Thread

Apple has added persistent 'ads' to iOS, and it's driving users crazy

822 points · 601 comments · MC995

AnonC · 1790088825 · focus · HN ↗
I doubt John Ternus will change direction anytime soon, since it will look like he’s reversing the plethora of eyesore ads that Tim Cook added over his tenure.
But the Apple with ads is not the Apple that had some taste and discernment in the past. For a long time I’ve visited the App Store’s app update page directly (tap and hold on App Store icon to see the context menu option). Anytime I inadvertently go to the App Store home page or the few times I search, it’s an ad filled disaster!
From this article
> repeatedly attempting to prod customers towards even more of the company’s products might seem cheap, even distasteful.
From a recent post by John Gruber:
> Steve Jobs in 2011: 'We Build Products That We Want for Ourselves, Too, and We Just Don't Want Ads' [1]
Looks like Tim Cook, John Ternus and Eddy Cue really enjoy being swamped with ads in their products. Will there soon be a time when Apple executives start carrying some other brand’s devices with them to avoid having a rotten experience?
[1]: We don’t want ads <a href="https://daringfireball.net/linked/2026/07/28/jobs-we-dont-want-ads" rel="nofollow">https://daringfireball.net/linked/2026/07/28/jobs-we-dont-wa...
1. api · 1790088911 · focus · HN ↗
  Ad revenue is bad revenue if you're going for the high end of the market. If it has ads, it's crap.
  Apple has all but conquered the high end of the market, but that ad revenue... it's so tempting... soooo tempting... just one hit...
  1. malfist · 1790089693 · focus · HN ↗
    What are you going to do? Switch to android which has even more ads?
    What we need is antitrust enforcement so there are other options and more competition. The free market can't fix anything if the market is just a race to the bottom between two companies
    adrian_b · 1790099197 · focus · HN ↗
    Android by itself does not have any ads.
    I have had until now 4 Android smartphones, which did not have any ads whatsoever.
    Like other posters have said, if you do not buy the phone directly, but subsidized by some carrier, then it might come with crap installed on it.
    Of course, currently Google appears to make efforts to make Android worse, so it would not be surprising if ads would appear.
    microtonal · 1790101549 · focus · HN ↗
    Which Android though? AOSP doesn't have ads. But Samsung phones are full of ads for their own and other's services (McAfee VPN, McAfee security scan, OneDrive, etc.). I heard that Chinese phones are similar. Even Pixel pushes Google One in places.
    The primary exceptions are GrapheneOS and Lineage, but it's not like people can buy a phone with them in the store (yet).
    BizarroLand · 1790108324 · focus · HN ↗
    Moto phones are relatively ad free. There's a few (removable/disableable) apps on it at stock that have ads, the rest is all good.
    kbelder · 1790109609 · focus · HN ↗
    I've been very happy with the low-end moto phones I've bought, and plan to continue with them until they inevitably get worse.
    BizarroLand · 1790120376 · focus · HN ↗
    I've heard their flagships will start coming with LineageOS next year. Should be a step in the right direction.
    happymellon · 1790111913 · focus · HN ↗
    > I heard that Chinese phones are similar.
    My Xiaomi has no adverts.
    But then the Samsung S22 I had before didn't have adverts. Certainly didn't come with McAfee.
    realusername · 1790113170 · focus · HN ↗
    > But Samsung phones are full of ads for their own and other's services
    I have a Samsung and I've never seen such ads.
    The kind of ads they are talking there in the article would be in cheap Chinese phones in the Android world I think.
    adrian_b · 1790151248 · focus · HN ↗
    I have used several models of Sony Compact phones, then ASUS phones.
    No ads, and moreover I never had and still do not have any Google account.
    The only problem that I had for not having a Google account was that one of the banks with which I was working terminated their on-line banking and replaced it with a smartphone app. That would not have been a problem, except that they refused to provide the app directly for download, but only from the Google store, which cannot be used without a Google account.

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