It's also a way for PMs who own apps to build habit-forming loops. If you download the app, you can send push notifications, deep link from email, etc. "Better experience" and all that, ultimately leading to more ad impressions or a purchases in-app.

And don’t forget tracking scripts too. Another huge reason.

Many users who use mobile adblockers will use one across the entire device (easy on rooted Android) instead of just a browser extension.

I'm pulling these numbers out of a hat, but I would wager users with rooted Android devices are below 1% of the mobile user base, and probably below 0.1% of the total user base including desktop.

On Android, it used to be the case that many ad blocking apps were just Proxy services.

Blokada (https://blokada.org/) acts as a VPN. It slows my connection speeds to a halt.

Counterpoint, installing uBlock in Firefox is a piece of cake, but lots of apps don't work on rooted devices. I know there are ways to hide root from detection, but I don't care to ride that treadmill back and forth.

How many users have rooted Android? Especially people in the west who are worth a lot more to advertisers?

It can’t be that high anymore. All the signals seem to be that rooting is trending down. I could be wrong of course as I have no hard data.

Aren't the majority of users on iOS or unrooted android?