this post was submitted on 07 Feb 2025
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My pet peeve about ads everywhere now is on Android.
Your Android phone doesn't come with a voice recorder? Download one, with ads every time you record.
You want a different calculator? Ads!
Flashlight app? Ads!
Notepad? Ads!
And people just apparently accept ads in nearly every app, even the most basic ones.
I don't remember the Sound Recorder, or Notepad having ads. But because people are now used to ads everywhere, it's certainly coming as MS is trying to jam ads in everywhere possible in Windows too, now.
I'm so grateful for Linux. The apps I get through apt-get don't make me watch ads. Unfortunately even if based on Linux, the Android world is so infuriatingly crammed with ads.
I wish I could find a "phone" or portable device in that format, with an OS that works like "true" Linux.
Use f-droid. The apps may not always be as polished (hell, some play store apps look like they came out of 2005), but you can filter apps by anti-features such as ads, tracking, permissions, etc.
As for what you've mentioned:
The fossify repo of apps is privacy friendly, no ads, etc.
Fossify Voice Recorder (Record anything with this Open-source and Ad-free recorder) https://f-droid.org/packages/org.fossify.voicerecorder/
Uh, may I introduce you to F-droid, the FOSS "appstore".
Edit: adding a link and also the community:
https://f-droid.org/
!fdroid@lemmy.ml
Fortunately, you can block all those ads on Android. Check out Tracker Control: https://f-droid.org/packages/net.kollnig.missioncontrol.fdroid
Nice tool, thank you ! However I'm bit confused
That's strange... Why have different versions doing different things?
The short answer is that the Google Play version won't actually block anything because it breaks their terms of service. So that version just tells you how many trackers and what the trackers are. I still use some of those apps and even respect them (e.g. AP News, AccuWeather), but it completely boggles my mind how they've loaded so many trackers into their applications... 🫤
Longer answer: To actually block trackers and ads, you need to use a third party source to download the app so that it's fully functional. By providing the app that way, they don't have to abide by Google Plays rules.
The link above is for the F-Droid "app store" version, which is one of the more well-known "stores." I highly recommend F-Droid. They host free and open source (FOSS) applications. For most everything you use, there is a FOSS alternative which will be ad and tracker free.
https://f-droid.org/
Want a simple ad-free calculator, go there. Want to watch YouTube ad free, go there. Want to download an ad free Lemmy client, go there. Etc etc.
Hurrah for high quality FOSS software!
You can also just set your private DNS to something like
dns.adguard.comand block almost all ads in every app, no installs requiredYep, that can work per device or per network. I'm a big fan of Tracker Control because it's going to work on any network. It's also highly customizable.
I'm personally using
p2.freedns.controld.comfor anyone looking for an alternative.I actually use adblock.dns.mullvad.net, I just recommend adguard for beginners as it seems more stable (though I've not had a stability issue with mullvad for years)
Always good to have options. People need to find whatever works for them.
or just use DNS servers from Mullvad, no additional app required https://mullvad.net/en/help/dns-over-https-and-dns-over-tls#android
If you want something that's simple, fire and forget. You can try PersonalDNSFilter.