As noted by The Verge, Tumblr’s founder David Karp was initially opposed to the idea of including ads on the platform, but since the company needed a way to pay for its operations, there was little alternative.
However, if you’d rather not see ads at all when you’re browsing Tumblr, then you might be interested to learn that Tumblr has since announced a new subscription service where for $4.99 a month, you will be able to remove ads from the posts and blogs that you are reading.
There will be a cheaper option priced at $39.99 if you’re willing to pay for an entire year’s subscription, which is roughly a 33% discount. This removal of ads will be applicable on desktop and mobile as long as you’re signed into your Tumblr account. According to Tumblr, this is a completely optional subscription and those who don’t want to pay don’t have to, but they’ll be seeing ads instead.