How to permanently remove ads on Xiaomi Mi 9T: from system banners to push notifications

Xiaomi Mi 9T (also known as Redmi K20 in some regions) remains a popular smartphone even years after its release. However, owners often face intrusive advertising in the shell of MIUI — banners in settings, push notifications from system applications and even advertising in the call menu. In this article, we will discuss 5 proven ways to remove ads on Xiaomi Mi 9T without losing functionality, including hidden settings, disabling telemetry and alternative firmware.

It's important to understand that some of the ads are built into MIUI system services and can't be removed by standard methods, but with a combination of settings, disabling unnecessary services and third-party tools, you can minimize the ad impressions, and we tested all the methods on current firmware versions (including MIUI 14 and HyperOS), and only selected those that work without root rights.

1. disable personalized advertising in MIUI settings

The first step is to deactivate the targeted ad mechanisms that Xiaomi uses to display banners, which won’t remove all ads, but will significantly reduce their number, especially in system applications like Security or Themes.

Go to: Settings → Google → Advertising (if the item is missing, see spoiler below).

Turn off the option “Personalized Ads” and reset the ad ID (Reset button) here, which will block the collection of data about your actions to show targeted ads.

Then go back to the basic settings and go to: Settings → Special features → Services for users with disabilities → Advertising Notifications.

Turn off all the switches in this section – this will block some of the system notifications with ads.

• 🔍 Check the apps: Go to Settings → Annexes → Manage applications and manually disable notifications for Msa (Mobile Services Ads), Mi Video, Mi Browser and Themes.
• 📱 Reset your ad settings: In the same Google section → Advertising click Reset ID – this will reset all collected data for targeting.
• 🔄 Update Google Services: Outdated versions of Google Play Services may ignore privacy settings.Update them through Play Store.

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If banners continue to appear after personalized ads are turned off, try temporarily disabling mobile data for Msa and Miui Daemon apps in your traffic settings.

2 Manual removal of system applications without root (ADB-method)

Some Xiaomi apps (Msa, Analytics, Yellow Pages) are responsible for displaying ads, but they cannot be removed by standard means. ADB (Android Debug Bridge can be uninstalled without root rights.

For this:

1. Activate Developer Mode: Go to Settings → About Phone and 7 times click on MIUI Version. Return to Settings → Additional → For Developers and enable USB Debugging.
2. Connect your phone to your PC, install it. ADB-Drivers and open the command line in the folder with the platform-tools.
3. Enter the command to check the connection: adb devices If the device is displayed, execute commands to remove advertising packages (one by one):

adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.miui.analytics


adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.xiaomi.midrop




adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.miui.systemAdSolution




adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.miui.yellowpage

Note: Deleting the com.miui.systemAdSolution package may cause some system utilities (e.g. Security) to malfunction.If problems arise after deleting, restore the application with the command adb shell cmd package install-existing com.miui.systemAdSolution.

Install ADB-PC drivers

Enable debugging over USB on your phone

Download platform-tools from the official Android website

Create a backup copy of important data

Check the list of packages with the command adb shell pm list packages | grep 'miui\|xiaomi'-->

3. Blocking advertising domains through hosts file

One of the most effective ways is to redirect advertising domains to “empty" IP-address (127.0.0.1) via hosts file, which blocks banner loading at the network level without affecting system processes.

For the Xiaomi Mi 9T, you can use apps like AdAway (requires root) or Blokada (works via VPN) without root.

1. Download Blokada from the official website (not from the Play Store, as there is a stripped-down version).
2. Install and allow creation VPN-connection.
3. In Blokada settings, select the “Energy” or “Fennec” lock list – these are optimized for Xiaomi.
4. Activate the lock and restart the phone.

An alternative method is to manually edit hosts via Termux (requires minimal command line knowledge):

pkg update && pkg install tsu


tsu




mount -o rw,remount /system




echo "127.0.0.1 ad.mi.com" >> /system/etc/hosts




mount -o ro,remount /system

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Blocking through a hosts file or VPN-applications (e.g. Blokada) do not require root rights and operate at the network level, preventing the download of advertising materials from Xiaomi servers.

4. Resetting Advertising and Telemetry settings (hidden MIUI section)

Xiaomi hides some of the settings related to data collection and display of advertising in a special menu MIUI Hidden Settings.

1. Open the phone app and enter the code: ##6484##
2. In the menu that appears, select MIUI Hidden Settings (if the code doesn't work, try ##64663##).
3. Go to Advertisement and turn off all switches.
4. In the Telemetry section, deactivate the User Experience Program and Diagnostic Data.

These settings are responsible for:

• 📊 Collection of usage statistics (Telemetry)
• 🎯 Personalized advertising based on your actions
• 📢 Push notifications from Xiaomi system services

Banners in MIUI settings

Push notifications from system applications

Advertising in the call/calls menu

Advertising in the annex “Themes”

Other-->

5.Alternative firmware: transition to caste or global version of MIUI

If standard methods don’t work, a radical solution is to install custom firmware (like LineageOS or Pixel Experience) or flash it to a global version of MIUI (if you have Chinese), which will completely remove system advertising, but require unlocking the bootloader and potentially void the warranty.

Comparison of options:

For flashing:

1. Unlock the bootloader through the official Xiaomi tool (requires a Mi Account binding and waits 7-30 days).
2. Download the firmware from Xiaomi.eu (for Mi 9T – Davinci version) or XDA Developers.
3. Install via TWRP (instructions depend on the selected firmware).

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Before you run the firmware, check the model compatibility! Xiaomi Mi 9T has the code name davinci, and Redmi K20 is raphael. Installing firmware for another model will lead to a "brick" (inoperability) of the device.

6.Additional measures: disabling notifications and cleaning the cache

Even after applying basic methods, some of the ads can seep through notifications or cached data, and regular cleaning will help to minimize them:

• 🧹 Cleaning the cache of system applications: Go to Settings → Annexes → Application management and for each of the list below click Clear cache and Clear data: Msa (com.xiaomi.msa.global) Miui Daemon (com.miui.daemon) Topics (com.android.themes) Security (com.miui.securitycenter)
• 🔔 Block Notifications: In the same Application Management section, disable notifications for all applications with the word ad, msa, or analytics in the packet name.
• 🔄 Reset Ads: Repeat the steps from the first section once a month, as Xiaomi may reset some options after updates.

⚠️ Note: Do not clear the data of the com.android.providers.settings application – this will result in resetting all system settings (including wallpaper, sounds and Wi-Fi passwords).

FAQ: Frequent questions about removing ads on Xiaomi Mi 9T