How to Remove Ads on Xiaomi Smartphones

Xiaomi has a unique business model. The company has vowed not to make more than 5% of net profit on their hardware. That’s not really healthy for a big listed company, isn’t it? So yeah, they are relying on making money by selling services (like the app store, Mi Pay, etc.) And a part of it is advertising which seems to be on an overdrive of late.

But Ads can get annoying at times, especially if you have them overlaying on top of core apps or services that you use frequently. If you own a Xiaomi phone, chances are you’ve encountered a ton of ads spread across the UI or system apps (unless you have the Mi A1 or A2 which are Android One devices and do away with MIUI in favor of stock android) which surely hinders your user experience.

How to Stop Ads in Xiaomi Redmi smartphones?

Thankfully, there are numerous ways to fix, or rather, break Xiaomi’s ad service so as to have a pleasant experience while using your phone. So, let’s get to what you should do. Also, we suggest you to follow this guide in its entirety to get rid of ads across all your system apps. Do note that these steps can be followed for MIUI 9.6+ as well as MIUI 10.

Disable Ad Authorization

This is the first step for freeing yourself from ads that you see in stock MIUI apps.

Head over to the ‘Settings’ app on your phone and navigate to ‘Additional Settings’ and then select ‘Authorization and Revocation’ and disable ‘msa’. Now, this option might not get disabled the first time you try, so if it throws an error, just try disabling it again, and it should happen this time.

By disabling the authorization to display ads, apps like Browser, Security, Downloads, etc. will not have the permission to display ads anymore. Also, it prevents the algorithm which displays ads from being revoked so that you won’t see the ad recur on your phone. This step alone might work for some, but some of our readers have reported that it doesn’t work completely and they continue to see ads at some places. If this doesn’t work, proceed to the next step below.

Note – Xiaomi doesn’t let you turn off the ‘msa’ option from MIUI 10 8.9.20 onwards, so the workaround is to head over to Settings > Apps > msa > Restrict data usage.

Manually Disabling Ad Services from MIUI System Apps

The ads that you receive on a daily basis in MIUI are usually pushed from apps like File Manager, Music, Downloads, Browser, etc. This can easily be tackled by digging for options under menus and disabling ‘Recommendations’. We’ll tell you how it’s done.

• Let’s do this one app at a time. First, head over to the Mi File Manager and tap on the 3 lines that appear at the top left corner to open up the hamburger menu. The head over to Settings > About and disable the ‘Recommendations’ tab.

• Next comes the Security app, which probably operates contrary to its moniker by showing you ads based on your usage patterns. To prevent this, fire up the Security app, then go to settings by tapping the gear icon on the top right and disable ‘Receive Recommendations’. While you’re at it, also head over to the ‘Cleaner’ section in the same settings menu and disable the ‘Receive Recommendations’ option here as well.

• The default MIUI browser is what displays maximum ads since it has permissions to be connected to the internet all the time, so let’s handle that. Also, this setting is really buried in a place you wouldn’t expect to find it, so probably Xiaomi doesn’t want you to disable it after all! Once you open up the Browser app, got to Settings > Advanced > Top sites order and disable ‘Receive recommendations’.

• Another app linked to the internet is Downloads, so once in the app, head over to Settings and deselect ‘Show recommended content’.

• Since MIUI 9, the default Music app is integrated with online services, which again means a ton of ads. To disable this, open up the Music app, go to Settings > Advanced Settings and turn off ‘Recommendations’.

Disable Advertising Tracker

Lastly, let’s disable the service which tracks your usage patterns to display user specific ads. Open the Settings app and navigate to Additional Settings > Privacy > Ad Services and disable ‘Personalized Ad Recommendation’

Once you follow all these steps, reboot your device for the settings to take effect.

Alternatively, you could also use a service named Blokada which blocks ads system-wide giving you a complete ad-free experience if that’s what you’re looking for. Mind you, this is a third party service, so understand the risks involved before you proceed. We don’t really suggest you this over the others mentioned above.

If you followed these steps accurately, you could be assured that you will not see ads anymore on your home screen or as banners on stock apps or in the form of notifications. If you have any queries regarding any of the steps mentioned, feel free to comment down below, and we’ll get back to you.