6 ms·

Microsoft Edge is about to lock out older ad blockers, just like Chrome did

193 points by eternalreturn 2mo ago

unlimit 2mo ago
I never stopped using Firefox.
- Krssst 2mo ago
  It always feels weird to see so much more complaining about Firefox than Chrome and Edge, while it's still so very much far ahead in terms of respecting user choices. All AI features can easily be turned off (and I am assuming those respect user privacy better than the ones of Chrome/Edge). When you say no to Firefox, it remembers it. Chrome keeps asking me every few days / weeks to become the default browser. If we lose Firefox the web is going to be a worse place to be in.
  - VCFundedGenYer 2mo ago
    I feel a lot of the "complaints" about Firefox are misinformed opinions from a decade ago or more. I hear falsehoods such as "it's slower" or "it takes up more RAM" which are both patently false in modern times. That was all fixed up years ago.
    - sodapopcan 2mo ago
      It had a pretty annoying bug on Mac (which I ass-u-me was a memory leak) up until a couple of years ago. Every time you'd try and tab back to it, there would be a delay that would very, very slowly get longer over time until you closed and opened it again. I switched over to Arc at the time but after The Browser Company so epicly dropped the ball, I switched back to FF and it's been really great ever since.
    - roryirvine 2mo ago
      Sadly, I suspect there are also a lot of culture war aspects driving some of the most vocal Firefox hatred. (There's a steelmanned form of their argument - that Mozilla ought to be held to a higher standard than their commercial competitors - which you might think would speak in favour of LibreWolf and the like. But those who complain most forcefully about Firefox often turn out to be Chrome / Opera / Brave users)
raverbashing 2mo ago
I guess it still will be the best browser to download Firefox
- biglyburrito 2mo ago
  It always was.
- jmclnx 2mo ago
  Lets hope it stays that way :) But if offered enough $, I fear it will join that no-bocker bandwagon.
- anticrymactic 2mo ago
  > I guess it still will be the best browser to download Firefox ```cmd winget install Mozilla.Firefox ``` Should always work out-of-the-box now.
  - Marsymars 2mo ago
    Good as long as you don't want the EME-free version.
    - anticrymactic 2mo ago
      In that case you can use the simple Mozilla API (all code in pwsh) irm https://product-details.mozilla.org/1.0/firefox_versions.json Will output a table of latests Firefox versions. (LATEST_FIREFOX_VERSION is the one we care about. Save it in $v), then simply: iwr "https://download-origin.cdn.mozilla.net/pub/firefox/releases/$v/win64-EME-free/en-US/Firefox%20Setup%20$v.exe" -OutFile Firefox.exe start Firefox.exe So simple. So elegant. So thankful that Mozilla uses their millions of funding for maintenance of a subset of their packages on winget.
poulpy123 2mo ago
I honestly don't know how people do without ad blockers. Even with being ok with ads, they are so overwhelming that I could not use internet without blocking them
- cake-rusk 2mo ago
  Most laypeople I know haven't seen an ad blocker in action ever.
- Balinares 2mo ago
  In case your assumption here is that TFA is about Edge disabling adblockers: it's not. It's just removing ManifestV2 support. ManifestV3 is still supported. Despite what one might assume, MV3 does not seem to measurably diminish the effectiveness of adblockers; if anything, it improves it. (Source: https://petsymposium.org/popets/2026/popets-2026-0027.php https://petsymposium.org/popets/2026/popets-2026-0027.php)
  - LelouBil 2mo ago
    Isn't the main issue that for MV3 you can't have a dynamic blocklist ? And so you have to update it with an extension update ?
    - phire 2mo ago
      There is a dynamic API too that allows extensions to modify the blocklist at runtime. I’ve been using UBlock Origin Lite on my iPhone for a while, and that works great, keeping itself updated from EasyList and allowing for custom rules. In some ways it’s better, in some ways it’s worse. Sometimes you have to flip it into “complete mode” (and give it full access to modify the current site) to get good blocking.
      - gruez 2mo ago
        >In some ways it’s better, in some ways it’s worse. Sometimes you have to flip it into “complete mode” (and give it full access to modify the current site) to get good blocking. I don't how this is supposed to be a demerit given that the v2 version had full access to every site you visit. Safari just made that more explicit.
feverzsj 2mo ago
Basically every chromium based browser.
- olivermuty 2mo ago
  Brave as well?
  - feverzsj 2mo ago
    Brave's adblock isn't as powerful as ublock.
    - zamadatix 2mo ago
      It doesn't have to be so long as it still supports the above.
    - antonymoose 2mo ago
      In what sense? As a normie-tier user of Brave’s internal and blocker, it’s worked great. I never became a power-user of uBlock.
      - wild_pointer 2mo ago
        +1, works well enough
      - orwin 2mo ago
        Not saying this is it, but I never managed to block YouTube shorts with brave adblocker (in mobile), where I can do it with ublock. If you can do it, please explain, I promise I will try asap (I really dislike ff mobile UI).
        briHass 2mo ago
        On mobile (similar on Desktop), just go to Setting -> Shields and Privacy -> Content Filters. In there are a bunch of Youtube related blockers (including Shorts), that I find work really well. Mobile Brave also lets you lock/screen off your phone while a YT video continues playing, which is a killer feature for listening to podcasts. I found myself becoming addicted to YT Shorts, and Brave's filters totally solved my problem.
anaisbetts 2mo ago
Welp, the biggest reason that I use Edge just got thrown out, time to switch to Firefox.
- gruez 2mo ago
  The telemetry and ads (on start page) didn't bother you? I'm surprised there's seemingly a contingent of people who are too lazy to install any other chrome fork (eg. Brave), but are motivated enough to up sticks and switch to firefox the moment ublock is removed.
  - HPsquared 2mo ago
    Ad blocking is a big deal.
  - smallerize 2mo ago
    At least that's something I can just rant about a couple of times a year, and enjoy tracker blocking the rest of the time.
- Dwedit 2mo ago
  Until 2023, Edge was sending every URL you visited to bingapis.com. Microsoft's current privacy statement also says "Depending on your settings, this browsing history is sent to Microsoft"
  - 1718627440 2mo ago
    That seems to be true to every major application release by MS. No, the OS is of course secure, pinky promise!
  - tonyhart7 2mo ago
    what browser that respect your privacy ??
    - DeathMetal3000 2mo ago
deleted 2mo ago
[deleted]
TiredOfLife 2mo ago
It's ending manifest V2, not just adblockers. uBlock Origin lite is V3 and is still supported
- s0ss 2mo ago
  Inferior alternative
  - gruez 2mo ago
    Serious question: which sites have you encountered where ublock lite doesn't do the job? Even tricky sites (eg. youtube) are defeated with scriptlets, not by intercepting network responses.
    - s0ss 2mo ago
      I don’t have any data on that because chromium derivatives aren’t installed, haha. It’s not a matter of “does it work”. It’s philosophical.
  - novafunc 2mo ago
    I've used uBlock Origin Lite and have had no issues with blocking ads. The only downside I've seen is that I can't do "Block Elements" to hide non-ad annoying parts of sites.
    - gorhill 2mo ago
      > can't do "Block Elements" In uBO Lite, it's called "Create a custom filter" in the popup panel.
NeutralWanted 2mo ago
Running Unbound on my gateway with a curated adblock list. Easy setup, network-wide ad blocking on every device / browser.
- cmeacham98 2mo ago
  Some ads (e.g. I know YT ads used to be this way, haven't looked recently) can't be blocked at the network level because they are served from the same domain/servers as the content.
  - NeutralWanted 2mo ago
    Sure, but have YT Premium for the family. Don't know how anyone can use YT without it. And it blocks 90% of ads, the rest are tolerable / go mostly unnoticed.
    - layer8 2mo ago
      You’re just saying that 90% of your internet usage is YouTube?
    - microtonal 2mo ago
      I use a browser with a built-in blocker (Brave Origin) and I don't see ads in YouTube.
      - Izkata 2mo ago
        Same with ublock origin on firefox, been years since I've seen any ads. There was a period where they tried to break through the blocking and occasionally I'd see one, but it kinda seems like they gave up.
    - Cider9986 2mo ago
      >Don't know how anyone can use YT without it. With an adblocker.. Why would you need yt premium with an adblocker?
s0ss 2mo ago
Advertising companies shouldn’t be in the browser business. It’s a really bad conflict of interest. Chromium is a mistake. Firefox is pretty great. But IMO they have some poor ux defaults that make it unappealing to random people who simply want a browser.
- causality0 2mo ago
  Right. For example, Firefox Mobile doesn't support hitting ctrl+T to open a new tab, completely breaking flow for anyone on a tablet with a keyboard or their phone docked to a monitor.
  - porksoda 2mo ago
    One can simply fire up a claude and tell it what you'd like to change. A few minutes to sign the extension and Firefox does exactly what you'd like it to. I relayy just do not understand why HN comments pretend this option doesn't exist, or that this is so hard. I have extensions linking it with my i3 setup, setting custom CSS on wm actions, custom shortcuts, what have you. It takes maybe an hour of work to do it nicely.
- terminalbraid 2mo ago
  Chromium being open source is not a mistake. Letting google be the sole driver and not forking it has been. People who want control over their browsers have options. It's a fight because most people don't care about these things.
- clipsy 2mo ago
  There is no “browser business,” because people are - with rare exceptions - unwilling to pay for a web browser. Even Firefox is ad-supported indirectly via its default search contract with google.
  - layer8 2mo ago
    There is a browser business when the browser company is also in the ad business.
mococa 2mo ago
Droped Chromium browsers and been using Safari with Wipr2, so far the best experience
est 2mo ago
Why do browser vendors have such a control over browsers? Can anyone make a dll injection and bring back manifest v2 ?
- terminalbraid 2mo ago
  They have control over what they distribute. Chromium and Firefox are both open source and people can (and should) use derivatives they find acceptable.
- 1718627440 2mo ago
  People can create the world, but they do need a lot of time. A lot of money buys you time, so nobody 'poor' can keep up. That wouldn't be a problem for web UAs, if the standards wouldn't be 'improved' at the same path as well. It's kinda like proof of work, but for standard bodies and ownership of a system.
- Arnt 2mo ago
  Sure, just change the source and build from source. The reason is that V2 opened the door to some fairly nasty attacks. "This extension can read everything you enter on any form". There were some extensions that did exactly what you're thinking of. I suspect that nobody will make a browser that lets a plugin do that any more. It's easy, but on closer reflection, would you do it?
MarkWayneNewton 2mo ago
If this thread is indicative of the sort of browser discourse in <current year> it's no wonder Google won. Nerds used to know how to computer, is what i'm saying.
- draw_down 2mo ago
  [dead]
- joquarky 2mo ago
  This industry doesn't really hire nerds anymore. HR prefers brogrammers who can fast talk.
zb3 2mo ago
I use MV3 AdGuard and it blocks ads for me. I don't get the fuss about MV2 deprecation.. sure, MV3 is limited compared to firefox, but it's not like MV2 was that much better, no version ever supported rewriting request response. MV3 DNR redirect is notably lame though, instead of replacing the response it generates a real redirect which breaks for example replacing the service worker response. But could MV2 webRequestBlocking replace the response? Well of course not.
- sunaookami 2mo ago
  Rules are limited (in syntax and number) and you can only ship updated rules with updated extensions (at least you can skip the queue if you only update rulesets but it's VERY annoying to do). It's also missing a bunch of features: https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uBOL-home/wiki/Frequently-asked-questions-(FAQ)#filtering-capabilities-which-cant-be-ported-to-mv3 https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uBOL-home/wiki/Frequently-as... (I see here that replacing response body is possible with Firefox only, is that your use-case?). MV2 was miles better.
  - zb3 2mo ago
    Besides AdGuard I also have my own extension that loads userscripts from my own server (that uses the new userScripts API), so I think I only see my own point of view and the things that would potentially limit my solutions. So far I'm able to block everything I want, but I mentioned replacing the response body because this is the only way I could modify or even inspect the service worker.. I think this vector could help circumventing ad blockers, but again - it would only matter if there were ads I'd not be able to block. When it comes to distribution, firefox sucks because I can't even run my own extensions there, my distro doesn't package firefox developer edition so signatures are required. In contrast, Chrome let's me load unpacked extensions without any problems.
- boredhedgehog 2mo ago
  > I don't get the fuss about MV2 deprecation Just observe this thread. It's a tribal moment, an occasion for a consumer to reassure himself that he has the right philosophy, uses the right product and rightly hates these other things that deserve to be hated. The fellow believers can upvote each other and downvote any empirical observation which threatens the faith.
DarkmSparks 2mo ago
Vivaldi for the win.
- g8oz 2mo ago
  I love Vivaldi, but it also uses Chromium. If an extension is not in the Chrome Web store Vivaldi will not be able to install it. Firefox seems to be the only reasonably mainstream option for proper ad blocking.
  - KetoManx64 2mo ago
    Vivaldi has ad blocking built into it, and has no issue with you enabling developer settings and sideloading extensions from a file you download from Github Releases.
    - tredre3 2mo ago
      Vivaldi is still dropping support for MV2, which means no more uBlock Origin (non-lite). Being able to side-load extensions doesn't matter if the API is gone.
- computronus 2mo ago
  Vivaldi is about to drop support for Manifest V2 as well: https://www.reddit.com/r/vivaldibrowser/comments/1urieed/comment/owi02gg/ https://www.reddit.com/r/vivaldibrowser/comments/1urieed/com... I'd been using it solely for GMail / Google Drive / etc. at work, for whatever improved compatibility a Chromium browser might provide over Firefox, which I use for everything else. I got the warning that UBlock Origin won't work, and I immediately ditched Vivaldi. I'm sad about it, I think Vivaldi otherwise is a good browser.
cosmic_cheese 2mo ago
This is ultimately the endpoint of all Chromium-based browsers. Even the most stalwart will throw in the towel on MV2 support sooner or later, because the effort required to maintain non-trivial patches against mainline becomes too great for the team to keep up with. It's a great demonstration of how Chromium's open source nature is something of a technicality. Unless you have an army of software engineers on par with that of Google, you're eventually going to wind up living with Google's decisions whether you like it or not.
- Cider9986 2mo ago
  Brave's built in adblocker is on par to uBlock Origin for me.
  - wolvoleo 2mo ago
    Does it have the same configurability though? Custom lists and the like? I really need those. I'd use Brave if someone made a fork with all the BAT token stuff removed but I haven't seen one.
    - qwerpy 2mo ago
      Brave still maintains MV2 support (for now) so you get to use full-fat uBlock Origin. Eventually, I imagine they'll tire of it, say "well just use the built-in one", and get rid of MV2 when it gets too obnoxious to maintain. I go through a 5 minute ritual every time I reimage/build a PC of installing Brave and disabling all the garbage on it. It's worth it to get Chromium compatibility and speed with uBlock Origin.
      - wolvoleo 2mo ago
        Ah I prefer firefox anyway. It has some features I can't do without. Like the multi-account containers. And its sync that is end to end encrypted. But I might have a look at brave for the 1-2 sites I still use chromium for because they don't work with firefox properly (especially Microsoft 365 of course, as usual).
rdx-amw 2mo ago
I wonder if this is from efforts to maintain the difference between upstream and Edge - such that Edge is trying to simplify development by following Chrome/Chromium closer.
sombragris 2mo ago
The link is paywalled and the site requires me a subscription to keep reading TFA. This happens even after using the link with the Wayback Machine.
throwaway613746 2mo ago
[dead]
ktosobcy 2mo ago
<surprised pikachu> time for everyone using Chromium-based crap xD
- vdfs 2mo ago
  Chromium is a solid browser, Firefox is second atleast in every aspect, but their companies "politics" is what make the difference, it's hard to swallow pill but Chromium is popular for a reason
  - sodapopcan 2mo ago
    What is better about it? I switched back to FireFox several years ago (with a very brief stint on Arc in there) after using Chrome for years and I couldn't describe a single hit I took in QOL. I remember, at the time at least, that FF's dev tooling had more useful things, at least for me (I couldn't tell you what those were at this point... I think I remember nicer flex/grid inspecting tools). From what I can tell, Chromium is popular because so many apps don't test on anything else, but I don't use a lot of web apps so I guess I probably don't run into this as much.
  - ktosobcy 2mo ago
    > it's hard to swallow pill but Chromium is popular for a reason yes, google pushing hard "download real browser" for years on their main page didn't have anything to do with it… oh the benevolent monopolies doing what's best in user interest! /s
rambojohnson 2mo ago
who uses Edge anyway..
- wolvoleo 2mo ago
  95% of corporate users sadly due to Microsoft's lobbying
paxys 2mo ago
All the software freedom people here will do everything except use Firefox.
- zem 2mo ago
  I've been using firefox happily for years; I'm still emotionally invested in chrome having proper ad blocking, because that's good for users.
roryirvine 2mo ago
uBO 1.7.3 was released just 3 days ago, so it would be more accurate to say "better" rather than "older".
KronisLV 2mo ago
For what it's worth, I daily drive Edge on my Windows machine and it's an okay browser, haven't had a reason to install Chrome in ages (though did run Firefox for a while due to liking their dev tools better, it's still on my MacBook cause I like the UI more than Safari). Even when my Intel Arc B580 has its drivers freeze the browser, I can just kill the GPU rendering process and it picks back up with no data loss, whereas with Firefox I had to restart the whole thing. Seems related to video decode, changing ANGLE backends or whatever in the browsers didn't really help and disabling hardware acceleration makes the experience suck more than it otherwise should. If not for that, I'd still probably be on Firefox fully, despite Mozilla not exactly being the most sane of companies, though maybe trying to fund developing a browser and a whole org is a bit crazy as it is. Brave was okay but nothing special. Maybe I should look at Vivaldi again, but it's an odd position to be in, when upstream is pushing changes on you, so it probably doesn't matter what they do or don't want to support long term, same as with every other Chromium derived browser. Bummer about Chromium fucking over people who dislike ads.
- supermatou 2mo ago
  >I can just kill the GPU rendering process >and it picks back up with no data loss, >whereas with Firefox I had to restart the whole thing about:processes > kill the GPU process without having to restart Firefox.
  - KronisLV 2mo ago
    Thanks! I will try it out the next time when I jump back to Firefox! Not sure why it doesn't show up under Task Manager as clearly as Edge's does.
genxy 2mo ago
These companies that "own the web" shouldn't be allowed to also own the browsers. We went through this already.
VCFundedGenYer 2mo ago
This is why we all need to rally around Firefox (or Librewolf, or Waterfox, or whatever fork you prefer) and make sure that sacred goose is never tampered with.
- KetoManx64 2mo ago
  Ladybird is the future. Firefox is a joke at this point
  - nvme0n1p1 2mo ago
    Ladybird may be the future, but for us non-time-travelers, Firefox is currently the best option.
  - paxys 2mo ago
    Why is Firefox a joke?
    - doublerabbit 2mo ago
      Because of Mozilla.
      - paxys 2mo ago
        Doesn’t answer the question
        doublerabbit 2mo ago
        Yes it does. Just read up on Mozilla. Mozilla receives the vast majority of its funding—roughly $400 million annually from Google Mozilla has made announcements regarding transforming Firefox into an AI-heavy browser and have started alienating longtime open-source supporters Massive salaries paid to Mozilla Foundation executives. Firefox is a joke because it's no longer a users browser. Rather than it just being a browser it's now a VPN, Ai and other. I give it two years before it starts shoving advertisements.
ck2 2mo ago
all the forks in the world won't have widevine support only Firefox is left which is fine by me
Danox 2mo ago
No surprise they want to serve ads everywhere…
bastard_op 2mo ago
Google is an ad company, ad blockers are bad. Why are you using a browser from an advertising company and expecting different results? Microsoft repurposed Google's adware in Chrome into Edge telemetry/spyware to feed your browsing directly into windows telemetry to watch everything you do, they wanted that back when IE lost the war. Google already went evil and set the precedent removing adblocking capabilities, now Microsoft can just blame them and feed everything you do into Bing for ad money as well as telemetry/spyware without you blocking it, that's effectively double-dipping all in on stupid windows users.
- Marsymars 2mo ago
  Hey now, I use Edge on macOS.
  - frizlab 2mo ago
    Why?
    - Marsymars 2mo ago
      Firefox is my main browser, but I use all of Safari/Vivaldi/Edge with some specific configuration for some specific things. Edge primarily just to access MS sites, logging into the browser with MS account makes it easy.
    - bastard_op 2mo ago
      They must love giving their personal information to Microsoft. Mac users are used to it with the icloud "privacy" proxy they default enable on macos/ios users to slurp everything they do already, so I guess why limit yourself to giving your info to only to Tim Apple. Microsoft needs love too.
      - frizlab 2mo ago
        A shame I can’t downvote this. It is both factually false, and worded in a very aggressive way. iCloud private relay is only available for iCloud+ users. It cannot be enabled by default, and is not, even for iCloud+ users BTW. iCloud private relay is a novel dual-party VPN-like technology where neither party involved gets to be able to track the user, says Apple. Yes, it requires trust to believe it, but I tend to think the company the size of Apple would not go around throwing statements like these if they weren’t true, at least to the best of their knowledge, especially since privacy and trust is literally one of the core of Apple businesses… They would be lynched if it were proven that this is false. Finally your comment was posted after the person my comment was directed to answered a perfectly reasonable answer!
mancerayder 2mo ago
Please don't bite me -- question for this group, where "Firefox" is going back and forth as a topic. Isn't Brave okay? There's something toxic about Brave I'm not getting; I can tell you it's incredibly effective as a tool to block ads, scripts, and tracking. What am I missing? It's tracking me? The project owners are mean? There's something nefarious in the codebase? I have firefox and Brave, and both are 'OK', and better than Chrome or Edge which I only use for work. In the past I was told after being downvoted for mentioning Brave that the founder is controversial. Is that it?
- joquarky 2mo ago
  The founder invented JavaScript, which is a subject that triggers knee-jerk reactions in people who approach problem solving emotionally.
  - jraph 2mo ago
    This is not at all what is usually held against him.
- lelanthran 2mo ago
  > Isn't Brave okay? Sure it is. I use both Brave and FF (FF more than Brave, TBH). Brave's builtin adblocker is pretty great as well.
zem 2mo ago
something I've really been wondering about is is mv2 really a serious security loophole? if I think about it, browser extensions really do have a scary amount of access to sensitive webpages, so google's rationale for restricting the attack surface is at least plausible. and as the maintainers of the overwhelmingly dominant browser, they can't build ad blocking into the core engine, not because google is an ad company, but simply because that level of putting their thumb on the scales would lead to a huge backlash.
sfink 2mo ago
Title has a weird spin. I'd say that "stronger" is more accurate than "older". Ironically, MV2 blockers can do dynamic updates and so are often "newer" in the relevant sense. I do wonder if we haven't seen the effects of an MV3-only web yet. As in, once the vast majority of browsers lose MV2 support, will ad networks evolve to get around the limited MV3 capabilities? uBlock Origin Lite might be good enough for you now, but how about in a year or three?
Operyl 2mo ago
Welp, once this happens I’ll just migrate over to Firefox. I tried for one day to browse the internet without an ad blocker and I just couldn’t, it was awful.

193 points by eternalreturn 2mo ago

unlimit 2mo ago

I never stopped using Firefox.

Krssst 2mo ago
It always feels weird to see so much more complaining about Firefox than Chrome and Edge, while it's still so very much far ahead in terms of respecting user choices. All AI features can easily be turned off (and I am assuming those respect user privacy better than the ones of Chrome/Edge). When you say no to Firefox, it remembers it. Chrome keeps asking me every few days / weeks to become the default browser. If we lose Firefox the web is going to be a worse place to be in.
- VCFundedGenYer 2mo ago
  I feel a lot of the "complaints" about Firefox are misinformed opinions from a decade ago or more. I hear falsehoods such as "it's slower" or "it takes up more RAM" which are both patently false in modern times. That was all fixed up years ago.
  - sodapopcan 2mo ago
    It had a pretty annoying bug on Mac (which I ass-u-me was a memory leak) up until a couple of years ago. Every time you'd try and tab back to it, there would be a delay that would very, very slowly get longer over time until you closed and opened it again. I switched over to Arc at the time but after The Browser Company so epicly dropped the ball, I switched back to FF and it's been really great ever since.
  - roryirvine 2mo ago
    Sadly, I suspect there are also a lot of culture war aspects driving some of the most vocal Firefox hatred. (There's a steelmanned form of their argument - that Mozilla ought to be held to a higher standard than their commercial competitors - which you might think would speak in favour of LibreWolf and the like. But those who complain most forcefully about Firefox often turn out to be Chrome / Opera / Brave users)

raverbashing 2mo ago

I guess it still will be the best browser to download Firefox

biglyburrito 2mo ago
It always was.
jmclnx 2mo ago
Lets hope it stays that way :) But if offered enough $, I fear it will join that no-bocker bandwagon.
anticrymactic 2mo ago
> I guess it still will be the best browser to download Firefox ```cmd winget install Mozilla.Firefox ``` Should always work out-of-the-box now.
- Marsymars 2mo ago
  Good as long as you don't want the EME-free version.
  - anticrymactic 2mo ago
    In that case you can use the simple Mozilla API (all code in pwsh) irm https://product-details.mozilla.org/1.0/firefox_versions.json Will output a table of latests Firefox versions. (LATEST_FIREFOX_VERSION is the one we care about. Save it in $v), then simply: iwr "https://download-origin.cdn.mozilla.net/pub/firefox/releases/$v/win64-EME-free/en-US/Firefox%20Setup%20$v.exe" -OutFile Firefox.exe start Firefox.exe So simple. So elegant. So thankful that Mozilla uses their millions of funding for maintenance of a subset of their packages on winget.

poulpy123 2mo ago

I honestly don't know how people do without ad blockers. Even with being ok with ads, they are so overwhelming that I could not use internet without blocking them

cake-rusk 2mo ago
Most laypeople I know haven't seen an ad blocker in action ever.
Balinares 2mo ago
In case your assumption here is that TFA is about Edge disabling adblockers: it's not. It's just removing ManifestV2 support. ManifestV3 is still supported. Despite what one might assume, MV3 does not seem to measurably diminish the effectiveness of adblockers; if anything, it improves it. (Source: https://petsymposium.org/popets/2026/popets-2026-0027.php https://petsymposium.org/popets/2026/popets-2026-0027.php)
- LelouBil 2mo ago
  Isn't the main issue that for MV3 you can't have a dynamic blocklist ? And so you have to update it with an extension update ?
  - phire 2mo ago
    There is a dynamic API too that allows extensions to modify the blocklist at runtime. I’ve been using UBlock Origin Lite on my iPhone for a while, and that works great, keeping itself updated from EasyList and allowing for custom rules. In some ways it’s better, in some ways it’s worse. Sometimes you have to flip it into “complete mode” (and give it full access to modify the current site) to get good blocking.
    - gruez 2mo ago
      >In some ways it’s better, in some ways it’s worse. Sometimes you have to flip it into “complete mode” (and give it full access to modify the current site) to get good blocking. I don't how this is supposed to be a demerit given that the v2 version had full access to every site you visit. Safari just made that more explicit.

feverzsj 2mo ago

Basically every chromium based browser.

olivermuty 2mo ago
Brave as well?
- feverzsj 2mo ago
  Brave's adblock isn't as powerful as ublock.
  - zamadatix 2mo ago
    It doesn't have to be so long as it still supports the above.
  - antonymoose 2mo ago
    In what sense? As a normie-tier user of Brave’s internal and blocker, it’s worked great. I never became a power-user of uBlock.
    - wild_pointer 2mo ago
      +1, works well enough
    - orwin 2mo ago
      Not saying this is it, but I never managed to block YouTube shorts with brave adblocker (in mobile), where I can do it with ublock. If you can do it, please explain, I promise I will try asap (I really dislike ff mobile UI).
      - briHass 2mo ago
        On mobile (similar on Desktop), just go to Setting -> Shields and Privacy -> Content Filters. In there are a bunch of Youtube related blockers (including Shorts), that I find work really well. Mobile Brave also lets you lock/screen off your phone while a YT video continues playing, which is a killer feature for listening to podcasts. I found myself becoming addicted to YT Shorts, and Brave's filters totally solved my problem.

anaisbetts 2mo ago

Welp, the biggest reason that I use Edge just got thrown out, time to switch to Firefox.

gruez 2mo ago
The telemetry and ads (on start page) didn't bother you? I'm surprised there's seemingly a contingent of people who are too lazy to install any other chrome fork (eg. Brave), but are motivated enough to up sticks and switch to firefox the moment ublock is removed.
- HPsquared 2mo ago
  Ad blocking is a big deal.
- smallerize 2mo ago
  At least that's something I can just rant about a couple of times a year, and enjoy tracker blocking the rest of the time.
Dwedit 2mo ago
Until 2023, Edge was sending every URL you visited to bingapis.com. Microsoft's current privacy statement also says "Depending on your settings, this browsing history is sent to Microsoft"
- 1718627440 2mo ago
  That seems to be true to every major application release by MS. No, the OS is of course secure, pinky promise!
- tonyhart7 2mo ago
  what browser that respect your privacy ??
  - DeathMetal3000 2mo ago

deleted 2mo ago

[deleted]

TiredOfLife 2mo ago

It's ending manifest V2, not just adblockers. uBlock Origin lite is V3 and is still supported

s0ss 2mo ago
Inferior alternative
- gruez 2mo ago
  Serious question: which sites have you encountered where ublock lite doesn't do the job? Even tricky sites (eg. youtube) are defeated with scriptlets, not by intercepting network responses.
  - s0ss 2mo ago
    I don’t have any data on that because chromium derivatives aren’t installed, haha. It’s not a matter of “does it work”. It’s philosophical.
- novafunc 2mo ago
  I've used uBlock Origin Lite and have had no issues with blocking ads. The only downside I've seen is that I can't do "Block Elements" to hide non-ad annoying parts of sites.
  - gorhill 2mo ago
    > can't do "Block Elements" In uBO Lite, it's called "Create a custom filter" in the popup panel.

NeutralWanted 2mo ago

Running Unbound on my gateway with a curated adblock list. Easy setup, network-wide ad blocking on every device / browser.

cmeacham98 2mo ago
Some ads (e.g. I know YT ads used to be this way, haven't looked recently) can't be blocked at the network level because they are served from the same domain/servers as the content.
- NeutralWanted 2mo ago
  Sure, but have YT Premium for the family. Don't know how anyone can use YT without it. And it blocks 90% of ads, the rest are tolerable / go mostly unnoticed.
  - layer8 2mo ago
    You’re just saying that 90% of your internet usage is YouTube?
  - microtonal 2mo ago
    I use a browser with a built-in blocker (Brave Origin) and I don't see ads in YouTube.
    - Izkata 2mo ago
      Same with ublock origin on firefox, been years since I've seen any ads. There was a period where they tried to break through the blocking and occasionally I'd see one, but it kinda seems like they gave up.
  - Cider9986 2mo ago
    >Don't know how anyone can use YT without it. With an adblocker.. Why would you need yt premium with an adblocker?

s0ss 2mo ago

Advertising companies shouldn’t be in the browser business. It’s a really bad conflict of interest. Chromium is a mistake. Firefox is pretty great. But IMO they have some poor ux defaults that make it unappealing to random people who simply want a browser.

causality0 2mo ago
Right. For example, Firefox Mobile doesn't support hitting ctrl+T to open a new tab, completely breaking flow for anyone on a tablet with a keyboard or their phone docked to a monitor.
- porksoda 2mo ago
  One can simply fire up a claude and tell it what you'd like to change. A few minutes to sign the extension and Firefox does exactly what you'd like it to. I relayy just do not understand why HN comments pretend this option doesn't exist, or that this is so hard. I have extensions linking it with my i3 setup, setting custom CSS on wm actions, custom shortcuts, what have you. It takes maybe an hour of work to do it nicely.
terminalbraid 2mo ago
Chromium being open source is not a mistake. Letting google be the sole driver and not forking it has been. People who want control over their browsers have options. It's a fight because most people don't care about these things.
clipsy 2mo ago
There is no “browser business,” because people are - with rare exceptions - unwilling to pay for a web browser. Even Firefox is ad-supported indirectly via its default search contract with google.
- layer8 2mo ago
  There is a browser business when the browser company is also in the ad business.

mococa 2mo ago

Droped Chromium browsers and been using Safari with Wipr2, so far the best experience

est 2mo ago

Why do browser vendors have such a control over browsers? Can anyone make a dll injection and bring back manifest v2 ?

terminalbraid 2mo ago
They have control over what they distribute. Chromium and Firefox are both open source and people can (and should) use derivatives they find acceptable.
1718627440 2mo ago
People can create the world, but they do need a lot of time. A lot of money buys you time, so nobody 'poor' can keep up. That wouldn't be a problem for web UAs, if the standards wouldn't be 'improved' at the same path as well. It's kinda like proof of work, but for standard bodies and ownership of a system.
Arnt 2mo ago
Sure, just change the source and build from source. The reason is that V2 opened the door to some fairly nasty attacks. "This extension can read everything you enter on any form". There were some extensions that did exactly what you're thinking of. I suspect that nobody will make a browser that lets a plugin do that any more. It's easy, but on closer reflection, would you do it?

MarkWayneNewton 2mo ago

If this thread is indicative of the sort of browser discourse in <current year> it's no wonder Google won. Nerds used to know how to computer, is what i'm saying.

draw_down 2mo ago
[dead]
joquarky 2mo ago
This industry doesn't really hire nerds anymore. HR prefers brogrammers who can fast talk.

zb3 2mo ago

I use MV3 AdGuard and it blocks ads for me. I don't get the fuss about MV2 deprecation.. sure, MV3 is limited compared to firefox, but it's not like MV2 was that much better, no version ever supported rewriting request response. MV3 DNR redirect is notably lame though, instead of replacing the response it generates a real redirect which breaks for example replacing the service worker response. But could MV2 webRequestBlocking replace the response? Well of course not.

sunaookami 2mo ago
Rules are limited (in syntax and number) and you can only ship updated rules with updated extensions (at least you can skip the queue if you only update rulesets but it's VERY annoying to do). It's also missing a bunch of features: https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uBOL-home/wiki/Frequently-asked-questions-(FAQ)#filtering-capabilities-which-cant-be-ported-to-mv3 https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uBOL-home/wiki/Frequently-as... (I see here that replacing response body is possible with Firefox only, is that your use-case?). MV2 was miles better.
- zb3 2mo ago
  Besides AdGuard I also have my own extension that loads userscripts from my own server (that uses the new userScripts API), so I think I only see my own point of view and the things that would potentially limit my solutions. So far I'm able to block everything I want, but I mentioned replacing the response body because this is the only way I could modify or even inspect the service worker.. I think this vector could help circumventing ad blockers, but again - it would only matter if there were ads I'd not be able to block. When it comes to distribution, firefox sucks because I can't even run my own extensions there, my distro doesn't package firefox developer edition so signatures are required. In contrast, Chrome let's me load unpacked extensions without any problems.
boredhedgehog 2mo ago
> I don't get the fuss about MV2 deprecation Just observe this thread. It's a tribal moment, an occasion for a consumer to reassure himself that he has the right philosophy, uses the right product and rightly hates these other things that deserve to be hated. The fellow believers can upvote each other and downvote any empirical observation which threatens the faith.

DarkmSparks 2mo ago

Vivaldi for the win.

g8oz 2mo ago
I love Vivaldi, but it also uses Chromium. If an extension is not in the Chrome Web store Vivaldi will not be able to install it. Firefox seems to be the only reasonably mainstream option for proper ad blocking.
- KetoManx64 2mo ago
  Vivaldi has ad blocking built into it, and has no issue with you enabling developer settings and sideloading extensions from a file you download from Github Releases.
  - tredre3 2mo ago
    Vivaldi is still dropping support for MV2, which means no more uBlock Origin (non-lite). Being able to side-load extensions doesn't matter if the API is gone.
computronus 2mo ago
Vivaldi is about to drop support for Manifest V2 as well: https://www.reddit.com/r/vivaldibrowser/comments/1urieed/comment/owi02gg/ https://www.reddit.com/r/vivaldibrowser/comments/1urieed/com... I'd been using it solely for GMail / Google Drive / etc. at work, for whatever improved compatibility a Chromium browser might provide over Firefox, which I use for everything else. I got the warning that UBlock Origin won't work, and I immediately ditched Vivaldi. I'm sad about it, I think Vivaldi otherwise is a good browser.

cosmic_cheese 2mo ago

This is ultimately the endpoint of all Chromium-based browsers. Even the most stalwart will throw in the towel on MV2 support sooner or later, because the effort required to maintain non-trivial patches against mainline becomes too great for the team to keep up with. It's a great demonstration of how Chromium's open source nature is something of a technicality. Unless you have an army of software engineers on par with that of Google, you're eventually going to wind up living with Google's decisions whether you like it or not.

Cider9986 2mo ago
Brave's built in adblocker is on par to uBlock Origin for me.
- wolvoleo 2mo ago
  Does it have the same configurability though? Custom lists and the like? I really need those. I'd use Brave if someone made a fork with all the BAT token stuff removed but I haven't seen one.
  - qwerpy 2mo ago
    Brave still maintains MV2 support (for now) so you get to use full-fat uBlock Origin. Eventually, I imagine they'll tire of it, say "well just use the built-in one", and get rid of MV2 when it gets too obnoxious to maintain. I go through a 5 minute ritual every time I reimage/build a PC of installing Brave and disabling all the garbage on it. It's worth it to get Chromium compatibility and speed with uBlock Origin.
    - wolvoleo 2mo ago
      Ah I prefer firefox anyway. It has some features I can't do without. Like the multi-account containers. And its sync that is end to end encrypted. But I might have a look at brave for the 1-2 sites I still use chromium for because they don't work with firefox properly (especially Microsoft 365 of course, as usual).

rdx-amw 2mo ago

I wonder if this is from efforts to maintain the difference between upstream and Edge - such that Edge is trying to simplify development by following Chrome/Chromium closer.

sombragris 2mo ago

The link is paywalled and the site requires me a subscription to keep reading TFA. This happens even after using the link with the Wayback Machine.

throwaway613746 2mo ago

[dead]

ktosobcy 2mo ago

<surprised pikachu> time for everyone using Chromium-based crap xD

vdfs 2mo ago
Chromium is a solid browser, Firefox is second atleast in every aspect, but their companies "politics" is what make the difference, it's hard to swallow pill but Chromium is popular for a reason
- sodapopcan 2mo ago
  What is better about it? I switched back to FireFox several years ago (with a very brief stint on Arc in there) after using Chrome for years and I couldn't describe a single hit I took in QOL. I remember, at the time at least, that FF's dev tooling had more useful things, at least for me (I couldn't tell you what those were at this point... I think I remember nicer flex/grid inspecting tools). From what I can tell, Chromium is popular because so many apps don't test on anything else, but I don't use a lot of web apps so I guess I probably don't run into this as much.
- ktosobcy 2mo ago
  > it's hard to swallow pill but Chromium is popular for a reason yes, google pushing hard "download real browser" for years on their main page didn't have anything to do with it… oh the benevolent monopolies doing what's best in user interest! /s

rambojohnson 2mo ago

who uses Edge anyway..

wolvoleo 2mo ago
95% of corporate users sadly due to Microsoft's lobbying

paxys 2mo ago

All the software freedom people here will do everything except use Firefox.

zem 2mo ago
I've been using firefox happily for years; I'm still emotionally invested in chrome having proper ad blocking, because that's good for users.

roryirvine 2mo ago

uBO 1.7.3 was released just 3 days ago, so it would be more accurate to say "better" rather than "older".

KronisLV 2mo ago

For what it's worth, I daily drive Edge on my Windows machine and it's an okay browser, haven't had a reason to install Chrome in ages (though did run Firefox for a while due to liking their dev tools better, it's still on my MacBook cause I like the UI more than Safari). Even when my Intel Arc B580 has its drivers freeze the browser, I can just kill the GPU rendering process and it picks back up with no data loss, whereas with Firefox I had to restart the whole thing. Seems related to video decode, changing ANGLE backends or whatever in the browsers didn't really help and disabling hardware acceleration makes the experience suck more than it otherwise should. If not for that, I'd still probably be on Firefox fully, despite Mozilla not exactly being the most sane of companies, though maybe trying to fund developing a browser and a whole org is a bit crazy as it is. Brave was okay but nothing special. Maybe I should look at Vivaldi again, but it's an odd position to be in, when upstream is pushing changes on you, so it probably doesn't matter what they do or don't want to support long term, same as with every other Chromium derived browser. Bummer about Chromium fucking over people who dislike ads.

supermatou 2mo ago
>I can just kill the GPU rendering process >and it picks back up with no data loss, >whereas with Firefox I had to restart the whole thing about:processes > kill the GPU process without having to restart Firefox.
- KronisLV 2mo ago
  Thanks! I will try it out the next time when I jump back to Firefox! Not sure why it doesn't show up under Task Manager as clearly as Edge's does.

genxy 2mo ago

These companies that "own the web" shouldn't be allowed to also own the browsers. We went through this already.

VCFundedGenYer 2mo ago

This is why we all need to rally around Firefox (or Librewolf, or Waterfox, or whatever fork you prefer) and make sure that sacred goose is never tampered with.

KetoManx64 2mo ago
Ladybird is the future. Firefox is a joke at this point
- nvme0n1p1 2mo ago
  Ladybird may be the future, but for us non-time-travelers, Firefox is currently the best option.
- paxys 2mo ago
  Why is Firefox a joke?
  - doublerabbit 2mo ago
    Because of Mozilla.
    - paxys 2mo ago
      Doesn’t answer the question
      - doublerabbit 2mo ago
        Yes it does. Just read up on Mozilla. Mozilla receives the vast majority of its funding—roughly $400 million annually from Google Mozilla has made announcements regarding transforming Firefox into an AI-heavy browser and have started alienating longtime open-source supporters Massive salaries paid to Mozilla Foundation executives. Firefox is a joke because it's no longer a users browser. Rather than it just being a browser it's now a VPN, Ai and other. I give it two years before it starts shoving advertisements.

ck2 2mo ago

all the forks in the world won't have widevine support only Firefox is left which is fine by me

Danox 2mo ago

No surprise they want to serve ads everywhere…

bastard_op 2mo ago

Google is an ad company, ad blockers are bad. Why are you using a browser from an advertising company and expecting different results? Microsoft repurposed Google's adware in Chrome into Edge telemetry/spyware to feed your browsing directly into windows telemetry to watch everything you do, they wanted that back when IE lost the war. Google already went evil and set the precedent removing adblocking capabilities, now Microsoft can just blame them and feed everything you do into Bing for ad money as well as telemetry/spyware without you blocking it, that's effectively double-dipping all in on stupid windows users.

Marsymars 2mo ago
Hey now, I use Edge on macOS.
- frizlab 2mo ago
  Why?
  - Marsymars 2mo ago
    Firefox is my main browser, but I use all of Safari/Vivaldi/Edge with some specific configuration for some specific things. Edge primarily just to access MS sites, logging into the browser with MS account makes it easy.
  - bastard_op 2mo ago
    They must love giving their personal information to Microsoft. Mac users are used to it with the icloud "privacy" proxy they default enable on macos/ios users to slurp everything they do already, so I guess why limit yourself to giving your info to only to Tim Apple. Microsoft needs love too.
    - frizlab 2mo ago
      A shame I can’t downvote this. It is both factually false, and worded in a very aggressive way. iCloud private relay is only available for iCloud+ users. It cannot be enabled by default, and is not, even for iCloud+ users BTW. iCloud private relay is a novel dual-party VPN-like technology where neither party involved gets to be able to track the user, says Apple. Yes, it requires trust to believe it, but I tend to think the company the size of Apple would not go around throwing statements like these if they weren’t true, at least to the best of their knowledge, especially since privacy and trust is literally one of the core of Apple businesses… They would be lynched if it were proven that this is false. Finally your comment was posted after the person my comment was directed to answered a perfectly reasonable answer!

mancerayder 2mo ago

Please don't bite me -- question for this group, where "Firefox" is going back and forth as a topic. Isn't Brave okay? There's something toxic about Brave I'm not getting; I can tell you it's incredibly effective as a tool to block ads, scripts, and tracking. What am I missing? It's tracking me? The project owners are mean? There's something nefarious in the codebase? I have firefox and Brave, and both are 'OK', and better than Chrome or Edge which I only use for work. In the past I was told after being downvoted for mentioning Brave that the founder is controversial. Is that it?

joquarky 2mo ago
The founder invented JavaScript, which is a subject that triggers knee-jerk reactions in people who approach problem solving emotionally.
- jraph 2mo ago
  This is not at all what is usually held against him.
lelanthran 2mo ago
> Isn't Brave okay? Sure it is. I use both Brave and FF (FF more than Brave, TBH). Brave's builtin adblocker is pretty great as well.

zem 2mo ago

something I've really been wondering about is is mv2 really a serious security loophole? if I think about it, browser extensions really do have a scary amount of access to sensitive webpages, so google's rationale for restricting the attack surface is at least plausible. and as the maintainers of the overwhelmingly dominant browser, they can't build ad blocking into the core engine, not because google is an ad company, but simply because that level of putting their thumb on the scales would lead to a huge backlash.

sfink 2mo ago

Title has a weird spin. I'd say that "stronger" is more accurate than "older". Ironically, MV2 blockers can do dynamic updates and so are often "newer" in the relevant sense. I do wonder if we haven't seen the effects of an MV3-only web yet. As in, once the vast majority of browsers lose MV2 support, will ad networks evolve to get around the limited MV3 capabilities? uBlock Origin Lite might be good enough for you now, but how about in a year or three?

Operyl 2mo ago

Welp, once this happens I’ll just migrate over to Firefox. I tried for one day to browse the internet without an ad blocker and I just couldn’t, it was awful.