Why is it important to test whether Adblocker is causing issues?
Well first of all, 26% of all internet users use Adblocker, and usage is apparently increasing 2% a year (according to one source anyway). The trend is only accelerating, with the advent of adblocking browsers and privacy focused browsers like Brave. The trend is growing because lets face it, the vast majority of users do not enjoy ads (unless you happen to be an advertiser yourself, tsk tsk). On a slightly related note, advertising people and salesman in general are among the least trusted type of professions.
Glen Allsopp also mentioned it in the Detailed SEO course that you should do this check! It’s simple to do and you might be surprised to see what you find.
How can Adblocker cause design bugs?
One important way Adblockers function is by simply blocking a Javascript (JS) or stylesheet (CSS) from loading on the page. Some common examples are Google Analytics, Google Adsense.
Unfortunately, sometimes it does this by what’s known in the programming world as a “catch-all” rule. I’ve even some Adblockers block ALL content from a certain domain (ouch). For the programmer-savvy among you, these are regexps using *.
What’s a real world example of Adblocker causing bugs?
We already have a demo example loaded in the URL submission form: “https://pdf.wondershare.net/ad/pdf-editor/ocr.html”
You can see the two screenshots are totally different (see below image)
What did adblocker do that caused the UI bug? Turns out, the adblocker had a rule to blog all URLs starting with “https://pdf.wondershare.net/ad”. This ended up blocking “global.css” and “style.css” from ever loading.
It’s a very simple test to do, but this simple check can literally save you thousands of dollars.
What is Automated Adblock Tester?
It’s a simple automated test that works like a speed tester tool — all you have to do is paste the URL you want to test, then you’ll get back two screenshots (one with adblocker, one without) so you can visually inspect the page for any bugs. Additionally, we also display the load times for each screenshot (an interesting fact you’ll notice is adblocker usually loads web pages way quicker!).
How Automated Adblock Tester works
We spin up two Chromes, one with ublock Origin chrome extension installed, and one without any adblocker. Then we take the URL you give us and and load it into the two Chromes.
Pricing? Nope, it’s free
But we’d appreciate it if you gave us a social media shoutout! 🙂
Why does the page with adblocker load so much quicker?
Because adblocker prevents many extra scripts, images, CSS from even loading. By the way, it is a good idea to install an adblocker tool like ublock origin if you haven’t done so already.
Can you give us feedback?
Is this adblocker tester tool useful to you? Would you use it? How often? What kind of websites of web pages would you use it for?
Would you be interested in a tool to monitor a web page for adblocker bugs?
Follow us on twitter @web_bug_experts. For any questions or bug reports, please email hello@bugmuse.com