About Adblock Plus
Index
What is Adblock Plus
Adblock Plus is a free extension that allows you to customize your web experience. You can block annoying ads, disable tracking and lots more. It’s available for all major desktop browsers and for your mobile devices.
The Adblock Plus web extension is an open source project licensed under GPLv3 and subject to its Terms of Use. Some versions of Adblock Plus, including the Adblock Plus for Safari iOS App (version 3.x or higher), are proprietary codebases not licensed under GPLv3. See the Terms of Use for license details.
How does Adblock Plus work?
Choose what you want to see when browsing the web by using filter lists to block unwanted elements, like ads or tracking.
What are filter lists?
Filter lists are sets of rules that tell your browser which elements to block. You can block as little or as much as you want. Choose from pre-made, externally maintained filter lists, or create your own (English only). Almost all pre-made filter lists are created, published and maintained by users for users under open source licenses.
Many ads have tracking built in and some may even contain malware. Because of this, Adblock Plus provides certain levels of tracking and malware protection by default. If you want, you can add additional tracking and malware filter lists to increase your protection.
Default filter lists
The following filter lists are enabled by default when you install Adblock Plus:
Blocklisted Ads
A filter list that blocks ads (e.g. EasyList) based on your browser’s language settings.
eyeo GmbH is not related to the EasyList project and therefore has no right to, or control over, its filter list content. Visit the EasyList Community for more information.
Acceptable Ads
A feature that supports a better web by allowing nonintrusive, respectful ads that comply with the Acceptable Ads criteria agreed upon by the Acceptable Ads Committee.
This list is open source. Want to block all ads? No problem. Click here to learn how.
These filter lists are enabled to get you started. You can keep them, modify them, remove them and / or add other filter lists – it’s up to you.
How is Adblock Plus financed?
Adblock Plus is free to use and always will be. For large platforms that benefit commercially from participating in the Acceptable Ads program, we charge a licensing fee — this covers the ongoing work of reviewing and enforcing the criteria. The program itself is governed by an independent committee, not by eyeo.
About Acceptable Ads
In 2011, Adblock Plus users and the wider community asked for a way to support the websites they valued without turning off their ad blocker entirely. That user request led to the Acceptable Ads initiative — a set of strict, publicly listed criteria for what a non-intrusive ad looks like. The initiative outlines criteria that identify nonintrusive ads. Thanks to the initiative, Adblock Plus users have the option to display certified ads that are part of the Acceptable Ads initiative or to disable the feature and browse free of all ads.