Xiaomi, Redmi and POCO smartphone owners often encounter intrusive interface elements that appear after watching photos or videos. Instead of a clean gallery screen, the system offers to watch “similar” videos or opens a built-in player with banner ads, which is annoying, distracts from working with personal files and reduces the overall speed of interaction with the device.
The problem is that the company has aggressively monetized its services, particularly the Mi Video app and the MIUI (or HyperOS) shell, which analyzes your actions and tries to keep users' attention within the ecosystem by feeding content from online sources, and fortunately, most of these features can be manually deactivated by returning the gallery to its original appearance.
In this article, we will look at all the known ways to eliminate intrusive recommendations, we will look at the settings of the Gallery app itself, the parameters of the video player, and also touch on the privacy issues that are often the source of data collection for targeted offers, you will learn to fully control what you see on the screen of your smartphone.
The Nature of Intrusive Recommendations in MIUI and HyperOS
To effectively combat the problem, you need to understand the source. In Xiaomi smartphones, it is often not the gallery itself that plays and recommends videos, but the associated Mi Video service that is responsible for online content that pops up on top of local files, and the system thinks that the user will be interested in watching something else based on their browsing history.
And then there's the smart sorting and image analysis feature, which requires a network connection, and while the phone scans your photos to create People, Places or Events albums, it also gets data on which ad units to show, and turning them off requires a holistic approach, because the settings are scattered across different menus.
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Before making changes, make sure you have the latest version of the Gallery and Security app installed, as the location of menu items may change with system updates.
It is important to distinguish between local recommendations (based on your files) and online recommendations (advertising and content from the Internet), the former can be minimized by denying access to the network, the latter by disabling the personalization of advertising in the system settings of your Mi Account account.
Disabling recommendations in the Gallery annex
The first step is to set up the app itself, which is where you're going to be smearing media, and in the latest versions of the shell, the interface is more congested, but the switches are still available, so you need to remove the tabs and disable data collection to improve the service.
Go to the Gallery app and find the profile icon or three dots in the corner of the screen. In the menu that opens, select Settings. Here you're interested in the privacy or sharing section, and that's where the key switches are hidden.
Find the option to "Receive recommendations" or "Show ads." The name may differ from MIUI to version, but the meaning remains the same. You should also turn off the feature "Improving image analysis" if you are not using cloud albums, which will prevent the metadata of your photos from being sent to the company's servers.
☑️ Gallery settings
After making changes, it is recommended to completely close the application. To do this, go to the menu of running tasks and swipe the gallery card. When you re-enter, the interface should become cleaner, and pop-ups with suggestions disappear.
Setup and clean up the Mi Video app
Mi Video is often the main source of annoyance, and it's the default app on all the brand's devices, and it's deeply integrated, and it's responsible for playing video files and, unfortunately, for showing online content.
You need to enter the settings of the player itself. Open Mi Video, click on the profile icon or menu, then select Settings. In this section, you need to find Online Services or Personalization. Move the slider to the Off position. This action will prevent the application from downloading newsfeeds and advertising blocks.
⚠️ Note: After online services are disabled, Mi Video will no longer automatically search for movie covers and download subtitles from the Internet.
If simple settings didn’t work, you can go a more radical way to clear the app data. This will return the player to the post-purchase state by removing the accumulated recommendation cache. Go to Settings → Apps → All apps, find in the Mi Video list and select Clear → Clear Everything.
Another effective method is to restrict access rights. In the same app settings menu, find the "Other permissions" or "Access to the network" section. Disable Mi Video from Wi-Fi and mobile Internet. Without a network connection, the app will not physically be able to download advertising recommendations, but will continue to work perfectly with files stored in the phone's memory.
Managing permissions and network access
Modern smartphones allow you to flexibly manage the network activity of each installed application, a powerful tool to combat intrusive content, if you use a gallery and video player primarily to view local files, there is no point in giving them access to the Internet.
To implement this method, open Settings → Apps → All apps. In the list, look for Gallery and Mi Video. Go to the settings of each and find Activity Control or Other Permissions. Here you will see switches for Wi-Fi and Mobile Internet.
Turn off both access options. Now, when you run the gallery, the system can issue a warning that the app is trying to access the network. Choose the "Disable" option and tick "Remember my choice" to ensure that background processes do not load the ad modules.
| Annex | Permits required | Excessive permits | Action. |
|---|---|---|---|
| gallery | Memory, Photo | Wi-Fi, Mob network, Geolocation | Ban the network |
| Mi Video | Memory, Audio. | Wi-Fi, Mob. Network, Microphone | Ban the network |
| Security | Systemic | Recommendations, Advertising | Disable MSA |
| Conductor | Memory. | Wi-Fi, Mob. | Ban the network |
This approach not only removes recommendations, but also saves traffic and battery life, and apps will not waste resources on background updates to news feeds or usage analytics.
Disabling System Advertising and MSA
Xiaomi’s system-based applications are managed by a special MSA (MIUI System Ads) process, which is the most effective way to remove ads from the entire shell, including the gallery.
The procedure requires several steps. First go to Settings → Passwords and Security → Access to personal data. Find the msa list and turn off the switch. The system will ask you to wait 10 seconds, after which the "Cancel" button will become active. Press it.
What if the “Revoke” button is inactive or an error occurs?
Next, disable ad personalization. Go to Settings → Passwords & Security → Access to Personal Data (or some versions of Privacy → Advertising Services) Find Ad Personalization and turn it off. This will prevent the system from using your data to target ads.
Also worth checking is the settings of the Security app. Open it, click on the settings gear, and find "Get recommendations." Turn it off. It's through the Security app that push notifications often come with suggestions to clear memory or speed up the phone that lead to pages with ads.
Use of third-party alternatives
If the built-in tools don’t work out the way they want or seem too complicated, you can always turn to third-party solutions. Google Play offers a lot of great galleries and video players that are ad-free and faster than standard ones.
Apps like Google Photos, Simple Gallery (or its forks since the original was sold) or A Gallery are great for viewing photos, offering a user-friendly interface, cloud synchronization and no intrusive recommendations at all.
For video content, the best alternatives are VLC Player, MX Player or Nova Video Player. These players support all formats, have powerful codecs and do not try to impose online cinemas on you. You can install them and assign them by default to open video files.
⚠️ Note: When installing a third-party gallery, the system may insist on returning a standard application. To avoid this, select Always from the app selection menu when opening the photo to lock the action into the new program.
Using third-party software often solves the problem dramatically, eliminating the dependence on MIUI updates that can return ad modules to system applications.
Resetting and extreme measures
In the rare cases where recommendations are caused by software failure or system files corruption, resetting application settings helps, not deleting your personal photos and videos, but returning all system programs to their original state.
You can reset via Settings → Apps → All apps. Select Gallery, click Clear, and select Settings Reset. Repeat the same for Mi Video. You will then need to reconfigure access rights and preferences.
If that didn't work, consider removing system component updates: Go to the app's settings, click three dots in the corner, and select "Delete Updates," which will roll back the app to the factory version, which may be less ad-driven, though devoid of new features.
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Comprehensive MSA disabling, denial of network access for system applications and use of third-party players are guaranteed to eliminate recommendations in 99% of cases.
Remember that after major operating system updates, some settings may reset. Check privacy settings periodically to stay in "digital hygiene."