How to remove advertising in the carousel of Xiaomi wallpaper: the complete guide

Xiaomi and Redmi smartphone owners often face a situation where, after unlocking the device, instead of the expected clean desktop or usual wallpaper, a bright banner appears on the screen. This phenomenon has become a hallmark of the MIUI brand shell, which, unfortunately, aggressively monetizes its free services. Users notice that advertising can appear in different places, but most annoying is its invasion of the system wallpaper carousel.

Advertising integrations are built deep into system processes, and simply removing the app won't help.Advertising content is loaded through system services like msa and miui daemon, which are by default active on all global firmware versions.To regain comfort of use and stop seeing offers of online stores or games every time you turn on the screen, you need to perform a series of sequential actions in the settings.

In this article, we will take a look at all the ways to eliminate intrusive marketing, not only the basic settings, but also the deeper system changes that are guaranteed to clean the interface. It is important to understand that the layout of menu items may vary slightly depending on the version of Android and the shell modification.

The nature of advertising in the MIUI system

The main source of unwanted content is the MSA (MIUI System Ads) service, which is responsible for collecting user preferences and displaying targeted ads in various sections of the interface, and the wallpaper carousel is just one of the channels that developers are actively using to monetize budget and mid-budget devices.

In addition to the MSA service, Glance or the built-in Wallpaper app are responsible for offerings in the lock feed, which are often updated automatically through the GetApps store, returning advertising functions even after they are manually disabled, so combating advertising requires a comprehensive approach and periodic checks of settings.

It’s worth noting that in recent versions of HyperOS firmware and the updated MIUI, ad algorithms have become more sophisticated, and ads can now masquerade as news notifications or suggestions for system optimization, and understanding which component generates a pop-up is the first step to eliminating it.

⚠️ Note: Complete removal of system components through ADB This can cause some features to work unstable, such as Find Device or Automatic Theme Update. Use this method only if you are confident in your actions.

Disabling recommendations in the Security Appendix and the MSA

Before you set up the wallpaper itself, you need to shut down the main channel of advertising data, this is done by disabling advertising personalization and limiting the MSA service. Without this step, any other settings can be reset the next system update.

To start, go to your phone's settings and look for the Password and Security section, and you're interested in the Access and Privacy section, and you'll find the Receive References switch and put it inactive, and the system can ask you a few times about your decision, insisting on the benefits of personalized content.

Next, you should find the Ads item in the menu (usually at the bottom of the settings list or in the “Additional” section). You should activate the “Disable Personalized Ads” option here. This action will not remove the ads completely, but will make them less intrusive and stop collecting data about your interests for targeting.

• 🔒 Go to Settings. → Password and security → Access data and disable recommendations.
• 📉 Find the Advertising section and activate the Cutting Personalization Toggle.
• 🚫 In the search for settings, enter msa and turn off the “Receive recommendations” switch in the window that appears.
• ⏳ When disconnected MSA a countdown timer of 10 seconds will appear, after which you need to click "Disable».

After these steps are done, the system may need to restart, which is normal because the key parameters of the ad modules change. If the MSA switch is turned on again after the reboot, repeat the procedure 2-3 times - this is a known bug that is often solved by multiple application of settings.

Setting up wallpaper carousel and removing Glance

The main culprit for images of text on a locked screen is most often Glance or a similar content provider (such as Lockscreen Magazine), which is built into the Themes or Wallpaper app and works independently of the main gallery.

To get rid of this, open the Themes app (an icon with a brush or package). Click on the profile avatar in the upper right corner and select Settings. In this menu, you need to find the Wallpaper Carousel or Wallpaper Carousel and turn it off completely. If you have a separate Glance service installed, it is also advisable to find it in the list of applications and turn it off.

In some regions and firmware versions, the path may differ, for example, in HyperOS, the settings may be in the “Block Screen” section, where you should find the option “Get content from the Internet” or “Recommendations” and turn it off, which will prevent new advertising images from downloading from the network.

The way to disable in new versions:


Settings → Lock screen → Wallpaper carousel → Disconnect

If standard methods fail to disable the service, you can try to limit its background activity. Go to Settings → Apps → All Apps, find Wallpaper Carousel or Glance, go to Battery and select No Restrictions (to allow work if you need to configure) or, conversely, Hard Restriction (to prohibit background launch).

Removing System Applications Through ADB

For advanced users who want to securely remove ad modules, there is a method of using Android Debug Bridge (ADB), which allows you to remove system applications that are not removed through the normal interface.

First, activate the developer mode. To do this, click on the build number 7 times in the About Phone section. Then in Advanced Settings, turn on USB Debugging. Connect your smartphone to your PC and type a command to delete the com.miui.misys or com.miui.yellowpage package if they are responsible for advertising in your area.

⚠️ Warning: Removing critical system packages (such as those associated with a phone or messages) can lead to a device "brick" or endless reboot.

To remove a particular carousel component, use the following command in the terminal:

adb shell pm uninstall -k --user 0 com.miui.miwallpaper

This command will remove the user portion of the wallpaper application for the current user without affecting the system partition completely. If necessary, you can restore the application with the command adb shell cmd package install-existing com.miui.miwallpaper. This method is most effective for combating deep system integrations of advertising.

Alternative methods of blocking through DNS

If you don't want to go into deep system settings or use a computer, the effective method is to block ad servers at the network level. DNS-address.

Go to Wi-Fi or mobile settings (depending on where ads appear most often). Find DNS settings (for Wi-Fi: click on network name → Change → Show additional settings → DNS). Select Manual and type in the address of the server blocking ads, such as dns.adguard.com.

This method blocks requests to known ad servers, including Xiaomi servers, and the advantage of this method is that it does not require root rights and works for all applications at once. However, if advertising content is loaded from the same domains as useful features (for example, downloading new themes), there may be problems with displaying legitimate content.

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Use the AdGuard app for Android to automatically configure local VPN-filter that blocks ads in all apps without the need to configure DNS manually for each network.

Possible problems and solutions

Users often experience a situation where after all the actions taken, the ad returns. This may be due to automatic updates of system components through the GetApps store. To prevent this, go to the settings of the GetApps store, go to Settings, and turn off auto-update applications, especially system ones.

Another problem may be regional alignment: In some regions (e.g. India or Indonesia), the default number of ads is higher, and changing the region in settings ("Additional" → "Region") to a country with less aggressive policies (e.g., the United States or European countries) can reduce the frequency of ad units.

If the ad continues to appear as pop-ups after installing a particular app, it is likely that it is the culprit, not Xiaomi's system. Check out newly installed programs, especially flashlights, memory cleaners and "accelerators," and delete them.

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Integrated approach including shutdown MSA, carousel setting and use DNS-Filtering gives 99% guarantee of getting rid of advertising in the Internet MIUI.

In conclusion, the fight against advertising in MIUI is an ongoing process, firmware updates can bring back old settings or add new revenue streams for the company, and regular checks of the above points will help keep the interface of your smartphone clean.