14 DAY TRIAL // Adblock Plus has long time been the most popular Firefox add-ons and for good reason, users have had enough of the ad pollution some sites practice. But if you wanted to use Chrome, you'd be out of luck. There are plenty of ad blockers for the Google browser, but none live up to the Firefox version of Adblock Plus. Thankfully, Adblock Plus is finally coming to Chrome, albeit if mostly in name for now.
The developers behind the Adblock Plus add-on have now taken over the existing AdThwart extension, renamed it Adblock Plus for Google Chrome, updated some common code and linked it to the existing filter lists.
In the future, the two versions will become a lot more similar, as far as the technology for both browsers permit it.
"We are starting to look into ways to cover other browsers than Firefox and SeaMonkey. And we are starting with Google Chrome," Wladimir Palant, the developer behind Adblock Plus, wrote last week.
The beta version of Adblock Plus for Google Chrome is now available. Existing Adthwart users should be updated automatically. Apart for some rebranding and using the Adblock filter lists, there's not much new for now, but that will change.
"Chrome’s extension system has severe limitations, so we won’t be able to create an exact equivalent of Adblock Plus for Firefox. However, there is still much we can improve to make Adblock Plus for Chrome behave more similar to the Firefox version," Palant explained.
AdThwart already uses some Adblock Plus code, which is open source. The goal is to have as much common code as possible, to speed up development.
Then, another big goal is to have Adblock Plus for Chrome block ads before they are downloaded, not just cover them up like Adthwart and any other Chrome ad blocker do now. Beyond that, the two releases should stay pretty much in sync and share the same features, as long as the APIs enable it.
Blocking ads on websites is a tricky issue, many live based on advertising alone and you may want to support a website you like or, who knows, you may even find one ad useful. But some websites and ads are so annoying that there is sometime no other way than just blocking all of them altogether.
Adblock Plus for Google Chrome is available for download here.