Adguard for Windows Updates & Release Notes

February 28, 2025

This hotfix, as well as the release before it, focuses on filters. Many users have reported a big issue: filters and extensions were gone after updating from the previous version. Rest assured, they are not gone permanently — we always create backups. If you’ve been affected by this issue, please follow the steps below to restore your settings:

Open File Explorer and navigate to the path “%programdata%/adguard/backups”.

Find the backup zip file associated with the 7.19 version. It will be named something like adguard_settings_7.19.... Save this file somewhere.

Uninstall AdGuard, but make sure to keep your settings (don’t check the box Delete settings).

Go back to File Explorer and navigate to “%programdata%/adguard”. Delete the FLM folder and the adguard.db file.

From the zip file you saved in step 2, extract the adguard.db file and copy it to the “%programdata%/adguard” folder.

Finally, install version 7.20.1. Your settings should be restored.

July 4, 2024

We’re happy to share with you the fresh version of AdGuard for Windows! For v7.18, we made it our goal to give you the best possible ad filtering experience, and we’d like to believe we have succeeded.

Let’s start with great news for all Windows 11 users: AdGuard now blocks the ads that Microsoft started incorporating into the Start menu on Windows 11. This feature can be enabled from the Ad Blocker tab of the settings.

Back to fighting more ‘conventional’ ads: we have updated the CoreLibs filtering engine, along with other components. With these updates, we have introduced new modifiers and scriptlets that will help filter developers create better and more powerful filtering rules against ads and trackers. As a bonus, there will be less crashes now! You can be sure that AdGuard will protect you at all times without fail.

But the good news doesn’t stop there! We have also updated our network drivers to improve AdGuard’s compatibility with other network-based apps.

January 30, 2023

Two most important changes in this release: protection is turned on and off faster and DNS protection is now enabled by default. We’ve also fixed some bugs, updated CoreLibs and DnsLibs, and improved the WFP and TDI network drivers.

Protection is turned on and off faster

We’ve significantly reworked everything “under the hood”, thus improving the app performance: protection is now enabled, disabled, and reloaded much faster. Previously, because of the long startup and restart of the protection, the implementation of rules and other protection features could be delayed or could even cause a web resource to “leak” past the protection. Some connections could remain unfiltered. And after all, it was very annoying for the user to watch the long startup of the app. Starting with this version, it won’t happen again.

DNS protection is enabled by default

Now, if you have just installed AdGuard, DNS protection is automatically turned on. By default, the ISP's DNS server is used, and for security, AdGuard DNS filter is enabled: ads, trackers, and requests for malicious domains will be automatically blocked. To increase security, you can always select a DNS server from the list or add a custom one (for example, a private AdGuard DNS server) via Settings → DNS protection. DNS filtering allows AdGuard to catch ads and trackers even before the browser tries to connect to the ad server. So this update has also helped us improve the spee…

October 24, 2022

AdGuard v7.11 for Windows boasts a handful of significant enhancements: AdGuard now can run on ARM-based computers and filter encrypted DNS-over-HTTPS requests. We’ve also added an option to manage (or get to know) AdGuard VPN from within the AdGuard app, updated CoreLibs and DnsLibs, and made the app look and function even better.

[Enhancement] Windows on ARM support #3067

Windows on ARM We’ve added a driver that allows AdGuard to run on ARM-based Windows devices. Now, if you install AdGuard on your computer with a 64-bit ARM processor, we’ll automatically detect this and install the right driver. You can just relax.

[Enhancement] AdGuard VPN management #4204

AdGuard VPN in the AdGuard app

If you already have an AdGuard VPN app installed on your computer, now you’ll be able to open it from your AdGuard app. If you don’t have it yet — here’s a chance to get to know our product closer and download it if you enjoy it. And there’s more yet to come: in future versions, we’re planning to add an option to manage the VPN connection from within the AdGuard app. Stay tuned.

[Enhancement] Filtering of encrypted DNS requests …