packages/net/adblock

DNS based ad/abuse domain blocking

Table of Contents

• Description
• Quick Start
• Main Features
• Prerequisites
• Installation & Usage
• Adblock CLI interface
• Adblock Config Options
• Examples
• Best practice and tweaks
• Troubleshooting & debug options
• Support
• Removal
• Donations

Description

A lot of people already use adblocker plugins within their desktop browsers, but what if you are using your (smart) phone, tablet, watch or any other (wlan) gadget!? Getting rid of annoying ads, trackers and other abuse sites (like facebook) is simple: block them with your router.

When the DNS server on your router receives DNS requests, you will sort out queries that ask for the resource records of ad servers and return a simple NXDOMAIN. This is nothing but Non-eXistent Internet or Intranet domain name, if a domain name cannot be resolved using the DNS server, a condition called the NXDOMAIN occurred.

Quick Start

For a typical setup these few steps are enough to get adblock up and running — see the sections below for details:

1. Install the LuCI companion package: apk update && apk add luci-app-adblock (this pulls in the adblock backend as a dependency).
2. Enable the adblock system service under System → Startup, then open LuCI under Services → Adblock, tick Enabled and (recommended) set a Startup Trigger Interface to your WAN interface(s).
3. Keep the small, pre-selected default feed selection to start with (e.g. adguard, adguard_tracking and certpl, ≈280K domains).
4. Start and verify the service:

/etc/init.d/adblock start
/etc/init.d/adblock status

Please note: don't blindly enable (too) many feeds at once — on low memory devices this will sooner or later lead to OOM conditions.

Main Features

Support of the following fully pre-configured domain blocklist feeds (free for private usage, for commercial use please check their individual licenses)

Feed	Enabled	Size	Focus	Information
1Hosts		VAR	compilation	Link
adguard	x	L	general	Link
adguard_tracking	x	L	tracking	Link
android_tracking		S	tracking	Link
andryou		L	compilation	Link
anti_ad		L	compilation	Link
anudeep		M	compilation	Link
bitcoin		S	mining	Link
certpl	x	L	phishing	Link
cpbl		XL	compilation	Link
disconnect		S	general	Link
divested		XXL	compilation	Link
doh_blocklist		S	doh_server	Link
firetv_tracking		S	tracking	Link
games_tracking		S	tracking	Link
hagezi		VAR	compilation	Link
hblock		XL	compilation	Link
ipfire_dbl		VAR	compilation	Link
oisd_big		XXL	general	Link
oisd_nsfw		XXL	porn	Link
oisd_nsfw_small		M	porn	Link
oisd_small		L	general	Link
phishing_army		S	phishing	Link
smarttv_tracking		S	tracking	Link
spam404		S	general	Link
stevenblack		VAR	compilation	Link
stopforumspam		S	spam	Link
utcapitole		VAR	general	Link
wally3k		S	compilation	Link
whocares		M	general	Link
winspy		S	win_telemetry	Link
yoyo		S	general	Link

Please note: Feeds marked with size VAR (1Hosts, hagezi, ipfire_dbl, stevenblack, utcapitole) additionally require a category selection via the options adb_hst_feed, adb_hag_feed, adb_ipf_feed, adb_stb_feed and adb_utc_feed (or via the LuCI feed configuration). Without a category the feed is skipped during processing.

• List of supported and fully pre-configured adblock sources, already active sources are pre-selected. To avoid OOM errors, please do not select too many lists! List size information with the respective domain ranges as follows: • S (-10k), M (10k-30k) and L (30k-80k) should work for 128 MByte devices • XL (80k-200k) should work for 256-512 MByte devices • XXL (200k-) needs more RAM and Multicore support, e.g. x86 or raspberry devices • VAR (50k-900k) variable size depending on the selection
• Zero-conf like automatic installation & setup, usually no manual changes needed
• Simple but yet powerful adblock engine: adblock does not use error prone external iptables rulesets, http pixel server instances and things like that
• Supports six different DNS backend formats: dnsmasq, unbound, named (bind), kresd, smartdns or raw (e.g. used by dnscrypt-proxy)
• Supports three different SSL-enabled download utilities: uclient-fetch, full wget or curl
• Supports SafeSearch for google, bing, brave, duckduckgo, yandex, youtube and pixabay
• Fast downloads & list processing as they are handled in parallel running background jobs with multicore support
• The download engine supports ETAG headers to download only updated feeds
• Supports a wide range of router modes, even AP modes are supported
• Full IPv4 and IPv6 support
• Provides top level domain compression (tld compression), this feature removes thousands of needless host entries from the blocklist and lowers the memory footprint for the DNS backend
• Provides a DNS Blocklist Shift, where the generated final DNS blocklist is moved to the backup directory and only a soft link to this file is set in memory. As long as your backup directory is located on an external drive, you should activate this option to save valuable RAM.
• Feed parsing by a very fast & secure domain validator, all domain rules and feed information are placed in an external JSON file (/etc/adblock/adblock.feeds)
• Overall duplicate removal in generated blocklist file adb_list.overall
• Additional local allowlist for manual overrides, located in /etc/adblock/adblock.allowlist
• Additional local blocklist for manual overrides, located in /etc/adblock/adblock.blocklist
• Implements firewall‑based DNS Control to force DNS interfaces/ports and to redirect to external unfiltered/filtered DNS server
• Includes firewall‑based Remote DNS Allow, a CGI-Interface to allow certain MACs temporary bypass the local adblock DNS
• Supports firewall‑based temporary DNS Bridging, to ensure a Zero‑Downtime during adblock-related DNS Restarts
• Connection checks during blocklist update to ensure a reliable DNS backend service
• Minimal status & error logging to syslog, enable debug logging to receive more output
• Procd based init system support (start, stop, restart, reload, enable, disable, running, status, suspend, resume, search, report)
• Auto-Startup via procd network interface trigger or via classic time based startup
• Suspend & Resume adblock temporarily without blocklist re-processing
• Provides comprehensive runtime information
• Provides a detailed DNS Report with DNS related information about client requests, top (blocked) domains and more
• Provides a powerful search function to quickly find blocked (sub-)domains, e.g. to allow certain domains
• Implements a jail mode - only domains on the allowlist are permitted, all other DNS requests are rejected
• Automatic blocklist backup & restore: backups are used on start/restart and as a fallback on download errors — feeds are only actually refreshed via reload
• Send notification E-Mails, see example configuration below
• Add new adblock feeds on your own with the Custom Feed Editor in LuCI or via CLI, see example below
• Strong LuCI support, all relevant options are exposed to the web frontend

Prerequisites

• OpenWrt, latest stable release or a development snapshot
• A usual setup with a working DNS backend
• A download utility with SSL support: wget, uclient-fetch with one of the libustream-* ssl libraries or curl is required
• A certificate store such as ca-bundle or ca-certificates, as adblock checks the validity of the SSL certificates of all download sites by default
• For E-Mail notifications you need to install and setup the additional msmtp package
• For DNS reporting you need to install the additional package tcpdump-mini or tcpdump

Please note:

• Devices with less than 128MB of RAM are not supported
• For performance reasons, adblock depends on gnu sort and gawk
• Before update from former adblock releases please make a backup of your local allow- and blocklists. In the latest adblock these lists have been renamed to /etc/adblock/adblock.allowlist and /etc/adblock/adblock.blocklist. There is no automatic content transition to the new files.
• The uci configuration of adblock is automatically migrated during package installation via the uci-defaults mechanism using a housekeeping script
• Only reload actually refreshes the feeds (ETag check plus download of changed feeds). start, restart — and boot/resume — restore the existing blocklist backups and only download feeds that have no backup yet; they do not re-fetch already cached feeds. To update your blocklists (e.g. from a cron job) always use reload

Installation & Usage

• Make a backup and update your local opkg/apk repository
• Install the LuCI companion package luci-app-adblock which also installs the main adblock package as a dependency
• Enable the adblock system service (System -> Startup) and enable adblock itself (adblock -> General Settings)
• It's strongly recommended to use the LuCI frontend to easily configure all aspects of adblock, the application is located in LuCI under the Services menu
• It's also recommended to configure a Startup Trigger Interface to depend on your WAN interface events during boot or restart of your router. Listing IPv6 interfaces (wan6) is fine as well: a trigger only starts a run if the last one did not succeed or if its blocklist is gone, so the chatty netifd update events no longer cause repeated downloads

Adblock CLI interface

• The most important adblock functions are accessible via CLI as well.

~# /etc/init.d/adblock
Syntax: /etc/init.d/adblock [command]

Available commands:
	start           Start the service
	stop            Stop the service
	restart         Restart the service
	reload          Reload configuration files (or restart if service does not implement reload)
	enable          Enable service autostart
	disable         Disable service autostart
	enabled         Check if service is started on boot
	suspend         Suspend adblock processing
	resume          Resume adblock processing
	search          <domain> Search active blocklists and backups for a specific domain
	report          [<cli>|<mail>|<gen>|<json>] Print DNS statistics
	running         Check if service is running
	status          Service status
	trace           Start with syscall trace
	info            Dump procd service info

The report sub-command accepts an output mode: cli (default, human-readable table printed to the console), json (machine-readable output, incl. GeoIP map data when adb_map=1), mail (send the report via msmtp) and gen (regenerate the report data files in the background, used by the LuCI frontend).

Adblock Config Options

• Usually the auto pre-configured adblock setup works quite well and no manual overrides are needed

Option	Default	Description/Valid Values
adb_enabled	1, enabled	set to 0 to disable the adblock service
adb_feedfile	/etc/adblock/adblock.feeds	full path to the used adblock feed file
adb_dns	-, auto-detected	dnsmasq, unbound, named, kresd, smartdns or raw
adb_cores	-, auto-detected	limit the cpu cores used by adblock; only auto-detection is memory-capped
adb_fetchcmd	-, auto-detected	uclient-fetch, wget or curl
adb_fetchparm	-, auto-detected	manually override the config options for the selected download utility
adb_fetchretry	5	number of download attempts in case of an error (not supported by uclient-fetch)
adb_fetchinsecure	0, disabled	don't check SSL server certificates during download
adb_trigger	-, not set	logical reload trigger interface(s), e.g. wan and wan6
adb_triggerdelay	5	additional trigger delay in seconds before adblock processing begins
adb_debug	0, disabled	set to 1 to enable the debug output
adb_nicelimit	0, standard prio.	valid nice level range 0-19 of the adblock processes
adb_dnsshift	0, disabled	shift the blocklist to the backup directory and only set a soft link to this file in memory
adb_dnsdir	-, auto-detected	path for the generated blocklist file adb_list.overall
adb_dnstimeout	20	timeout in seconds to wait for a successful DNS backend restart
adb_dnsinstance	0, first instance	set the relevant dnsmasq backend instance used by adblock
adb_dnsflush	0, disabled	set to 1 to flush the DNS Cache before & after adblock processing
adb_lookupdomain	localhost	domain to check for a successful DNS backend restart
adb_report	0, disabled	set to 1 to enable the background tcpdump gathering process for reporting
adb_map	0, disabled	enable a GeoIP Map with blocked domains
adb_reportdir	/tmp/adblock-report	path for DNS related report files
adb_repiface	-, auto-detected	name of the reporting interface or any used by tcpdump
adb_repport	53	list of reporting port(s) used by tcpdump
adb_repfilter	-, not set	additional tcpdump filter expression, logically ANDed to the internal reporting port filter
adb_repchunkcnt	5	report chunk count used by tcpdump
adb_repchunksize	1	report chunk size used by tcpdump in MB
adb_represolve	0, disabled	resolve reporting IP addresses using reverse DNS (PTR) lookups
adb_tld	1, enabled	set to 0 to disable the top level domain compression (tld) function
adb_basedir	/tmp	path for all adblock related runtime operations, e.g. downloading, sorting, merging etc.
adb_backupdir	/tmp/adblock-backup	path for adblock backups
adb_safesearch	0, disabled	enforce SafeSearch for google, bing, brave, duckduckgo, yandex, youtube and pixabay
adb_safesearchlist	-, not set	limit SafeSearch to certain provider (see above)
adb_mail	0, disabled	set to 1 to enable notification E-Mails in case of a processing errors
adb_mailreceiver	-, not set	receiver address for adblock notification E-Mails
adb_mailsender	no-reply@adblock	sender address for adblock notification E-Mails
adb_mailtopic	adblock notification	topic for adblock notification E-Mails
adb_mailprofile	adb_notify	mail profile used in msmtp for adblock notification E-Mails
adb_jail	0	jail mode - only domains on the allowlist are permitted, all other DNS requests are rejected
adb_nftforce	0, disabled	redirect all local DNS queries from specified LAN zones to the local DNS resolver
adb_nftdevforce	-, not set	firewall LAN Devices/VLANs that should be forced locally
adb_nftportforce	-, not set	firewall ports that should be forced locally
adb_nftallow	0, disabled	routes MACs or interfaces to an unfiltered external DNS resolver, bypassing local adblock
adb_nftmacallow	-, not set	listed MAC addresses will always use the configured unfiltered DNS server
adb_nftdevallow	-, not set	entire interfaces or VLANs will be routed to the unfiltered DNS server
adb_allowdnsv4	-, not set	external IPv4 DNS resolver applied to MACs and interfaces using the unfiltered DNS policy
adb_allowdnsv6	-, not set	external IPv6 DNS resolver applied to MACs and interfaces using the unfiltered DNS policy
adb_nftremote	0, disabled	routes MACs to an unfiltered external DNS resolver, bypassing local adblock
adb_nftmacremote	-, not set	Allows listed MACs to remotely access an unfiltered external DNS resolver, bypassing local adblock
adb_nftremotetimeout	15	Time limit in minutes for remote DNS access of the listed MAC addresses
adb_remotednsv4	-, not set	external IPv4 DNS resolver applied to MACs using the unfiltered remote DNS policy
adb_remotednsv6	-, not set	external IPv6 DNS resolver applied to MACs using the unfiltered remote DNS policy
adb_nftblock	0, disabled	routes MACs or interfaces to a filtered external DNS resolver, bypassing local adblock
adb_nftmacblock	-, not set	listed MAC addresses will always use the configured filtered DNS server
adb_nftdevblock	-, not set	entire interfaces or VLANs will be routed to the filtered DNS server
adb_blockdnsv4	-, not set	external IPv4 DNS resolver applied to MACs and interfaces using the filtered DNS policy
adb_blockdnsv6	-, not set	external IPv6 DNS resolver applied to MACs and interfaces using the filtered DNS policy
adb_nftbridge	-, not set	enables a temporary DNS bridge to an external DNS resolver during local DNS restarts
adb_bridgednsv4	-, not set	external IPv4 DNS resolver used during bridging
adb_bridgednsv6	-, not set	external IPv6 DNS resolver used during bridging
adb_hst_feed	-, not set	category selection for the 1hosts feed (required to enable it)
adb_hag_feed	-, not set	category selection for the hagezi feed (required to enable it)
adb_ipf_feed	-, not set	category selection for the ipfire_dbl feed (required to enable it)
adb_stb_feed	-, not set	category selection for the stevenblack feed (required to enable it)
adb_utc_feed	-, not set	category selection for the utcapitole feed (required to enable it)

Examples

Change the DNS backend to unbound:
No further configuration is needed, adblock deposits the final blocklist adb_list.overall in /var/lib/unbound by default. To preserve the DNS cache after adblock processing please install the additional package unbound-control.

Change the DNS backend to bind:
Adblock deposits the final blocklist adb_list.overall in /var/lib/bind by default. To preserve the DNS cache after adblock processing please install the additional package bind-rndc. To use the blocklist please modify /etc/bind/named.conf:

in the `options` namespace add:
  response-policy { zone "rpz"; };

and at the end of the file add:
  zone "rpz" {
    type master;
    file "/var/lib/bind/adb_list.overall";
    allow-query { none; };
    allow-transfer { none; };
  };

Change the DNS backend to kresd:
Adblock deposits the final blocklist adb_list.overall in /tmp/kresd, no further configuration needed.

Change the DNS backend to smartdns:
No further configuration is needed, adblock deposits the final blocklist adb_list.overall in /tmp/smartdns by default.

Service status output:
In LuCI you'll see the realtime status in the Runtime section on the overview page. To get the status in the CLI, just call /etc/init.d/adblock status or /etc/init.d/adblock status_service:

root@blackhole:~# /etc/init.d/adblock status
::: adblock runtime information
  + adblock_status  : enabled
  + frontend_ver    : 4.5.2-r4
  + backend_ver     : 4.5.2-r4
  + blocked_domains : 888 135
  + active_feeds    : 1hosts, adguard, adguard_tracking, bitcoin, certpl, doh_blocklist, hagezi, ipfire_dbl, phishing_army, smarttv_tracking, stevenblack, winspy
  + dns_backend     : unbound (1.24.2-r1), /mnt/data/adblock/backup, 346.57 MB
  + run_ifaces      : trigger: wan, report: br-lan
  + run_information : base: /mnt/data/adblock, dns: /var/lib/unbound, backup: /mnt/data/adblock/backup, report: /mnt/data/adblock/report, error: /dev/null
  + run_flags       : shift: ✔, custom feed: ✘, ext. DNS (std/prot/remote/bridge): ✘/✔/✔/✔, force: ✔, flush: ✘, tld: ✔, search: ✘, report: ✔, mail: ✔, jail: ✘, debug: ✘
  + last_run        : mode: reload, 2026-03-12T19:08:41+01:00, duration: 0m 57s, 1337.01 MB available
  + system_info     : cores: 4, fetch: curl, Bananapi BPI-R3, mediatek/filogic, OpenWrt SNAPSHOT (r33360-ab0872a734)

Best practice and tweaks

Recommendation for low memory systems
adblock keeps all working data in RAM to avoid unnecessary flash wear. The number of parallel processing jobs and the sort buffer size are automatically scaled to the available memory, so on constrained devices adblock already throttles itself during feed processing. On devices with only 128–256 MB RAM, you can further reduce memory pressure with the following optimizations:

• Limit CPU parallelism: the auto-detected core count is capped to the available memory; set adb_cores=1 to force single-threaded processing with minimal peak memory. A manually set value is always used as-is — it is never lowered, so raising it on a constrained device is at your own risk
• Use external storage: Set adb_basedir, adb_backupdir and adb_reportdir to a USB drive or SSD to offload temporary and persistent data
• Enable blocklist shifting: Activate adb_dnsshift to store the generated blocklist on external storage and keep only a symlink in RAM
• Use firewall‑based DNS redirection: Route DNS queries via nftables to external filtered DNS resolvers and keep only a minimal local blocklist active
• Use compressed swap: install the zram-swap package so the kernel can page out cold memory into compressed RAM under pressure (see below)

Use compressed swap (zram-swap) on low memory devices
The simplest way to survive the memory peak during feed processing is to give the kernel a compressed swap device and let it page out cold memory under pressure. The zram-swap package sets this up automatically at boot — no scripting, no changes to adblock, and adblock benefits transparently. Because the swap lives in compressed RAM rather than on flash, this incurs no flash wear.

apk add zram-swap

Size the swap device relative to your physical RAM — a sensible rule of thumb is half to one times the installed RAM. Note that the compressed pages occupy RAM themselves, so do not oversize it on very small devices:

Installed RAM	Suggested zram_size_mb
128 MB	64–128
256 MB	128–256
512 MB	256–512
1 GB and more	512

The device size is configured in /etc/config/system via LuCI (System -> ZRam Settings) or via CLI:

uci set system.@system[0].zram_size_mb='128'
uci commit system
/etc/init.d/zram restart

A running zram device cannot be resized in place, so the restart is required for a changed size to take effect.
To make the kernel reclaim into zram more eagerly during the short processing peak, raise the swappiness and persist it across reboots, e.g.:

echo 'vm.swappiness=100' >> /etc/sysctl.conf
sysctl -p

Leave adb_basedir and adb_backupdir at their defaults. On very small devices (128 MB) compressed swap helps, but heavy swapping costs CPU — if RAM is truly marginal, the more honest fix is to activate fewer feeds.

Sensible choice of blocklists
The following feeds are just my personal recommendation as an initial setup:

• adguard, adguard_tracking and certpl

In total, this feed selection blocks about 280K domains. It may also be useful to include compilations like hagezi, stevenblack or oisd. Please note: don`t just blindly activate too many feeds at once, sooner or later this will lead to OOM conditions.

DNS reporting, enable the GeoIP Map
adblock includes a powerful reporting tool on the DNS Report tab which shows the latest DNS statistics generated by tcpdump. To get the latest statistics always press the "Refresh" button.

In addition to a tabular overview adblock reporting includes a GeoIP map in a modal popup window/iframe that shows the geolocation of your own uplink addresses (in green) and the locations of blocked domains in red. To enable the GeoIP Map set the following option in "Advanced Report Settings" config tab: set adb_map to 1 to include the external components listed below and activate the GeoIP map.

To make this work, adblock uses the following external components:

• Leaflet is a lightweight open-source JavaScript library for interactive maps
• The free and quite fast IP Geolocation API to resolve the required IP/geolocation information (max. 45 blocked Domains per request)

The basemap is no longer pulled from a tile service. CARTO started to require an API key for the raster basemaps at basemaps.cartocdn.com and watermarks every unauthenticated tile request, and a key is bound to a single customer, so it cannot be shipped with a package that lands on every installation. adblock therefore draws the basemap from country outlines that come with luci-app-adblock: Natural Earth 1:110m, public domain and stripped of all attributes. The map page issues no request to a third party, works without a WAN connection and leaks no part of the admin session to a CDN. The outlines are enough to locate an IP, so the map does not zoom in beyond level 6 and labels the continents rather than the countries.

Optional: a higher detail basemap

The shipped 1:110m outlines are coarse around Scandinavia, the Greek islands and the smaller island states. If you want sharper coastlines, build the 1:50m variant with mapshaper and drop it next to the shipped file. LuCI looks for it on every map run and falls back to the shipped outlines when it is missing, no config option is involved:

curl -sSLo ne50.geojson https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nvkelso/natural-earth-vector/v5.1.2/geojson/ne_50m_admin_0_countries.geojson
mapshaper ne50.geojson -filter-fields -simplify 5% keep-shapes -o force precision=0.01 format=geojson world-50m.json
scp world-50m.json root@openwrt:/www/luci-static/resources/view/adblock/

The result is roughly 105 kB, about three times the shipped file. Please note: this file is not part of any package, so it is removed on sysupgrade unless you add its path to /etc/sysupgrade.conf, and it stays behind when luci-app-adblock is uninstalled.

DNS reporting, limit the tcpdump capture
adb_repfilter takes a regular tcpdump/BPF expression which is logically ANDed to the internal reporting port filter. It narrows the capture for every adb_repiface setting, not just for any, e.g. to skip a single noisy client or to limit the report to certain network segments.

The most common use case is a capture with adb_repiface set to any, where tcpdump also picks up DNS traffic on outbound interfaces, e.g. requests that originate from the router itself and are routed through a VPN client interface. Those packets are captured correctly, but they are redundant, they clutter the report and they consume the limited pcap ring buffer configured via adb_repchunkcnt and adb_repchunksize. Some examples:

Expression	Purpose
not net 10.0.0.0/24	skip a VPN transfer network
not (net 10.0.0.0/24 or net fd00:dead:beef::/64)	skip a VPN transfer network, IPv4 and IPv6
net 192.168.1.0/24 or net 192.168.2.0/24	limit the capture to selected LAN segments
not host 192.168.1.10	skip a single noisy client
not (host 192.168.1.10 or host 192.168.1.11)	skip several clients
not host 9.9.9.9	skip the forwarding between the router and its upstream resolver
ip	capture IPv4 only

Please note:

• the expression must not drop one direction of a DNS transaction. A report line is only emitted once the answer to a pending query has been seen, so filters like inbound, src net ... or dst port 53 compile fine but result in an empty report
• net 10.0.0.1 is not a subnet, without a prefix length libpcap assumes /32 and the expression becomes equivalent to host 10.0.0.1
• not host A or not host B does not skip both hosts, it only skips the traffic between A and B. Use not (host A or host B) instead
• address, network and port primitives work with every interface, but the vlan and ether primitives require an ethernet based capture. They are rejected with adb_repiface set to any (linux cooked mode) as well as on tunnel or ppp interfaces like wg0 or pppoe-wan
• the expression can only narrow the capture, additional ports have to be added via adb_repport
• a too narrow expression still compiles and tcpdump starts normally, it just yields an empty report. Keep that in mind when adb_repiface is changed while a filter is set, the active filter is part of the runtime status

External adblock test
In addition to the built‑in DNS reporting and GeoIP map, adblock users can verify the effectiveness of their configuration with an external test page. The Adblock Test provides a simple way to check whether your current adblock setup is working as expected. It loads a series of test elements (ads, trackers, and other resources) and reports whether they are successfully blocked by your configuration.

The test runs entirely in the browser and does not require additional configuration. For best results, open the page in the same environment where adblock is active and review the results displayed.

Firewall‑Based DNS Control
adblock provides several advanced firewall‑integrated features that allow you to enforce DNS policies directly at the network layer. These mechanisms operate independently of the local DNS resolver and ensure that DNS traffic follows your filtering rules, even when clients attempt to bypass them.

• Unfiltered external DNS Routing: routes DNS queries from selected devices or interfaces to an external unfiltered DNS resolver
• Filtered external DNS Routing: routes DNS queries from selected devices or interfaces to an external filtered DNS resolver
• Force DNS: blocks or redirects all external DNS traffic to ensure that clients use the local resolver

The DNS routing allows you to apply external DNS (unfiltered and/or filtered) to specific devices or entire network segments. DNS queries from these targets are transparently redirected to a chosen external resolver (IPv4 and/or IPv6):

• MAC‑based targeting for individual devices
• Interface/VLAN targeting for entire segments
• Separate IPv4/IPv6 resolver selection
• Transparent DNS redirection without client‑side configuration This mode is ideal for guest networks, IoT devices, or environments where certain clients require stricter/lesser DNS filtering.

force DNS ensures that all DNS traffic on your network by specific devices or entire network segments is processed by the local resolver. Any attempt to use external DNS servers is blocked or redirected.

• Blocks external DNS on port 53 and redirects DNS queries to the local resolver when appropriate
• Also prevents DNS bypassing by clients with hardcoded DNS settings on other ports, e.g. on port 853 This mode guarantees that adblock’s filtering pipeline is always applied.

adblock's firewall rules are based on nftables in a separate isolated nftables table (inet adblock) and chains (prerouting), with MAC addresses stored in a nftables set. The configuration is carried out centrally in LuCI on the ‘Firewall Settings’ tab in adblock.

Remote DNS Allow (Temporary MAC‑Based Bypass)
This additional firewall feature lets selected client devices temporarily bypass local DNS blocking and use an external, unfiltered DNS resolver. It is designed for situations where a device needs short‑term access to content normally blocked by the adblock rules.

A lightweight CGI endpoint handles the workflow:

• The client opens the URL, e.g. http(s)://<ROUTER-IP>/cgi-bin/adblock (preferably transferred via QR code shown in LuCI)
• The script automatically detects the device’s MAC address
• If the MAC is authorized, the script displays the current status:
  • Not in the nftables set → option to request a temporary allow (“Bypass”)
  • Already active → shows remaining timeout
• When renewing, the CGI adds the MAC to an nftables Set with a per‑entry timeout

The CGI interface is mobile‑friendly and includes a LuCI‑style loading spinner during the renew process, giving immediate visual feedback while the nftables entry is created. All operations are atomic and safe even when multiple devices renew access in parallel.

Temporary DNS Bridging (Zero‑Downtime during DNS Restarts)
Adblock can optionally enable a temporary DNS bridging mode to avoid DNS downtime during DNS backend restarts. When this feature is enabled, all DNS queries from LAN clients are briefly redirected to an external fallback resolver until the local DNS backend becomes available again. This ensures that DNS resolution continues to work seamlessly for all clients, even while adblock reloads blocklists or restarts the DNS service. Just set the options adb_nftbridge, adb_bridgednsv4 and adb_bridgednsv6 accordingly.

Jail mode (allowlist-only):
Enforces a strict allowlist‑only DNS policy in which only domains listed in the allowlist file are resolved, while every other query is rejected. This mode is intended for highly restrictive environments and depends on a carefully maintained allowlist, typically managed manually.

Download options
By default adblock uses the following pre-configured download options:

    * curl: --connect-timeout 20 --retry-delay 10 --retry 4 --retry-max-time 80 --retry-all-errors --fail --silent --show-error --location -o
    * wget: --no-cache --no-cookies --timeout=20 --waitretry=10 --tries=5 --retry-connrefused -O
    * uclient-fetch: --timeout=20 -O

To override the default set adb_fetchretry, adb_fetchinsecure or globally adb_fetchparm to your needs.

Enable E-Mail notification via msmtp:
To use the email notification you have to install & configure the package msmtp. Modify the file /etc/msmtprc:

[...]
defaults
auth            on
tls             on
tls_certcheck   off
timeout         5
syslog          LOG_MAIL
[...]
account         adb_notify
host            smtp.gmail.com
port            587
from            dev.adblock@gmail.com
user            dev.adblock
password        xxx

Finally enable E-Mail support, add a valid E-Mail receiver address in LuCI and setup an appropriate cron job.

Automatic adblock feed updates and E-Mail reports
For a regular, automatic update of the used feeds or other regular adblock tasks set up a cron job. Use reload here — start/restart would only restore the backups instead of fetching fresh feeds. In LuCI you find the cron settings under System => Scheduled Tasks. On the command line the cron file is located at /etc/crontabs/root:

Example 1

# update the adblock feeds every morning at 4 o'clock
00 04 * * * /etc/init.d/adblock reload

Example 2

# update the adblock feeds every hour
0 */1 * * * /etc/init.d/adblock reload

Example 3

# send an adblock E-Mail report every morning at 3 o'clock
00 03 * * * /etc/init.d/adblock report mail

Change/add adblock feeds
The adblock default blocklist feeds are stored in an external JSON file /etc/adblock/adblock.feeds. This file is shipped with the package and is overwritten on every package update, so never edit it directly. All of your custom changes belong in the separate JSON file /etc/adblock/adblock.custom.feeds (empty by default), which is preserved across updates. It's recommended to use the LuCI based Custom Feed Editor (Custom Feed Editor tab), which validates the JSON for you.

Please note: if /etc/adblock/adblock.custom.feeds exists and is non-empty, it is loaded instead of the shipped adblock.feeds — it replaces the feed set, it does not merge with it. A custom feed file must therefore contain every feed you want active, not just your additions. The Custom Feed Editor handles this for you by working on a full copy.

A feed is a single JSON object, keyed by a unique feed name (no spaces, no special characters). Example:

	[...]
	"stevenblack": {
		"url": "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/StevenBlack/hosts/master/",
		"rule": "feed 0.0.0.0 2",
		"size": "VAR",
		"descr": "compilation"
	},
	[...]

The object supports the following fields:

Field	Required	Description
url	yes	download URL of the domain list (for category feeds: the base URL, see below)
rule	yes	the parsing ruleset, max. 4 space separated parameters (see below)
size	yes	size hint shown in LuCI: S, M, L, XL, XXL or VAR (see the feed table legend in Main Features)
descr	yes	a short human-readable description shown in LuCI and the feed table

The rule field
The rule consists of max. 4 individual, space separated parameters:

1. type: always feed (required). adblock only supports the feed type for external sources; any source whose rule does not start with feed is skipped.
2. prefix: an optional search term (a literal string, not a regex) that a line must contain to be treated as a valid entry. Use it to pick the relevant rows of a hosts-style file, e.g. 0.0.0.0. Omit it for a plain list with one bare domain per line.
3. column: the 1-based column that holds the domain within a matching line, e.g. 2 for a 0.0.0.0 example.com hosts file or 1 for a bare list (required). When no prefix is used, give the column directly, e.g. feed 1.
4. separator: an optional field separator; default is the whitespace character class [[:space:]]+. Pass a literal character such as , for comma-separated sources.

Examples:

• feed 1 — plain list, one domain per line, domain in column 1
• feed 0.0.0.0 2 — hosts-style file, keep only 0.0.0.0 lines, domain in column 2
• feed 1 , — comma-separated source, domain in the first field

Category-based feeds (size VAR)
The feeds marked VAR in the feed table (1hosts, hagezi, ipfire_dbl, stevenblack, utcapitole) are built-in feeds that require an additional category selection via the dedicated options adb_hst_feed, adb_hag_feed, adb_ipf_feed, adb_stb_feed and adb_utc_feed (or the LuCI feed configuration). For these, the url is a base URL to which the selected category is appended at download time. This category mechanism is wired to those specific feed names in the backend, so it cannot be reused for arbitrary new feeds — a custom feed you add yourself should point url at a single, complete list URL.

After editing /etc/adblock/adblock.custom.feeds, reload adblock (/etc/init.d/adblock reload) and check the Log View tab (or logread -e adblock-). With adb_debug enabled, a malformed JSON object or a wrong column/separator typically shows up there as a feed that produces zero domains.

Troubleshooting & debug options

Adblock provides an optional debug mode that writes diagnostic information to the system log and captures internal error output in a dedicated error logfile - by default located in the adblock base directory as /tmp/adb_error.log. The log file is automatically cleared at the beginning of each run. Under normal conditions, all error messages are discarded to keep regular runs clean and silent. To enable debug mode, set the option adb_debug to 1. When enabled, the script produces significantly more log output to assist with troubleshooting.

Whenever you encounter adblock related processing problems, please enable debug logging, restart adblock and check the Log View tab in LuCI (or the syslog via logread -e adblock-).

Support

Please join the adblock discussion in this forum thread or contact me by mail dev@brenken.org

Removal

Stop all adblock related services with /etc/init.d/adblock stop and remove the adblock package if necessary.

Donations

You like this project - is there a way to donate? Generally speaking "No" - I have a well-paying full-time job and my OpenWrt projects are just a hobby of mine in my spare time.

If you still insist to donate some bucks ...

• I would be happy if you put your money in kind into other, social projects in your area, e.g. a children's hospice
• Let's meet and invite me for a coffee if you are in my area, the “Markgräfler Land” in southern Germany or in Switzerland (Basel)
• Send your money to my PayPal account and I will collect your donations over the year to support various social projects in my area

No matter what you decide - thank you very much for your support!

Have fun!
Dirk