Safari extension has some blocked functionality without paying, but fair enough, it may be different for other platforms, I'll edit my reply then. Thanks for the correction. I stand by the other point though, I think uBlock Origin has an inherent advantage and added trust by being non-profit and fully community driven vs. AdGuard being ran by a for-profit company.
Isn't AdGuard just DNS? That means it blocks ads from everywhere, not just the browser. But you can't customise the blocklist unless you selfhost it.
If there's a web extension too, then idk. If you use say, Firefox for Android, then you don't have much choice besides uBlock, and with... Hm, other mobile browsers you don't have any at all.
Or AdGuard. I run the AdGuard browser extension on my Firefox for Android. It claims to also have one for iOS Safari. It has a paid desktop app, and that one add DNS blocks. I tried it once and paid for a license, but then I switched back to the free browser extensions for a reason I dont remember anymore.
I remember now. It caused havok with a lot of UWP apps. So I went to browser-extensions only.
It isn't "just" DNS level blocking, no. They have an adblocker for browsers, too. uBlock is using their filters.
Some have built-in adblockers (ex: Brave, DDG), others support extensions (ex: Safari, Orion).
uBlock Origin is FOSS.
Edit: AdGuard is FOSS too, for some reason I never even consider the possibility of AdGuard been FOSS