How to block Ads on Android Phones

Warning: ROOT is required to block ads, so your phone must be rooted. Please don't ask me how to root your phone as there are a billion android phones out there and some are harder to root than others.

For those questions the simple answer is this:

1. Go to Google
2. Type in <your phone here> root guide. Or any variation just make sure to include your phone and carrier.
3. Follow whatever guides you find


With google recently removing all adblocking apps from the market, anybody with a rooted phone might be wondering "well how am i gonna block the ads now?"

Well there are a few things you can do,

1. If you already have the APK just back it up directly on your phone, either using titanium backup, or any root explorer app that will let you copy and paste the apk file somewhere. It will usually be found in either your system/app or data/app folder from the root of your internal storage, unless you save apps to the SD card.

2. While option number 1 is great, you won't be getting anymore updates for the apps (an example would be jrummy's rom toolbox pro. It has an adblocker built in but he will have to remove it to put his app back on the market, this means that you won't want to update that entire app just to keep the adblocking in place) the solution to this problem is to download one of the following standalone ad blocking apps either AdAway or Adblock Plus my personal choice is AdAway but they are both free
How to install these apps?

1. Download either one of those apps, my personal favorite way is to just chrome to phone the download link from my desktop to my phone, that way it'll take me right to the download.

2. Go to your settings menu ---> Security ----> Unknown Sources and check that box. This will allow you to sideload applications on your phone. Without that checked it won't work.

3. Find wherever you saved it too. If you downloaded it via your phones mobile browser it will most likely be in your "downloads" folder in the internal storage.
*Note, there are many different browsers for android, so i can't promise that's exactly where you'll find it, but it'll be wherever your other downloads go*

4. Click on the app and it should take you to an installation screen. Just click through it and it will install.

5. Go into the actual application and make sure it downloads the host sources/turn on the ad blocking.

5a. This step is optional, on AdAway you can add your own host source files, i highly recommend doing so as by default it only has a few. You can find them here the top ones i recommend are:

Code:

http://www.ismeh.com/HOSTS
https://sites.google.com/site/logroid/files/hosts.txt
https://jansal.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/adblock/hosts
http://adaway.sufficientlysecure.org/hosts.txt 

*Note, the redirection lists will cause google+ not to work, so i recommend not using those*

To add these to AdAway's default list you'll need to go into the application, bring up the settings menu and click "host sources" then click the plus sign in the upper right hand corner and type them in exactly how they appear on the site. After that redownload the host source files and reboot.

*Note, this may also work for Adblock Plus and other adblocking apps but i do not know for sure*

6. Reboot your phone after you've turned on adblocking to ensure everything is working.

And now you're all set with adblocking. This may not block EVERY ad but it'll get the job done

*Note, i am sure there are plenty other adblocking apps out there, but these two in my opinion are the better ones*

*Note 2, i highly recommend checking your adblocking app everyday as host source files update and then you can get the updated versions downloaded automatically*

Disclaimer, i am not responsible for anything that happens to you or your phone while you block ads.