This Safari Extension Can Block Unwanted Content on Any Website.
Lately, I’ve been trying to avoid visiting news sites as much as possible. It’s impossible to endlessly read articles about crimes, wars, and other injustices in the world, and I often want to filter out news that doesn’t interest me. I do this largely on social media , some of which allow you to block posts containing certain keywords, while others require a browser extension .
However, the problem persists across the internet as a whole: I can’t open any major news site without seeing repeated mentions of the poor decisions of billionaires and politicians or the tragic consequences of climate change, and I’ve been searching for a way to somehow protect myself from the onslaught of despair. Finally, I found an effective method by using Filtre , a recently launched Safari extension that lets you hide pages containing keywords you’d prefer to avoid. The concept is simple: create your list of keywords, and the extension will take care of the rest. It works quite well in most cases, and I recommend giving it a try—your mental health will thank you.
How to set up Filtre on all your Apple devices
Filtre works on iPhone, iPad, and Mac, and a single purchase unlocks the extension’s features on all three platforms. You can start with a week-long free trial, after which the app costs $1.50 per month, $9 per year, or $28 as a one-time purchase. Once you’ve decided, setup is simple. Launch the app, grant Filtre permission to access websites, and begin adding keywords you want to block. Extensions like these aren’t very useful if they don’t sync filters across devices, and I’m glad Filtre supports iCloud syncing. In my tests, it instantly synced filters between my Mac and iPhone.
Use this extension to filter out noise or avoid spoilers.
There are many ways to use an extension like Filtre, but I primarily use it to limit access to political news. It’s easy to set up multiple keywords that block politicians’ names, and the extension lets you choose how to hide these headlines. By default, it hides all mentions of the selected keywords, but you can also choose “Dark” or “Grayscale.” “Dark” keeps the headlines intact but blocks the keywords and reduces their opacity to make them easier to skim. “Grayscale” converts any part of the webpage containing your keywords to a black and white version. You can customize these settings in the “Default Settings” tab of the Filtre app (which will appear in the app drawer on your iPhone/iPad or be searchable in Finder on a Mac).
Customize various personalization options
While universal filters are used by default, you can also create different filter sets for different websites. For example, if you visit a website about movies or video games, you could create a filter set to hide spoilers for Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey or Grand Theft Auto 6 only on those websites.
In Filtre’s “Site Settings” tab, you can configure different filters for each website you frequently visit or disable certain filter sets on specific websites. The extension makes it easy to export filter sets, which is convenient for sharing your block lists with others and for those who want to avoid iCloud syncing. You can send your filter list via AirDrop and download it to another device.
I noticed a few minor limitations when using the extension. For example, I deleted the Instagram app from my devices, so when I need to access the site, I open it in Safari. Filtre didn’t seem to affect my Instagram feed at all. Since most social networks now allow keyword muting, this limitation didn’t bother me too much. (On the plus side, Filtre also works with Reddit, although it started hiding my entire feed when I switched to the old version of Reddit .)
Filtre is undergoing privacy testing.
My biggest concern about browser extensions is the amount of data they can access. For Filtre to work effectively on the web, you’ll need to grant it permission to access every website you visit, which can seem rather intrusive. However, developer Jeffrey Kuiken has explicitly stated that the app doesn’t collect any of your data and even stores all your filters only locally and in your linked iCloud account. This same developer also created Noir , an extension that enables dark mode for every website you visit in Safari , and has earned the community’s trust with a transparent business model and regular updates.