Zen

Zen: Your Comprehensive Ad-Blocker and Privacy Guard

There is, simply, no way, to ignore privacy. Because a citizenry’s freedoms are interdependent, to surrender your own privacy is really to surrender everyone’s.

Edward Snowden, Permanent Record

Zen is an open-source system-wide ad-blocker and privacy guard for Windows, macOS, and Linux. It works by setting up a proxy that intercepts HTTP requests from all applications, and blocks those serving ads, tracking scripts that monitor your behavior, malware, and other unwanted content. By operating at the system level, Zen can protect against threats that browser extensions cannot, such as trackers embedded in desktop applications and operating system components. Zen comes with many pre-installed filters, but also allows you to easily add hosts files and EasyList-style filters, enabling you to tailor your protection to your specific needs.

Winget

Zen is available via Winget (Windows Package Manager) (opens in a new tab). To install, run:

Screenshots

Request history Filter list manager

Request history shows all requests blocked by Zen. Each request can be inspected to see which filter and rule blocked it.

Zen comes with many pre-installed filters. You can also add your own by providing a URL to a hosts file or an EasyList-style filter.

Special Thanks

Zen exists thanks to the support of many incredible people and organizations, including:

• Our contributors

• Our sponsors

• SignPath (opens in a new tab) and SignPath Foundation (opens in a new tab), who generously provide a free Windows certificate and code signing