from Hacker News

Ask HN: Why is uBlock Origin not available on iOS devices?

by markrankin on 4/12/23, 10:20 PM with 3 comments

Why is it available via browsers on Mac OS?

  • by cookiengineer on 4/14/23, 4:51 AM

    Because Safari and its WebView process are still the only processes allowed to run JIT compilers.

    Other Browsers on iOS are just unaccelerated Safari Webviews.

    In order to have a real Browser on iOS, with a real Web Extension API (manifest v2/v3) users would need to jailbreak their devices.

    This has been going on for decades, and Apple pretty much gives zero effs about it.

  • by orbz on 4/12/23, 10:25 PM

    I would guess it using a blocking mechanism that isn’t compatible with the plugin system that iOS safari supports. There are at least other ad blockers in the AppStore.

  • by Raed667 on 4/13/23, 2:36 PM

    Look at how Adguard built their safari extension. It is basically an electron app that talks to the browser. Not really in the spirit of uBlock.