hosts README

The project's README from github.com/StevenBlack/hosts. As one markdown file: README.md.

[!IMPORTANT] Cloning this repository can take a long time! You probably just want to start with the latest version, not its whole history since 2018. Therefore you probably want to use git clone --depth 1 ... to save significant time.

[!NOTE] With the exception of issues and PRs regarding changes to hosts/data/StevenBlack/hosts, all other issues regarding the content of the produced hosts files should be made with the appropriate data source that contributed the content in question. The contact information for all of the data sources can be found in the hosts/data/ directory.

Logo

latest release license repo size contributors Build Status Code style: black commits since last release last commit commit activity

Unified hosts file with base extensions

This repository consolidates several reputable hosts files, and merges them into a unified hosts file with duplicates removed. A variety of tailored hosts files are provided.

Therefore this repository is a hosts file aggregator.

Aggregator

Size history

List of all hosts file variants

This repository offers 31 different host file variants, in addition to the base variant, with and without the unified hosts included.

The Non GitHub mirror is the link to use for some hosts file managers like Hostsman for Windows that don't work with GitHub download links.

Host file recipe Readme Raw hosts Unique domains Non GitHub mirror
Unified hosts = (adware + malware) Readme link 80,169 link
Unified hosts + fakenews Readme link 82,638 link
fakenews Readme link 2,187 link
Unified hosts + gambling Readme link 87,083 link
gambling Readme link 6,644 link
Unified hosts + porn Readme link 156,503 link
porn Readme link 76,771 link
Unified hosts + social Readme link 84,227 link
social Readme link 3,808 link
Unified hosts + fakenews + gambling Readme link 89,270 link
fakenews + gambling Readme link 8,837 link
Unified hosts + fakenews + porn Readme link 158,690 link
fakenews + porn Readme link 78,964 link
Unified hosts + fakenews + social Readme link 86,414 link
fakenews + social Readme link 6,001 link
Unified hosts + gambling + porn Readme link 163,135 link
gambling + porn Readme link 83,415 link
Unified hosts + gambling + social Readme link 90,859 link
gambling + social Readme link 10,452 link
Unified hosts + porn + social Readme link 160,277 link
porn + social Readme link 80,577 link
Unified hosts + fakenews + gambling + porn Readme link 165,322 link
fakenews + gambling + porn Readme link 85,608 link
Unified hosts + fakenews + gambling + social Readme link 93,046 link
fakenews + gambling + social Readme link 12,645 link
Unified hosts + fakenews + porn + social Readme link 162,464 link
fakenews + porn + social Readme link 82,770 link
Unified hosts + gambling + porn + social Readme link 166,909 link
gambling + porn + social Readme link 87,221 link
Unified hosts + fakenews + gambling + porn + social Readme link 169,096 link
fakenews + gambling + porn + social Readme link 89,362 link

Expectation: These unified hosts files should serve all devices, regardless of OS.

Sources of hosts data unified in this variant

Updated hosts files from the following locations are always unified and included:

Host file source Home page Raw hosts License Issues Description
Steven Black's ad-hoc list link raw MIT issues Additional sketch domains as I come across them.
AdAway link raw CC BY 3.0 issues AdAway is an open source ad blocker for Android using the hosts file.
add.2o7Net link raw MIT issues 2o7Net tracking sites based on hostsfile.org content.
add.Dead link raw MIT issues Dead sites based on hostsfile.org content.
add.Risk link raw MIT issues Risk content sites based on hostsfile.org content.
add.Spam link raw MIT issues Spam sites based on hostsfile.org content.
Mitchell Krog's - Badd Boyz Hosts link raw MIT issues Sketchy domains and Bad Referrers from my Nginx and Apache Bad Bot and Spam Referrer Blockers
hostsVN link raw MIT issues Hosts block ads of Vietnamese
KADhosts link raw CC BY-SA 4.0 issues Fraud/adware/scam websites.
minecraft-hosts link raw CC0-1.0 issues Minecraft related tracker hosts
MVPS hosts file link raw CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 issues The purpose of this site is to provide the user with a high quality custom HOSTS file.
Dan Pollock – someonewhocares link raw non-commercial with attribution issues How to make the internet not suck (as much).
Tiuxo hostlist - ads link raw CC BY 4.0 issues Categorized hosts files for DNS based content blocking
UncheckyAds link raw MIT issues Windows installers ads sources sites based on https://unchecky.com/ content.
URLHaus link raw CC0 issues A project from abuse.ch with the goal of sharing malicious URLs.
yoyo.org link raw issues Blocking with ad server and tracking server hostnames.

Extensions

The unified hosts file is optionally extensible. Extensions are used to include domains by category. Currently, we offer the following categories: fakenews, social, gambling, and porn.

Extensions are optional, and can be combined in various ways with the base hosts file. The combined products are stored in the alternates folder.

Data for extensions are stored in the extensions folder. You manage extensions by curating this folder tree, where you will find the data for fakenews, social, gambling, and porn extension data that we maintain and provide for you.

Generate your own unified hosts file

You have three options to generate your own hosts file. You can use our container image, build your own image, or do it in your own environment. Option #1 is easiest if you have Linux with Docker installed.

Option 1: Use our container image (Linux only)

This will replace your /etc/hosts.

We assume you have Docker available on your host. Just run the following command. Set extensions to your preference.

docker run --pull always --rm -it -v /etc/hosts:/etc/hosts \
ghcr.io/stevenblack/hosts:latest updateHostsFile.py --auto \
--replace --extensions gambling porn

If you want to add custom hosts or a whitelist, create either or both files as per the instructions and add the following arguments before ghcr.io/stevenblack/hosts:latest depending on which you wish to use.

-v "path/to/myhosts:/hosts/myhosts" \
-v "path/to/whitelist:/hosts/whitelist" \

You can rerun this exact command later to update based on the latest available hosts (for example, add it to a weekly cron job).

Option 2: Generate your own container image

We provide the Dockerfile used by the previous step, which you can use to create a container image with everything you need. The container will contain Python 3 and all its dependency requirements, and a copy of the latest version of this repository.

Build the Docker container from the root of this repo like this:

docker build --no-cache . -t stevenblack-hosts

Or without cloning (directly from GitHub):

docker build --no-cache https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts.git -t stevenblack-hosts

Then run your command as such:

docker run --rm -it stevenblack-hosts updateHostsFile.py

This will create the hosts file, and remove it with the container when done, so not very useful. You can use the example in option #1 to add volumes so files on your host are replaced.

Option 3: Generate it in your own environment

To generate your own amalgamated hosts files you will need Python 3.6 or later.

First, install the dependencies with:

pip3 install --user -r requirements.txt

Note we recommend the --user flag which installs the required dependencies at the user level. More information about it can be found on pip documentation.

Option 4: Generate it in Google Colab

Spin up a free remote Google Colab environment.

Common steps regardless of your development environment

To run unit tests, in the top-level directory, run:

python3 testUpdateHostsFile.py

The updateHostsFile.py script will generate a unified hosts file based on the sources in the local data/ subfolder. The script will prompt you whether it should fetch updated versions (from locations defined by the update.json text file in each source's folder). Otherwise, it will use the hosts file that's already there.

python3 updateHostsFile.py [--auto] [--replace] [--ip nnn.nnn.nnn.nnn] [--extensions ext1 ext2 ext3]

Command line options

--help, or -h: display help.

--auto, or -a: run the script without prompting. When --auto is invoked,

--backup, or -b: Make a backup of existing hosts file(s) as you generate over them.

--extensions <ext1> <ext2> <ext3>, or -e <ext1> <ext2> <ext3>: the names of subfolders below the extensions folder containing additional category-specific hosts files to include in the amalgamation. Example: --extensions porn or -e social porn.

--flush-dns-cache, or -f: skip the prompt for flushing the DNS cache. Only active when --replace is also active.

--ip nnn.nnn.nnn.nnn, or -i nnn.nnn.nnn.nnn: the IP address to use as the target. Default is 0.0.0.0.

--keepdomaincomments, or -k: true (default) or false, keep the comments that appear on the same line as domains. The default is true.

--noupdate, or -n: skip fetching updates from hosts data sources.

--output <subfolder>, or -o <subfolder>: place the generated source file in a subfolder. If the subfolder does not exist, it will be created.

--replace, or -r: trigger replacing your active hosts

--skipstatichosts, or -s: false (default) or true, omit the standard section at the top, containing lines like 127.0.0.1 localhost. This is useful for configuring proximate DNS services on the local network.

--nogendata, or -g: false (default) or true, skip the generation of the readmeData.json file used for generating readme.md files. This is useful if you are generating host files with additional whitelists or blacklists and want to keep your local checkout of this repo unmodified.

--nounifiedhosts: false (default) or true, do not include the unified hosts file in the final hosts file. Usually used together with --extensions.

--compress, or -c: false (default) or true, Compress the hosts file ignoring non-necessary lines (empty lines and comments) and putting multiple domains in each line. Reducing the number of lines of the hosts file improves the performances under Windows (with DNS Client service enabled).

--minimise, or -m: false (default) or true, like --compress, but puts each domain on a separate line. This is necessary because many implementations of URL blockers that rely on hosts files do not conform to the standard which allows multiple hosts on a single line.

--blacklist <blacklistfile>, or -x <blacklistfile>: Append the given blacklist file in hosts format to the generated hosts file.

--whitelist <whitelistfile>, or -w <whitelistfile>: Use the given whitelist file to remove hosts from the generated hosts file.

How do I control which sources are unified?

Add one or more additional sources, each in a subfolder of the data/ folder, and specify the url key in its update.json file.

Add one or more optional extensions, which originate from subfolders of the extensions/ folder. Again the url in update.json controls where this extension finds its updates.

Create an optional blacklist file. The contents of this file (containing a listing of additional domains in hosts file format) are appended to the unified hosts file during the update process. A sample blacklist is included, and may be modified as you need.

How do I include my own custom domain mappings?

If you have custom hosts records, place them in file myhosts. The contents of this file are prepended to the unified hosts file during the update process.

The myhosts file is not tracked by git, so any changes you make won't be overridden when you git pull this repo from origin in the future.

How do I prevent domains from being included?

The domains you list in the whitelist file are excluded from the final hosts file.

The whitelist uses partial matching. Therefore if you whitelist google-analytics.com, that domain and all its subdomains won't be merged into the final hosts file.

The whitelist is not tracked by git, so any changes you make won't be overridden when you git pull this repo from origin in the future.

How can I contribute hosts records?

If you discover sketchy domains you feel should be included here, here are some ways to contribute them.

Option 1: contact one of our hosts sources

The best way to get new domains included is to submit an issue to any of the data providers whose home pages are listed here. This is best because once you submit new domains, they will be curated and updated by the dedicated folks who maintain these sources.

Option 2: Fork this repository, add your domains to Steven Black's personal data file, and submit a pull request

Fork this hosts this repo and add your links to https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts/blob/master/data/StevenBlack/hosts.

Then, submit a pull request.

WARNING: this is less desirable than Option 1 because the ongoing curation falls on us. So this creates more work for us.

Option 3: create your own hosts list as a repo on GitHub

If you're able to curate your own collection of sketchy domains, then curate your own hosts list. Then signal the existence of your repo as a new issue and we may include your new repo into the collection of sources we pull whenever we create new versions.

What is a hosts file?

A hosts file, named hosts (with no file extension), is a plain-text file used by all operating systems to map hostnames to IP addresses.

In most operating systems, the hosts file is preferential to DNS. Therefore if a domain name is resolved by the hosts file, the request never leaves your computer.

Having a smart hosts file goes a long way towards blocking malware, adware, and other irritants.

For example, to nullify requests to some doubleclick.net servers, adding these lines to your hosts file will do it:

# block doubleClick's servers
0.0.0.0 ad.ae.doubleclick.net
0.0.0.0 ad.ar.doubleclick.net
0.0.0.0 ad.at.doubleclick.net
0.0.0.0 ad.au.doubleclick.net
0.0.0.0 ad.be.doubleclick.net
# etc...

We recommend using 0.0.0.0 instead of 127.0.0.1

Traditionally most host files use 127.0.0.1, the loopback address, to establish an IP connection to the local machine.

We prefer to use 0.0.0.0, which is defined as a non-routable meta-address used to designate an invalid, unknown, or non-applicable target.

Using 0.0.0.0 is empirically faster, possibly because there's no wait for a timeout resolution. It also does not interfere with a web server that may be running on the local PC.

Why not use 0 instead of 0.0.0.0?

We tried that. Using 0 doesn't work universally.

Location of your hosts file

To modify your current hosts file, look for it in the following places and modify it with a text editor.

Gentoo

Gentoo users may find sb-hosts in ::pf4public Gentoo overlay

NixOS

To install hosts file on your machine add the following into your configuration.nix:

{
  networking.extraHosts = let
    hostsPath = https://raw.githubusercontent.com/StevenBlack/hosts/master/hosts;
    hostsFile = builtins.fetchurl hostsPath;
  in builtins.readFile "${hostsFile}";
}

Nix Flake

NixOS installations which are managed through flakes can directly use the flake.nix in this repository as an input.

It contains a nixosModule that can be used to install the hosts file locally, as well as a package containing config files for the Unbound DNS server to be used as blocklists.

{
  inputs = {
    nixpkgs.url = "github:NixOS/nixpkgs?ref=$YOUR-REF";
    hosts = {
      url = "github:StevenBlack/hosts"; # or a fork/mirror
      inputs.nixpkgs.follows = "nixpkgs";
    };
  };

  outputs = { self, nixpkgs, hosts }: {
    nixosConfigurations.my-hostname = {
      system = "<architecture>";
      modules = [
        # nixosModule to install hosts file locally:
        hosts.nixosModule
        {
          networking.stevenBlackHosts = {
            enable = true;
            # optionally:
            # enableIPv6 = true;
            # blockFakenews = true;
            # blockGambling = true;
            # blockPorn = true;
            # blockSocial = true;
          };
        }

        # configure unbound to use config as blocklist:
        {
          {
            services.unbound = {
              enable = true;
              settings.server.include = [
                "${hosts.packages.${system}.unbound}/hosts"
                # alternates are also available, e.g. /fakenews, /fakenews-gambling etc.
              ];
            };
          }
        }
      ];
    };
  };
}

Updating hosts file on Windows

(NOTE: See also some third-party Hosts managers, listed below.)

For older versions of Windows

On Linux and macOS, run the Python script. On Windows more work is required due to compatibility issues so it's preferable to run the batch file as follows:

updateHostsWindows.bat

This file MUST be run in command prompt with administrator privileges in the repository directory. In addition to updating the hosts file, it can also replace the existing hosts file, and reload the DNS cache. It goes without saying that for this to work, you must be connected to the internet.

To open a command prompt as administrator in the repository's directory, do the following:

For new versions of Windows

On modern versions of Windows (10 and especially 11) not all features of the aforementioned batch script work (specifically checking if the current shell has administrative priviliges) and therefore a more modern approach is recommended.

The provided updateHostsWindows.ps1 is a Powershell 5.1 script that does the same thing as the batch script, but without the need for the python script, with added options, and uses only built-in commands (self-contained). As with the batch file it MUST be ran with administrative privildges, but it can relaunch itself if not.

To run execute the script type:

.\updateHostsWindows.ps1

into any available Windows command line and for detailed information type:

Get-Help .\updateHostsWindows.ps1 -Full

Newer Windows comes with several issues (that can be overcome) and for more information and solutions please visit the home of this script here.

You can also refer to the "Third-Party Hosts Managers" section for further recommended solutions from third parties.

Warning: Using this hosts file in Windows may require disabling DNS Cache service

Windows has issues with larger hosts files. Recent changes in security within Windows 10 denies access to changing services via other tools except registry hacks. Use the disable-dnscache-service-win.cmd file to make proper changes to the Windows registry. You will need to reboot your device once that's done. See the the comments within the cmd file for more details.

Disabling the DNS Cache Service can cause issues with services and applications like WSL and it's possible to compress the hosts file and negate the need to disable the DNS caching service. You can try the C++ Windows command line tool at Hosts Compress - Windows (the recommended method) or the PowerShell compression script and check out the guide located at the Hosts Compression Scripts repository.

Reloading hosts file

Your operating system will cache DNS lookups. You can either reboot or run the following commands to manually flush your DNS cache once the new hosts file is in place.

The Google Chrome browser may require manually cleaning up its DNS Cache on chrome://net-internals/#dns page to thereafter see the changes in your hosts file. See: https://superuser.com/questions/723703

Windows

Open a command prompt with administrator privileges and run this command:

ipconfig /flushdns

Linux

Open a Terminal and run with root privileges:

macOS

As described in this article, open a Terminal and run:

sudo dscacheutil -flushcache;sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder

Release management

This repository uses release-it, an excellent CLI release tool for GitHub repos and npm packages, to automate creating releases. This is why the package.json and .release-it.json files are bundled.

Goals of this unified hosts file

The goals of this repo are to:

  1. automatically combine high-quality lists of hosts,
  2. provide situation-appropriate extensions,
  3. de-dupe the resultant combined list,
  4. and keep the resultant file reasonably sized.

A high-quality source is defined here as one that is actively curated. A hosts source should be frequently updated by its maintainers with both additions and removals. The larger the hosts file, the higher the level of curation is expected.

It is expected that this unified hosts file will serve both desktop and mobile devices under a variety of operating systems.

Third-Party Hosts Managers

Interesting Applications

Contribute

Please read our Contributing Guide. Among other things, this explains how we organize files and folders in this repository.

We are always interested in discovering well-curated sources of hosts. If you find one, please open an issue to draw our attention.

Before you create or respond to any issue, please read our code of conduct.

Logo by @Tobaloidee Thank you!.

hosts (StevenBlack/hosts)

Searching Database…

31.2K ·GitHub
Hosts
What is this?A community-maintained aggregator that merges many reputable hosts files into one unified blocklist with duplicates removed — the base variant combines adware and malware lists and holds 80,169 entries.
So it's not an app — what exactly do I get?A plain text hosts file that maps unwanted domains to 0.0.0.0, so every app on the machine, not just the browser, fails to reach them. The repo also ships a Python script that generates custom variants.
How do I get it running?Download the raw unified hosts file from the repo and overwrite your system hosts file. On Linux, the ghcr.io/stevenblack/hosts Docker image replaces /etc/hosts in one command — rerun it periodically (a weekly cron job is suggested) to refresh.
Do I need Python or Docker installed to build my own variant?Nothing beyond admin rights if you just use a prebuilt file. To generate your own you need Python 3.6+ with its pip dependencies, Docker on Linux, or a free Google Colab notebook.
Any install pitfalls I should know about?Clone with --depth 1 since the full history is huge. On Windows an 80k+-line file can slow the DNS Client service, so prefer the compressed variant; Windows tools like Hostsman also need the non-GitHub mirror link.
Which systems does it work on?Any OS that honors a hosts file: Windows, macOS, Linux and Android are the usual targets — AdAway, an Android blocker, is one of the merged sources. The Docker route is Linux-only.
What are the optional extensions — porn, gambling, social, fakenews?Category add-ons you can combine with the base file in any mix; 31 ready variants are published, ranging from 80,169 entries (base) up to 169,096 with all four extensions enabled.
Where does the blocklist data actually come from?From about a dozen curated upstream sources — AdAway, MVPS, Dan Pollock's someonewhocares, abuse.ch URLHaus, yoyo.org, KADhosts and others — merged with duplicates removed. Content complaints go to the relevant upstream source, not this repo.
Can I add my own domains or unblock sites it blocks?Yes: put custom records in the myhosts file (prepended), extra blocks in a blacklist file (appended), and exclusions in a whitelist, which removes entries via partial matching. None of these are tracked by git, so your edits survive pulls.
I only care about one category — can I get just that?Yes, every extension is also published standalone, without the unified base — fakenews alone is 2,187 domains and social alone is 3,808 — so you can stay light or build any custom combination yourself.
What are similar projects?anti-AD, dns-blocklists, uBlock, helium, Xray-core, smartdns, dnscrypt-proxy, GitHub520
Which topics is it in?filtering, hosts, anti-tracking, ad-blocker, malware, adblock, network, dns, curated-list, android, privacy, security
Creator
StevenBlack
Size
1.8 GB
Stars
31.2K
Updated
CommitOct 15Release3.16.121Oct 15
Age
14y
Commits · 90 Days