My cynicism backed hypothesis is that they want telemetry, location tracking and all that kind of stuff. Also knowing Tencent has a stake on Reddit [1], I am even more inclined to avoid it.
I'm not a heavy reddit user - I don't subscribe to any subreddits or anything like that. But I do have an account and I occasionally post and comment.
I had the mobile app installed for a few months and I thought it was pretty good. I uninstalled it because I was using it to kill time on my phone, and it was becoming habitual (nothing going on? open reddit app). My solution to those types of things is to cut the cord, and I don't ever miss them.
I would call it an upside actually, that I don't even want to browse the site on my phone.
I just assumed because most people don't be able to block ads. Is the app anything more than a webview that doesn't get sent the 'make it crappy' parts from the server?
[1] https://www.fool.com/investing/2019/02/08/tencent-invests-so...