# SlimSocial for Facebook: a light Flutter client with a WebView at its core > SlimSocial for Facebook is a GPL-2.0 Flutter application that wraps the Facebook site in a WebView, lets you hide ads and run your own CSS and JS inside the app, and ships on F-Droid as well as Google Play. The client was rebuilt on Flutter after a long pause, and its ad hiding and privacy claims are described only in a feature list. **rignaneseleo/SlimSocial-for-Facebook** — Light version of Facebook. Light both in the weight and in the use. - Repository: https://github.com/rignaneseleo/SlimSocial-for-Facebook - Stars: 561 · Forks: 98 - Language: Dart - License: GPL-2.0 - Published: 2026-10-22 · Updated: 2026-10-22 · Language: en - Canonical page: https://hysenlabs.com/projects/rignaneseleo-slimsocial-for-facebook ## A third-party Facebook client rewritten on Flutter SlimSocial for Facebook is a third-party Android client for Facebook. Its own one line summary calls it a light version of Facebook, light both in the weight and in the use. It is written in Dart with the Flutter toolkit, and the repository publishes the entire client, so what you read here is the app itself rather than a library or a server component. The history explains the current shape. The project was created in 2015 as an exercise in Android app development, and it was then put on hold because of university and work commitments. It has since been rewritten on a Flutter codebase, which the readme describes as more efficient and user friendly than before. The tree still shows the earlier life of the project: an _old directory sits next to the current SlimSocial_for_Facebook directory, so both generations of code are in the repository. The audience is narrow and clear. This is for Android users who would rather have the Facebook site in a small app with their own styling than the official client, and who care about the app staying responsive on older hardware. The topic tags name the stack plainly: flutter, dart, android, webview, advancedwebview, facebook, xda. ## The feature list promises ad hiding and custom CSS, the docs explain neither Four features are listed, and only one of them has any mechanical detail attached. Lightweight design is claimed first, with the app meant to stay fast and responsive even on older devices. Customisable is the second entry, and here the readme is specific: you can change the app's colours and fonts, and you can run custom CSS and JS directly from the app. Privacy is the third, and the wording is absolute, saying the app lets you use Facebook without your data being collected or shared. Hide ads is the fourth, offering a more streamlined experience. That last pair is where an evaluator should slow down. The readme does not document how ads are hidden, whether the hiding is a blocklist, a content filter or a set of selectors, and it does not document what the app sends or requests beyond the pages Facebook itself serves. The repository does carry a Privacy.txt file at the top level and a csae.md file, but neither is explained in the documentation. So the privacy and ad blocking claims are things the project asserts about itself, and a reader without the source in front of them has to take them on trust. The custom CSS and JS point is the one that changes what the app is. It is not a sealed client. It is a container that the user can reprogram, which is attractive and also means a bad stylesheet or script is the user's own problem. ## Building the Google Play flavour takes three commands There is no package to install and no service to configure, because this is an application rather than a library. Getting a working build means having the Flutter toolchain and running the build yourself. The readme's building section is three commands. The first moves into the application directory, the second fetches the dependencies from the package registry, and the third produces the Android package: ```bash cd SlimSocial_for_Facebook flutter pub get flutter build apk ``` Two details around those commands matter. The repository pins its Flutter version, with a .fvm directory and a .fvmrc file at the top level, which is where Flutter Version Management keeps its configuration, so a build with a mismatched SDK is the first failure worth expecting. The second is the output: a single apk from flutter build apk, which is what the readme calls the Google Play build. Continuous integration is set up too. The readme carries a Codemagic build status badge, so the project builds its Android artefacts on a hosted service rather than only on a maintainer's laptop. Every published version has notes on the releases page, which is where change detail for each build lives. ## The F-Droid build is a different binary, not the same one rebuilt Shipping on F-Droid is not a formality for this project, because the two stores carry different binaries. The readme explains that the free-software build, the one F-Droid ships, has Play Billing and the Play rating sheet compiled out, and that the preparation for it is a separate script that has to be run before the ordinary build. The script path and the documentation are both named in the readme: ```bash ./scripts/fdroid_prepare.sh ``` The detail behind that script lives in docs/fdroid.md, referenced from the same paragraph. What this means in practice is that the F-Droid artefact is not the Google Play artefact with a different signature. It is a separate configuration of the same source, built without the proprietary pieces, and the difference is produced by an explicit preparation step in the repository rather than by a build flag passed at the command line. For a user, that means the version on F-Droid is the one without in-app purchase support, and the version from Google Play is the one with it. For anyone reviewing the project, it means the two stores cannot be compared line for line, and the F-Droid flavour is the one whose build recipe is written down in the repository. ## Crowdin owns the translations, and hand edits to the JSON are overwritten Localisation for this project is not done in pull requests, and the readme is unusually explicit about it. Translations are managed on Crowdin, and the invite is to join the project there, with the note that no coding is required. The warning that follows is the part that saves contributors an hour: the JSON files in the assets/lang directory are synced automatically from Crowdin, so manual changes to them would be overwritten. The only file edited in the repository is the English source, en-US.json. That arrangement has an obvious upside. Dozens of languages do not need maintainers who speak them, and the Crowdin project is listed as the project's translation entry point in the readme, along with a Crowdin badge in the header. The cost is that a string change to the English source still has to travel through Crowdin before it appears in other languages, and a translator cannot fix a broken string directly in the repository. The repository root also carries crowdin.yml, the configuration file that tells Crowdin which source file and which target directories to use, so the sync path is declared in the project rather than handled by hand. ## GPL-2.0 and a version number that changes every week The licence is GNU General Public License v2.0, stated in the readme and with a LICENSE file at the root. That matters more here than it would for an ordinary library, because the deliverable is a complete application that users install on a phone rather than a snippet of code inside their own product. Shipping a GPL-2.0 application means the source and the licence travel with the binary, and anyone who modifies and redistributes that binary inherits the same obligations. That is a licensing note rather than legal advice, and it applies to forks of the app rather than to people who simply install it. The release naming shows a tight update rhythm. The recent versions are 26.10.08+139, 26.09.28+138 and 26.09.27+137, a date based version with a build counter, which fits an app whose content is a wrapped website and which therefore needs to keep pace with changes on the site it wraps. The last push was on 2026-10-08 and the repository is not archived. The project also funds itself. The readme offers a PayPal donation link and mentions donations inside the app, so the maintenance of this client rests on a single developer rather than on an employer, which is the usual reason such apps move fast. ## Conclusion Adopt SlimSocial for Facebook if you want a small Android client for Facebook that you can restyle with your own CSS and JS, and if you are willing to treat it as a wrapper around Facebook's own web pages rather than a native app. Do not adopt it if you need official app features, offline messaging or any guarantee about the ad blocking, because the readme does not explain how the hiding works and the client depends on pages it does not control. Verify first that the Flutter version pinned in .fvmrc matches your toolchain, that the Google Play build and the F-Droid build differ in the way the readme describes, and that the ad hiding still works on the current Facebook web layout. ## FAQ ### How do I build SlimSocial for Facebook from source? Run cd SlimSocial_for_Facebook, then flutter pub get, then flutter build apk. The repository pins a Flutter version in .fvm and .fvmrc, and a hosted Codemagic build produces the same artefacts for the project. ### What is the difference between the F-Droid and Google Play builds? The free-software build that F-Droid ships is prepared with ./scripts/fdroid_prepare.sh, which compiles out Play Billing and the Play rating sheet. The readme points to docs/fdroid.md for the details of that preparation. ### Can I change the look of SlimSocial for Facebook? Yes. The feature list says you can change the app's colours and fonts and run custom CSS and JS directly from the app. ### How are translations managed, and can I edit the language files myself? Translations are managed on Crowdin and the language JSON files are synced from there automatically, so manual edits would be overwritten. Only the English source file en-US.json is edited in the repository. ### Under what licence is SlimSocial for Facebook released? It is released under the GNU General Public License v2.0, and the readme links to the LICENSE file in the repository. ## Sources - [Issues](https://github.com/rignaneseleo/SlimSocial-for-Facebook/issues) - [License: GPL-2.0](https://github.com/rignaneseleo/SlimSocial-for-Facebook/blob/master/LICENSE) - [README](https://github.com/rignaneseleo/SlimSocial-for-Facebook/blob/master/README.md) - [Releases](https://github.com/rignaneseleo/SlimSocial-for-Facebook/releases) - [rignaneseleo/SlimSocial-for-Facebook on GitHub](https://github.com/rignaneseleo/SlimSocial-for-Facebook) --- Hysen Labs editorial analysis, written from the project's own repository and release notes. Cite the canonical page: https://hysenlabs.com/projects/rignaneseleo-slimsocial-for-facebook