Web advertising is a cancer. What purportedly began as a way to fund the production of quality content has metastasized into a privacy-invading, kludgy, bloated weight that is at direct odds with the highest ideals of the internet. Luckily, great tools exist to inoculate us against this threat. uBlock Origin is a self-described “wide spectrum” content blocker that happens to be good at blocking ads, but can do much more.
Specifically, it can block any content on any site you choose. Out of the box it can block embedded ads on Google search results:
Much better! But I also don’t care for the “People also search for” functionality:
This throws off my page when viewing search results, does not pop up on the right result (e.g. if I click on a link, then go back to the results, the “People also search for” “enhancement” often appears on the result above the one I clicked. This is unexpected behavior.
Not to mention, I have never once found these suggestions helpful, nor have I ever clicked on one.
Luckily, uBlock provides a way to block this. First get into the uBlock Origin settings:
Then click on “My Filters”
Then add the following code:
! https://www.google.com/search
www.google.com##.exp-outline
www.google.com##[style="display: block; opacity: 1;"]
www.google.com##[data-hveid]>div:style(height: auto !important)
And voila! No more “People also search for” “enhancement”!
BONUS: It’s also easy to block the “People also ask” section by adding:
www.google.com##div:has(>div>div>div>h2:has-text(People also ask))
The end result is a nice, clean, circa 2005 Google search result page:
Much better!