VanishAds — Ad Blocker, Pop-up Blocker & Tracker Blocker

Free, open-source ad blocker for Chrome. Block ads, pop-ups, banners, and trackers. No telemetry, no accounts, no ads of our own.

VanishAds is a fast, transparent ad blocker for Chrome — built on the same community-maintained filter lists the world relies on, with none of the tracking, telemetry, or "acceptable ads" baggage you usually get for free. It blocks ads, pop-ups, banner ads, video pre-rolls, autoplay sound, news-site overlays, cookie banners, and the trackers ad networks use to follow you across the web. Pages load faster because blocked requests never leave your computer. ──────────────────────────────────── WHAT YOU GET ──────────────────────────────────── • 117,000+ filter rules from EasyList, EasyPrivacy, and Peter Lowe's list — the most widely-deployed community-maintained block lists on the web. • A clean toolbar popup that shows exactly what was blocked on each page, broken down by source list. • Per-site pause: one click to pause VanishAds on a site you want to support, one click to resume. • Per-site full block: ban a site outright. Visiting it redirects to a friendly "blocked" page instead of a confusing browser error. • Multi-tab settings page with statistics, allowlist, blocklist, and filter list management. • Manifest V3 native — battery-friendly, fast, future-proof. ──────────────────────────────────── WHAT VANISHADS DOES NOT DO ──────────────────────────────────── This is the part most "free" ad blockers won't tell you up front: • No telemetry. The extension makes zero network calls to any server we control. Open Chrome's network panel and verify it. • No accounts. No sign-up, no login, no email collection. Settings live only in your browser. • No "acceptable ads" program. We don't take money from advertisers to whitelist their ads. • No remote configuration. Filter rules are bundled with the extension. We can't push new behavior without a Web Store update you approve. • No data resale. We collect zero browsing data, so we have nothing to sell. • No obfuscated code. The extension's source is plain, human-readable JavaScript. You can audit the whole thing in 30 minutes. ──────────────────────────────────── HOW IT WORKS ──────────────────────────────────── VanishAds uses Chrome's native declarativeNetRequest engine. That means filter rules are loaded once at install time and matched by Chrome itself in C++, not by slow JavaScript running on every page. Older Manifest V2-era blockers do this work in JavaScript, which is why they can slow some pages down. VanishAds doesn't. When a tracker or ad request would be made, Chrome blocks it before it leaves your machine. When you click an ad link to a tracker domain, you land on our local "blocked" page with options to go back, visit anyway, or always allow that site. Per-tab block counts and a source breakdown (EasyList, EasyPrivacy, Peter Lowe's) are shown live in the popup. ──────────────────────────────────── HOW WE PLAN TO MAKE MONEY (HONESTLY) ──────────────────────────────────── VanishAds is free now and stays free. There is no premium tier and no subscription planned. To sustain the project long-term we may eventually add an optional, opt-in affiliate redirect feature: if you visit certain partner shopping sites through normal browsing and choose to enable the feature, the affiliate network may pay us a commission on purchases. You would pay nothing extra. We're committing publicly to two rules for that feature: 1. It will be opt-in. Off by default. You have to actively turn it on. 2. The list of partner sites and how the redirect works will be fully disclosed inside settings. It is currently NOT IMPLEMENTED. The version you're installing makes zero affiliate redirects. We chose this model because the alternatives — selling browsing data, charging for "premium" features, running our own ads — all create incentives to mistreat users. Affiliate revenue, done transparently, lets the extension stay free without compromising what it's for. ──────────────────────────────────── WHY WE NEED THE PERMISSIONS WE ASK FOR ──────────────────────────────────── • "Read and change all your data on websites you visit" — required by any working ad blocker. Filter rules need to be evaluated against requests on every site. • Storage — to save your allowlist, blocklist, and settings locally in your browser. • Tabs and webNavigation — to know which site you're on so the popup can show relevant info, and to redirect blocked-domain navigations to our local explanation page. • Alarms — to reset daily statistics at midnight. What matters is not the permissions but what the extension does with them. Our source contains zero networking code that could send your data anywhere. You can verify by reading the code at chrome://extensions after install, or on our website. ──────────────────────────────────── WHO MADE THIS ──────────────────────────────────── VanishAds is an independent, bootstrapped project. No VC, no parent company, no acquisition history. Built and maintained from Denmark. Website: https://vanishads.com Privacy: https://vanishads.com/privacy FAQ: https://vanishads.com/faq Source: published openly on the website above. ──────────────────────────────────── A FEW HONEST CAVEATS ──────────────────────────────────── Ad blockers occasionally cause sites to malfunction (broken layouts, login glitches). When that happens, the popup has a one-click pause for the current site. The pause sticks — you only have to do it once per site. Bug reports and false-positive reports go to report@vanishads.com. We read every one.