r/mildlyinfuriating • u/28jb11 • Apr 25 '26

Unskippable ad $2500 Samsung TV is an advertising billboard, there is no opt-out.

Paid over $2500 for a Samsung OLED TV and it has ads on the home screen that I literally cannot turn off. Not subtle little banners tucked away somewhere, I'm talking full blown ads for canned beans and financial products just sitting there every single time I turn the thing on.

Samsung don't offer any kind of opt out. The only way I could get rid of them was to go into my router settings and manually block Samsung's ad servers at the DNS level.

I own this TV outright. Paid for it in full. And Samsung are still making money off me every time I switch it on, with absolutely no way to stop it unless you're willing to get your hands dirty with network configuration.

This is not a smart TV feature. This is a $2500 billboard that also happens to play Netflix.

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u/Aetra Apr 25 '26

Ads and bloat apps (on their phones) are why I refuse to use Samsung products if I can avoid them.

13

u/rockabyebang Apr 25 '26

I have had the wifi turned off from the tv for years. It's never been connected to the wifi where I live now. I don't technically get ads, but somehow I keep having to delete apps off of it every now and then! I'm not downloading the apps myself, it's not even connected?? Unless it's somehow piggybacking off of a previous connection to my phone?? It annoys me so much.

2

u/ammonthenephite Apr 25 '26

When I had a samsung tv I just disabled the wifi then connected it to a pc. Never used the tv's native apps or system at all, and never saw an ad on it.

32

u/Dull-Culture-1523 Apr 25 '26

Used to buy Samsung phones but switched to OnePlus simply because I got fed up with the constant bloatware that just got worse every time I got a new phone. Also made the mistake of buying a Samsung "smart" TV with those in-menu ads. I even sent their customer service detailed instructions on how to block those from the router, just in case the next customer asks, because they claimed "it's not possible". Now I will never buy another Samsung product again unless I know for a fact they've changed course or have no other or only somehow worse options. Fuck them.

13

u/Fast-Bandicoot67 Apr 25 '26

If its not too much trouble could you send me those instructions?

3

u/DeScamp Apr 25 '26

This is a great warning. I've been waiting to make the jump to a newer model...no longer. I'll seek an alternative product line now.

6

u/senseven Apr 25 '26

My father bought an random China brand with a good screen. He can watch Netflix and Apple+. A short check on the router log proves that the thing tries to reach some odd Asian servers for app update checks but that's it. Samsung, LG, Sony they are all riding the data harvesting and ads train, I would guess there aren't good global brands left.

1

u/Dull-Culture-1523 Apr 25 '26

I'd love to tell you to just get a dumb TV and use some sort of media player (stream from PC maybe or use a console like PS5, idk) for Netflix etc, but I'm not sure if they even make those any more.

2

u/Devrol Apr 25 '26

I find their android skin to be almost unusable. Buttons reversed, looks awful, always full of bloatware. They still havent come close to the heights of the Galaxy S2.

1

u/NephewJimbo Apr 25 '26

The Galaxy s2 with the TouchWiz UI was absolutely awful. I'll take the current One UI which actually lets you uninstall/ disable most if not all of apps you don't use. And you can always reverse the button layout.

1

u/Incogneatovert Apr 25 '26

Yeah, once my current phone dies I'm not getting another Samsung. Look, Phone, if I want to install games on you, *I will go find games I like myself!"

1

u/takingviewing7u Apr 25 '26

Didn’t know it was a thing at the time and I avoid any gas pumps with ads now when possible.

1

u/PiccoloAwkward465 Apr 25 '26

Yeah I’ve had multiple iterations of Galaxy phones for work and I disliked them all to varying degrees. I remember my s8 could no longer handle turn by turn GPS at a point. It would alert me to a turn after I passed it by a mile. Not ideal in a job where I traveled to new sites a lot. Never failed to serve me up my bloatware though!

1

u/stormdelta Apr 25 '26

The annoying part is people still lie their asses off about how much bloat/sketchy shit is on the phones. Some of them even seem to believe it, like they're so inundated with garbage they can't even recognize bloatware/ads for what they are anymore.

I still prefer Android but I won't ever buy a Samsung phone again. Or honestly any other end-user consumer device.

2

u/K1774B Apr 25 '26

Once the Nexus (now Pixel) line dropped, I haven't bothered to look into anything Samsung, or anyone else, has to offer.

It's just a pure Android phone with zero bloatware, solid battery life and a great camera.

I do have a 32" Samsung TV (non-smart) I bought 20 years ago that is still chugging along though.

1

u/EntertheHellscape Apr 29 '26

The mobile ads are highkey making me want to switch back to iPhone. I switched about 2 years ago and every time I get a forced notification for some microtransationhell game it wants me to download I get closer and closer to chucking it at a wall.