head to head · open source
uBlock vs firefox-ios
uBlock has 67,923 GitHub stars, 4,353 forks, 15 open issues and last shipped yesterday. firefox-ios has 13,039 stars, 3,265 forks, 1,827 open issues and last shipped yesterday. uBlock leads on adoption by 421% (67,923 vs 13,039 stars). uBlock is written in JavaScript under GPL-3.0; firefox-ios is written in Swift under MPL-2.0. uBlock has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, firefox-ios 25%. firefox-ios was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (firefox), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| uBlock | firefox-ios | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 68K | ★ 13K |
| License | GPL-3.0 | MPL-2.0 |
| Written in | JavaScript | Swift |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 4.4K | ⑂ 3.3K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick uBlock if
- You weight community size — 68K stars and counting
- You want the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick firefox-ios if
- You want the firefox-ios feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MPL-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Swift
- You evaluated both and firefox-ios fits your workflow better
About uBlock
uBlock Origin is a CPU and memory efficient, wide spectrum content blocker for Chromium and Firefox, aimed at anyone who wants ads, trackers, coin miners, popups, anti blockers and malware sites neutralised by default without hand tuning anything.
read the full uBlock overview →
About firefox-ios
Firefox for iOS is the Mozilla maintained, Swift written monorepo that holds the complete source for the Firefox and Focus browsers on Apple's mobile platform, released under the Mozilla Public License 2.0 and intended for iOS engineers, Mozilla contributors, and anyone who wants to build, audit, or modify the browser running on an iPhone or iPad.
read the full firefox-ios overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is uBlock or firefox-ios more popular?
uBlock has 67,923 GitHub stars and firefox-ios has 13,039. uBlock has the larger community by that measure.
Are uBlock and firefox-ios free?
Both are open source. uBlock is licensed under GPL-3.0 and firefox-ios under MPL-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between uBlock and firefox-ios?
uBlock is written in JavaScript and firefox-ios in Swift. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, uBlock or firefox-ios?
Choose uBlock if you want the larger community (67,923 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose firefox-ios if its feature set, stack or MPL-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.