Not seeing my particular setup listed yet. Morphe and Firefox with ublock of course. But I also have a pihole running at home and a tailscale connection with the pihole configured as DNS. So I have pihole blocking even on my mobile data connection.

Tailscale was initially setup so I can access Actual Budget when not on my LAN, but pihole on the go is definitely a big plus.

Control D or Adguard DNS.

OS ads, website ads or app ads?

• For OS ads, it depends on the manufacturer. Some don't have ads. For Xiaomi devices, ads can be completely removed by disabling a single app. Avoid anything by Samsung.
• For ads on websites, use Firefox with uBlock.
• App ads are the hardest to remove. You can try blocking ad domains at the OS level, or disable ads in each app's settings (if they give you that option).

I just use Firefox with uBlock and don't install apps that have ads in the first place.

Adaway

Google always finds a way to bypass adblocking. What worked for me is using firefox with ublock origin. And using apps that don't have ads in the first place. There are many apps like this on F-droid.

NextDNS can provide a similar experience to adaway and similar apps, but without needing an app and with no need to constantly manage anything or ensure an app is running or whatever, it just always works.

Not open source though, but the free plan is more than enough for a single person on all their devices, so for a single phone it should work.

For me, the best bang for your buck as far as effort was to just set the DNS Provider to dns.adguard.com. Then use whatever adblocker or vpn solution you want on top of that. Has worked pretty well for me.

adaway is the best one, and now supports unrooted phones.

Adguard home blocks most ads on my network. But I'm also using Firefox with ublock on Android.

I use YouTube revanced to block YouTube ads on my phone. SmartTubeNext to block YouTube ads on my tv. So between these, it's exceptionally rare I see an ad.

It all depends on how you use the internet, and what ads you're seeing that you want to block.

I use TrackerControl for trackers in apps (and as others said Firefox+uBO, NewPipe for Youtube)

Firefox Mobile with uBlock Origin extension. YouTube ReVanced For other apps: Some VPNs are also blocking Ads and Trackers. Proton for example.

i use personaldnsfilter for adblocking on android

it uses VPN to block domains, you can modify the host file, and it works all the time

RethinkDNS.

I don't install any app that has ads, to the extent that I even uninstalled Google Maps and became a pariah that has no Whatsapp. Most apps are from f-droid, I use OSMAND~ from f-droid, Firefox with ublock origin to browse and pipepipe as youtube client. I don't think I've ever seen an ad on this phone and that's how I like it.

Ublock origin with firefox browser. The app store didn't carry it when I last loaded it on my last android phone I will ever own that is now dead. I had to find it on a search and download it.

Ad blockers don't work well, and websites can tell you are using them and force you to whitelist to use their site. They can't tell with ublock.

Using a computer without it, (I have ublock on my computer as well,) I was amazed at how bad a lot of these sites are that I'm linked to for news or whatever. Moving pictures while I'm trying to read is a deal breaker for me.

My DNS filters most of it.

Block ads where? In apps? I don't have a stock android phone so I can't tell you about improvements. But Rethink DNS blocks whatever u choose hence apps can't show you ads anymore: https://f-droid.org/en/packages/com.celzero.bravedns/

I use wgtunnel to stay connected to my home network to take advantage of dns filtering. Also have ublock origin installed in firefox mobile. Most of the activity is from blocking telemetry. The majority of apps I use on a daily basis are foss and the rare play store app is either a paid game or an app for a service like uber.

If you're not selfhosting, using one of the online options will probably work just as well.

If you are rooted adaway works great

What ads are you trying to remove?
For a browser, I use FireFox mobile with the uBlock Origin and NoScript extensions. Those two eliminate most ads while browsing, though NoScript does require extra effort to allow some pages to function.
For games and other apps, I try to stick to stuff which doesn't have ads. This usually means paying for the stuff you use or sticking to pure open-source solutions. However, I still have some apps which have ads. For that there I use PiHole as a DNS at home, which eliminates most of them.

I could probably do more to avoid the few ads I do see, but at some point I just accept that advertisement is an inevitable consequence of our economy and just move on with life.

In general i do like others and don't really use many apps that have ads.

I used to use TrackerControl which works great, but acts as a vpn to get around root restrictions that stop standard ad-blocking, and now I use a permanent VPN to my home network over Wireguard, so I can't use TrackerControl any more (or any other non-root system-wide ad blocker).

I got around this issue by setting up a work profile, and installing the few apps that I still use that have ads on the work profile, and having TrackerControl installed on the work profile. That way.. Can have always-on VPN on main profile, and few apps with ads blocked on the work profile.

I use Grayjay for YouTube, auto-blocks ads. Browser has its own ad blocker.

personaldnsfilter (yes, in a single word): https://github.com/IngoZenz/personaldnsfilter It can use Hagezi lists (an many more), is free and open source.

Blokada 5 with a bit of tweaking.

DNS 66. It looks to android as a vpn, but blocks known as hosts locally using lists of ad hosts.

for browsing, use Waterfox with uBlock Origin. for apps and the rest of the system, use a VPN that blocks ads like Proton, or use a Pihole.