Fruit Bat Docs

Lime Blocker

Ad, tracker and cookie-banner blocking, HTTPS-only, and clean links.

Lime Blocker is built in and on from the first page. It blocks ads, trackers and cookie pop-ups, and counts what it saved you on your receipt. Click the lime in the toolbar to see this page’s numbers or Pause Lime Blocker (pausing applies everywhere).

Filter lists and hiding elements#

The first launch downloads Lime Blocker's filter lists, which takes a second or two. After that they're cached, so the blocker starts instantly and works offline.

Keeping the lists fresh#

  • A couple of minutes after launch, and every 6 hours after that, Fruit Bat checks the saved lists. If they're older than 3 days, it downloads new ones and swaps them in without a restart. This covers Orange Blocker's stricter lists too.
  • A download only replaces the old lists if it actually blocks a test ad server, so a broken or empty download can't switch blocking off.
  • If the download fails, the old lists keep working and Fruit Bat tries again at the next check.
  • Settings › Lime Blocker › Filter lists shows how old the lists are and has Update now.

Hide element: right-click a page › Hide element…, then point at a sticky banner, chat bubble or box and click.

  • ↑/↓ pick the box around it or go back, Enter hides it, Esc cancels.
  • Right-click › Undo last hidden element / Show all hidden elements on this site; Settings › Lime Blocker › Hidden elements lists every site.
  • Pausing Lime Blocker shows everything again. Private and Vampire Bat windows use your rules but can't add any, since a rule would record which sites you visited.

HTTPS-Only Mode#

  • What it does: every http:// page is loaded as https:// instead. That covers addresses you type, links you click, bookmarks, history, and redirects that try to drop back to HTTP. Each upgrade counts as a "connection made secure" on your Lime Blocker receipt.
  • When a site can't do HTTPS: a Secure site not available page explains the risk, with Go back or Continue to HTTP site. Fruit Bat remembers the site after you continue.
    • Sites that keep bouncing back to HTTP get this page after a few tries instead of looping.
    • A site that simply doesn't exist gets the normal error page.
  • Never upgraded: your own computer and local network (localhost, *.local, *.lan, 192.168.x.x, 10.x.x.x, 172.16–31.x.x, 127.x, [::1]) and single-word intranet names, so dev servers, routers and NAS boxes keep working.
  • Settings › Privacy › HTTPS-Only Mode: All windows (the default), Private windows only, or Off, plus the list of sites you've allowed over HTTP, each with a ✕ to undo. Exceptions made in private windows are never saved.
  • Where to find it: right-click a link › Copy clean link, right-click a page › Copy clean page link, right-click a bookmark, or ☰ › Copy clean link. The toolbar confirms what it removed, e.g. "removed 3 trackers".
  • What it removes: tracking-only tags such as utm_*, fbclid, gclid, msclkid, Mailchimp/HubSpot/Matomo tags, plus site-specific ones: YouTube and Spotify si, X/Twitter s/t, Amazon's ref junk (including /ref=… in the path), Reddit share_id, Instagram igsh, TikTok, LinkedIn, AliExpress and eBay tags.
  • What it keeps: names like t, s or ref mean something real on most sites, so they're only removed on the sites listed above.
  • Redirect links: Google, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Steam, DuckDuckGo, Reddit and Bing wrappers are unwrapped to the real destination.
  • QR codes always use the clean link.
  • Receipt: stripped tags are counted as "tracking tags stripped".