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Firefox is now the last major browser that still supports uBlock Origin

https://www.pcworld.com/article/3212428/firefox-is-now-the-last-major-browser-that-still-supports-ublock-origin.html
161•DemiGuru•3h ago

Comments

spottedmarley•3h ago
Anyone can build a custom extension to do anything an extension is allowed to do. I had ~7 standard extensions that I pretty much always install into chrome browser. Over the past month or so I've been using Claude code to build a single custom extension that handles all of the things I used 7 extensions for previously. One extension does everything. You can even use the existing extensions you already use as guides for Claude to make sure all of the features you want are included. One extension to rule them all!
ycombinatrix•3h ago
>Anyone can build a custom extension to do anything an extension is allowed to do

Yes, that's why google moved to manifest v3 and extensions can't do as much.

ChrisArchitect•3h ago
Related:

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

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49220392

Insanity•47m ago
Edge is just chromium under the hood. So not a surprise there, should be easy lift for them.
vovavili•3h ago
Thank God for the Brave browser. For those disliking their built-in adblocker, there is a Manifest v2 opt-out specifically for uBlock if you need it.
jollyllama•2h ago
It's good but I find they EOL devices/OS's earlier than Firefox.
odidiejdiwjd•32m ago
Isn’t Brave just another Chromium variant?

Chromium is detestable. In whatever form it takes.

armadyl•10m ago
What’s detestable is Firefox’s lack of security and Mozilla’s priorities surrounding it compared to Chromium

https://www.reddit.com/r/GrapheneOS/comments/1unhtxu/initial...

AstralSerenity•21m ago
Peter Theil was an angel investor in Brave. That alone is all the reason privacy-minded users need to avoid it.
matheusmoreira•12m ago
It's certainly better than stock Chrome but Firefox becoming relevant again is still the ideal option.
timetraveller26•2h ago
Firefox, after 20 years, once again has an advantage over the other browsers.

Let's hope for new generations to get tired of so many ads to finally ditch chrome.

ImJamal•2h ago
uBlock Origin Lite works decently on Chrome so I doubt this will help migration to Firefox.
odidiejdiwjd•33m ago
If only they focused on making Firefox the definitive good browser instead of a platform for their AI efforts.

Firefox will never convince people to leave chrome on philosophy alone. I detest Chrome with a passion and refuse to touch it with a ten-foot pole, but cannot in good faith recommend Firefox to anyone in today’s world. “It kinda works” is about as far a compliment you can give it.

jasonpeacock•23m ago
What doesn’t work? It’s my daily driver and it renders every website I visit.
kulahan•23m ago
What do you think doesn’t work on Firefox? Aside from Google products purposely crippled, everything works just fine in my experience. It’s fast and stable. If there’s a bunch of AI stuff in it, I’ve not seen it. Of course I believe it exists, I just don’t ever read popups anyways. To be fair, I probably use 5% of the browser’s capability (I imagine many are like me). I browse websites and I have UBO installed.
BeetleB
josefritzishere•55m ago
Ads are so invasive and prevalent now that you need an ad blocker just to use the internet.
hdgvhicv•33m ago
Yet 90% of people don’t use a browser capable of running ubo
tensor•28m ago
Because all those other browsers can still block ads. I use ubo lite for safari and it's largely fine.
fsflover•14m ago
It will be "largely fine" until the ad networks start using the methods not blocked by the Lite version. You may not even notice that they start tracking you efficiently. See https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/uBlock-Origin-works-b... for some examples of things Ublock Lite can't do.

Related discussion:

uBlock Origin Lite now available for Safari (apps.apple.com)

1156 points by Jiahang on Aug 5, 2025 | 451 comments

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44795825

Casteil•8m ago
Now? Sure seems like it's been that way for well over a decade.
GeekyBear•37m ago
Firefox is also the only browser that vets uBlock's code on every update to make sure the developer hasn't inserted spyware or malware into the extension.

They don't do it for every extension, but they do so for a wide selection of popular options.

> Recommended extensions differ from other extensions that are regularly reviewed by Firefox staff in that they are curated extensions that meet the highest standards of security, functionality and user experience. After receiving Recommended status, safety standards are maintained through automated checks, monitoring, and periodic technical reviews

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/recommended-extensions-...

b3ing•29m ago
You can also run Ad Nauseum if you want to
rasz•20m ago
Vivaldi 8.1 still supports it (Chromium 150) as loaded unpacked extension.
avaer•18m ago
What's funny is that extensions were supposed to be a way to let you do the things the browser didn't want you to do. Guess that was a bit too much freedom for Google to accept, so they had to make a store with a gate, and destroy the APIs so that they're useless. Then they had to make up some reasons to justify that and ram it through the pipeline despite everyone's objections, and the frog got boiled.

Now we're back to needing an actual extension system that does what extensions were supposed to do in the first place.

matheusmoreira•8m ago
> Then they had to make up some reasons to justify that

Hate to be the one to defend Google here, but the reasons weren't that unreasonable. I want my browser to prevent random extensions from directly reading web page data. The declarative API idea is pretty good.

It's just that uBlock Origin is so insanely useful, important and trusted, it should get full access to the entire browser regardless. Honestly, it should be literally built into the browser instead of being a mere extension. Only the conflicts of interest inherent in an ad company maintaining an ad blocker prevent that.

Animats•12m ago
Manifest 3 is why I finally shut down Sitetruth and Ad Limiter. Removing ads from Google Search is now possible only in Firefox.
hn_submit•1m ago
Does it really make a huge difference to keep supporting Manifest Version 2?

I've installed uBlock Origin Lite in my Edge browser and I don't see any ads there either.

•
17m ago
In the last few months, I've seen a huge upsurge of sites that simply won't work for me in Firefox.

Not sure if it's the FF + Linux combination. Should probably try with a fresh profile to confirm.

It sucks, but I'm in on FF all the way. If much of the web stops working for me, it just means I have more time on my hands!

Silhouette•4m ago
Anecdotally my own experience is consistent with this with the same platform+browser combination.

It appears that there are now significant numbers of sites - or at least noticeable parts or features of sites - that rely on Google-specific APIs and haven't been tested on other browsers.

However visiting those sites from Apple devices is often similarly frustrating. I'm not sure this is an anti-Firefox thing. It seems more of a not realising there are other browsers apart from Chromium-based ones thing.

cadamsdotcom•18m ago
"It kinda works" is factually incorrect.

I have used Firefox exclusively every day on macOS for the past year, several hours a day, and have not one single time had to open another browser. None of the customers of my B2B saas use Firefox. Not once have I needed to test in their browsers except quick smoke testing to prove to myself that the rendering and details are identical. All my other browsing is indistinguishable from before when I used Chrome, and from on mobile where I (tragically) am forced by Apple's monopoly to use Safari.

Do you have evidence to support your false claim?

BeetleB•19m ago
It's funny. Over 20 years ago, I got people to switch to Firefox because of the AdBlock extension.

In case people don't know, Firefox was the first major browser to even have extensions.

doubled112•5m ago
There is only XUL!
matheusmoreira•17m ago
Unfortunately, new generations seem to be completely fine with this. People in general, they're just so completely captured by the dark patterns that I get the impression they cannot even imagine a world without them.

I install uBlock Origin on every browser I come across. Everybody notices. The internet just feels better, somehow. People can't quite explain what changed, but they know.

Qwen 3.8 27B

https://huggingface.co/Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B-FP8
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Firefox is now the last major browser that still supports uBlock Origin

https://www.pcworld.com/article/3212428/firefox-is-now-the-last-major-browser-that-still-supports...
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