HackerReposA FIELD GUIDE TO OPEN SOURCE
ProSponsor the shelf♧ 0
← Back to top all-time
gorhill
uMatrix
JavaScript2014–2025
gorhill / uMatrix · Archived

uMatrix

uMatrix: Point and click matrix to filter net requests according to source, destination and type

Explore on GitHubRead Hacker News discussions
102Distinct people
123Mentions
4Explicit recommenders
4.7KGitHub stars
REPOSITORY AT A GLANCE

What to know before exploring

What it is

uMatrix: Point and click matrix to filter net requests according to source, destination and type

GitHub

Where it is used

No documented product use was verified in the last source check.

What people are saying

I love uMatrix, but all evidence is that they stopped developing it in 2021. https://github.com/gorhill/uMatrix I don't know the implications of that, it's the only tool I've…

neltnerb used a recommendation phrase. 4 indexed comments match. This is a phrase match, not a verdict.

No classified warning is attached to this page. Read the discussions before treating silence as approval.

Also in these discussions

Mentioned in the same Hacker News threads. That is not proof they are substitutes.

This week on Hacker News

Nov 8–Nov 15 UTC · Direct repository links and separately labeled related project stories. Indexed through 11/15/2026, 8:01:28 AM UTC.

No direct repository links were found in the indexed HN discussions over the past seven days. Older discussions are available below.

Mentions over time

HN mentions by year123 dated mentions

Observed mentions: 2014-12-27 13:39:25 UTC to 2025-12-17 19:45:41 UTC.

01020302014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 0 submissions, 2 comments20142015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 15 mentions; 0 submissions, 15 comments2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 18 mentions; 0 submissions, 18 comments2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 16 mentions; 0 submissions, 16 comments2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 27 mentions; 1 submissions, 26 comments2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 12 mentions; 0 submissions, 12 comments20192020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 9 mentions; 1 submissions, 8 comments2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 11 mentions; 3 submissions, 8 comments2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 8 mentions; 0 submissions, 8 comments2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 3 mentions; 0 submissions, 3 comments2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 0 submissions, 2 comments2025

Counts come from the repository’s dated source evidence. Index cutoff: 2026-11-02 08:16:59 UTC.

View mention counts and date ranges
UTC ranges include their start and exclude their end. Select a period to filter the source evidence.
PeriodStart (UTC)End (exclusive, UTC)MentionsSubmissionsComments
20142014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC202
20152015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC15015
20162016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC18018
20172017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC16016
20182018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC27126
20192019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC12012
20202020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC918
20212021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC1138
20222022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC808
20232023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC303
20242024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20252025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC202

From the project README

An excerpt from the repository, fetched Nov 13, 2026.

Read the project’s introduction
uMatrix Definitely for advanced users. Keep Github issues for actual bugs. User support is /r/uMatrix. Forked and refactored from HTTP Switchboard. Install manually the latest release, or install from: Firefox AMO To help find issues with ongoing development: uMatrix dev build in Releases (click the latest uMatrix.webext.signed.xpi link of the last pre-resease.) Chrome store To help find issues with ongoing development: uMatrix dev build in Chrome store Opera store You may contribute with translation work: For in-app strings, on Crowdin: uMatrix on Crowdin. For description (to be used in AMO, Chrome store, etc.), submit a pull request. Reference description is here (feel free to improve as you wish, I am not a writer). HTTP Switchboard's documentation is still relevant, except for uMatrix's differences with HTTP Switchboard. You may contribute with documentation: uMatrix's wiki. Warnings Regarding broken sites uMatrix does not guarantee that sites will work fine: it is for advanced users who can figure how to un-break sites, because essentially uMatrix is a firewall which works in relaxed block-all/allow-exceptionally mode out of the box: it is not unexpected that sites will break. So this means do not file issues to report broken sites when the sites are broken because uMatrix does its job as expected. I will close any such issue without further comment. Using uMatrix logger is key to un-break sites: the logger will show you all that uMatrix does internally. I expect there will be community driven efforts for users to help each others. If uMatrix had a home, I would probably set up a forum, but I do not plan for such thing, I really just want to code, not manage web sites. If you need help to un-break a site when using uMatrix, you can try Wilders Security, where you are likely to receive help if needed, whether by me or other users. uMatrix can be set to work in allow-all/block-exceptionally mode with a single click on the all cell in the global scope *, if you prefer to work this way. This will of course break less sites, but you would then lose all the benefits which comes with block-all/allow-exceptionally mode -- though you will still benefit from the 62,000+ blacklisted hostnames by default. License GPLv3.
Read the full README on GitHub

What Hacker News says

15 sources
ryuuchin·Nov 21, 2015
> I block their Scripts, only temporarily allow if I need them, I don't keep cookies for longer than my current session except for Fastmail, I use VPN, have no DNS-Leak and WebRTC Detection turned off (last I checked you could not turn WebRTC Detection off in Chrome and the Extensions promising to do that were not working). It's been possible to disable multiple webrtc routes since M42[1]. uBlock exposes this option as a checkbox in its main settings. > And that's also why I use Mozilla Firefox. Not because it's the technically better browser, but I have trust in Mozilla and their API just allows capabilities Chrome isn't capable of (that's why there is no NoScript in Chrome and no, there is no NoScript-Alternative in Chrome with the same features and capabilities, look it up). The only thing Chrome/Chromium cannot block are inline scrip
Read the rest
t tags[2]. Inline script tags should apparently be considered cosmetic filtering according to [2]. Other than the above exception you can pretty close to blocking everything you could in Firefox with uBlock[3]/uMatrix[4]. Unless you're referring to something else? With uMatrix you can get basically the same granularity that you can with NoScript just in a much nicer looking interface (which is available for Firefox now as well). > Back when I used both Chrome and Firefox side by side, Firefox for example would turn off some Add-Ons/Extensions in Private Browsing Mode, while Chrome would not. I guess we all can grasp what most likely was the reason for it (Add-Ons/Extensions should not be able to obtain information from the user if in private browsing). Chrome extensions will by default NOT be allowed in incognito mode. I don't know what you observed but you must have explicitly allowed this behavior. [1] https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=457629 [2] https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Inline-script-tag-fil... [3] https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock [4] https://github.com/gorhill/uMatrix
In Popular Google Chrome extensions are constantly tracking you by default
tetraodonpuffer·Aug 21, 2015
that was what I thought as well, however I went to the umatrix github page and if you look at the top it links this page[1] that discusses how umatrix needs permission to disable prefetching so no network connections are made for blocked sites, which seems to imply it can do the pre-emptive blocking as opposed to just hiding of elements. I am wondering though now if I am mixing things up in my brain and the issues were with safari add-ons as opposed to chrome/chromium: there is no umatrix for safari[2] that I can see, ublock seems available but not ublock origin, but I am not sure if ublock on safari just hides or actually pre-emptively blocks. [1] https://github.com/gorhill/uMatrix/releases/tag/0.9.1.2 [2] https://github.com/gorhill/uMatrix/issues/96
In The Future of Developing Firefox Add-ons
seanp2k2·Jul 1, 2015
No disagreement on Ghostery; that got uninstalled real fast when I figured out what they were really up to. While I agree that NoScript helps, it doesn't prevent everything either: https://thehackerblog.com/the-noscript-misnomer-why-should-i... I used to be a big RequestPolicy believer, but single-page apps (which feels like saying "horseless carriages" in mid-2015) make it a lot of work. https://github.com/gorhill/uMatrix/wiki/Changes-from-HTTP-Sw... is the best thing I've found if you're into granular control over sites. uBlock also has an ~"I'm an advanced user" option which will give you a little more blunt but still useful control over cross-site requests.
In Firefox 41 will use less memory when running AdBlock Plus
Direct·Jan 20, 2015
This is awesome! I recently read this ticket[1] mentioning that porting of µBlock seems to be a starting point for gorhill to port µMatrix. In my perfect world, I would be using Firefox with nothing but µMatrix, as it is right now I'm having to use Chrome with µMatrix and sadly can't get rid of µBlock until µMatrix can hide blocked frames. Still, getting closer to that perfect world! The work done by gorhill is amazing. [1]: https://github.com/gorhill/uMatrix/issues/73
In µBlock for Firefox
tasqa·Jan 1, 2015
I can highly recommend µBlock as a alternative on ABP. The developer has written a whole page on the github wiki regarding performance implications of ABP [1]. The more advanced extension µMatrix is also very much worth checking out. It is kind of a alternative of Noscript/RequestPolicy in one on chrome based browsers[2].The developer is very serious with the development and responds quickly on issues. [1] https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/%C2%B5Block-vs.-ABP:-... [2] https://github.com/gorhill/uMatrix
In Privoxy – a non-caching web proxy with advanced filtering capabilities

MAKE YOURSELF AT HOME

A few shortcuts

/
Search the collection
?
Open this guide
Esc
Close dialogs and navigation

Your saved repositories and interests stay in this browser.