I don't use Facebook or other social media on my laptop anyway, so it's nice to have when I need to access something (like marketplace). But other than that, the peace of mind is truly worth the hassle of carrying two phones.
One iPhone that was wifi only, had my entire music library local, used for car play and a few exclusive apps.
One android with a sim that had my communication apps, social media, and some custom tinkering stuff that doesn't exist on iOS.
I did this for about two years. The main takeaways: -I 100% could have just had the iPhone with a sim for communication apps and been fine. The social media was just annoying enough to swap to that I never felt that draw and barely used it on 2phones. -even though I despise how little customization iOS lets you do, without social media or game apps, the only actual pain point with it was the nightmare of managing notifications/alert/vibration/screen wake settings* -god it made me miss small phones so much. The android was a pixel 4a, the last real phone with real hardware that released at the actual ideal size for my hands(that has an unlocked bootloader, I really can't do the Samsung hellOS experience again).
Now Im on a pixel 8 only, with Glider for this site and no other social media or games. It's fine. Phones too big, car doesn't have AAuto, and Google is trying to rot the foundation of android, but for now it's fine and better than the two phone experience because it's less juggling.
Still, I have a couple questions about it, since I don't own an iPhone but am considering buying one soon.
1. How does this affect backup and restore? Could I still restore from a backup on a new phone, if needed? I've lost my phone while traveling before and buying a replacement was pretty seamless.
2. Is the ability to disable the profile bound to the Mac you use Apple Configurator on? I don't own a Mac, but if I could use a friend's Mac when I need to make changes this could maybe work.
Great writeup, thanks for posting it!
1. I don't know, never tried this. I do know iCloud backups still work, because I've used them after wiping my phone. But I think you must plug the new phone into your computer and set it up as a managed device before you load the backup, or else parts of the profile might not take.
2. No, it's not. I traded in my old macbook pro for a mac mini back in May. I was able to use Apple Configurator on the new mac mini to change the profile on my phone. There is one caveat though -- the phone is still technically supervised by the old mac, so you have to confirm the profile by going into the phone's settings. Using the original, you just have to plug the phone in and unlock it.
Both of your answers sound workable for me!
Even if I couldn't restore the whole profile from backup while traveling (which seems natural), at least it's still possible to restore some data. Which should be enough in the short term.
And that's perfect that I could manage it from a different Mac. That totally works for me. I worried there would be something which prevented that. I'm imagining a parent using this for parental controls, but then the kid disabling it at a friend's house who has a Mac. Works better for my scenario though!
I’d highly suggest installing Dumb Phone (dp) from App Store to simplify your home into a monochromatic list, to top off this excellent guide.
I had no idea this was even possible to customize! Thank you.
It's a double edged sword because the amount of time I spend online (X) has been directly responsible for the most valuable opportunities and generally knowing enough of what's going on to leverage that for big financial and career returns. It was pretty easy to drop all non-X social media though (all meta) and just avoid short term video generally.
I've been tempted to try the lightphone 3 though - theory being if I have a separate hardware device that might be enough to help because I can leave the iPhone at home. In theory the Apple Watch could do this, but in practice it hasn't.
Another thing I think can work is committing to avoid using it for one day a week - you get a lot of the benefits, it's more doable, and the downside is minimized.
https://www.idownloadblog.com/2018/08/28/add-senders-vip-mai...
Email from my boss, my wife, my sister, my mother, and like 2 best friends produces a notification. Nothing else.
And if any of those folks were too chatty, I'd make a different choice.
Different people get different e-mails.
Also, some people just don't check e-mail otherwise. Why would they? Notifications tell them the 5 times a day they get a new e-mail, so they don't need to manually check their e-mail 2-3 times a day. It actually makes a lot of sense. Notifications mean you never have to check your e-mail.
Do you get notified of every article on HN that you read? Or what about YouTube or other content that you consume?
I’ve had email notifications turned off for years, and have no problem checking my email once or twice a day, just to see if there’s anything worth reading. (Spoiler alert: there almost never is.)
Just like HN, and a couple forums that I visit. I’ll check occasionally to see what’s going on.
For all of these things, it’s never anything urgent or time sensitive. Even if I went a couple days without checking, it’d be fine.
If somebody needs to reach me for anything time sensitive (outside of work), there’s SMS (with notifications) or phone (of course, notifications).
I think much of the issue with these comments — and this whole thread, in general — boils down to:
1. People use things outside of SMS and phone for time sensitive things (solution: move time sensitive things to SMS/phone)
2. People overestimate the criticality/time sensitivity of these things sending notifications
I’d rather check my email (or other X app) once or twice a day, if that, and catch up on low priority things, rather than get interrupted 5-10 times a day for these low priority things.
Nobody's saying you're wrong. That's great.
I'm just saying there are also people who are the opposite, and their way of doing it is also valid and works great for them.
Also, stuff on HN and YouTube isn't for you personally, and it doesn't need your reply, so it's not really an analogy for personal messages.
Agreed, but if we’re here discussing ways to reduce distractions of smartphones, I think auditing our notifications and the usage of apps that send notifications, particularly of things that are more noise than signal, is worth mentioning.
> Also, stuff on HN and YouTube isn't for you personally, and it doesn't need your reply, so it's not really an analogy for personal messages.
Fair point, but I’d bet that 90% of most people’s email is also not personal messages, and just more noise.
Yes, we should unsubscribe from the noise, and I have, but I still have some things I get that I occasionally care about, just not enough to be notified.
People are different and have different use cases and needs.
i don't have them enabled; but, the email address I use for my Android phone and tables is used only for those devices.I've neer used my primary email address on a mobile device. Email can wait until I'm at a computer.
I really wish Apple/Google would do something about notifications, use AI for something useful.
"Hey you haven't read any of your 3454 emails, should I disable notifications for Gmail?"
"Hey you're drowning in notifications with your son texting you 2 hours ago, 4 pages down. Should I prioritize him maybe?"
(you know you can make those bubbles go away?!)
Yes, please, for the love of anything that is holy. Stop the SMS spam!
I certainly don't.
I have email notifications disabled. I check my email in the morning.
I don't get a notification every time I receive a letter. I check my mailbox every other day.
Mail? Absolutely. Because most mail doesn't produce a notification.
It does if you turn them on.
For me email on the phone uses less than 1% of my screen time during the day.
When I'm waiting for Uber to arrive I know it will come, because I just ordered it, so I just check my phone.
Maybe I'm lucky with my delivery apps because mine don't send ads.
I don't read my work email at all unless I am specifically looking for something.
Apart from that I only have notifications for IM (telegram/whatsapp) and the phone is in constant DND mode (with sound allowed only for calls).
Basically in "downtime" mode all the time with a few "Always allowed" app. One thing is, you're phone (and it's browser) is pretty damn useless. Overtime you realize that a lot of things you need to lookup don't need to be looked up, etc but it can be frustrating at first.
Edited to add: for some reason, time limits never worked for my kids (they could always override them with one click). That's why I had to opt for permanent downtime.
Hah! Says something about my self control!
Yeah it's usually trouble once a week. I recently needed to pay for parking using a QR code had to finish it in the 1 minute I had. Another appointment asked me to fill some online form and their reaction when I said "my phone is blocked from the internet" was funny. Turns out they still have paper forms when needed.
Huh, that's weird. Seems to work ok for mine in limiting their iPad use. They can request more time and I can decide to grant it or not, I get choices of 15 minutes, 1 hour or all day.
While we're at it, I wish there was a 30 minutes option! There are many situations where 15 minutes is too short, and 1 hour is too long.
In case your kids hack the router you know that they have Kevin Mitnick skills :)
my wife has the password for my screentime, but i can't send her a request if we're physically apart. which means i'm out of luck, or she has to share the actual code with me, which then requires her to change it (and remember the new one)
See Settings – Screen Time.
You can use a passcode to lock it. It seems primarily meant for blocking things from your kids.
But it can help turn your iPhone more into a dumb phone
(Blocking safari was the key, for me)
- Ask wife to set up screen time passcode and not tell me
- Block social media and other distracting websites in Screen Time
- Set a 1 minute time limit on distracting apps
- Keep the phone in the garage as much as possible
- Get an Apple Watch cellular so that I can still communicate with people, make payments, get directions etc when I am out and about
Not a perfect dumb phone but this has helped me reduce usage tremendously.
And to top it off, in iOS 26 (Beta) you can set time limits for websites too! One feature I (and I'm sure many others) were waiting for since forever.
I'd rather feel confident I'm improving along that metric than to build guardrails for myself everywhere ...
I have type 1 diabetes, and there's studies about this on diabetics actually. There's a huge hit to quality of life and specific kinds of burnout attributed to the thousand or so extra decisions we have to make every day to manage our blood sugar. I'd love to get rid of those, but since I can't, I'm particularly sensitive to bullshit that takes my attention or willpower like that. In my experience, people don't live on a spectrum where "I have self control" = Everything that happens to me I make the right decision even if its hard or "I have no self control" = I always make the bad decision. There's always a pool of decisions, and the further you get into the onslaught of decisions the more you're beaten down and the worse your self-control is.
It is perhaps possible to attain a monk-like state where your will is absolute and you never make any compromises (although I doubt it), but since 99.99% of us will never get there, I think there's a lot to be said for cutting out things that nudge us in the wrong direction constantly
Maybe breaking out of your phone is just more self-control than you currently possess. Imagine trying to get in shape but you're only allowed to lift 200+ pound weights - you simply aren't strong enough to even make progress, you need an easier task.
Or maybe you just have other priorities in the short-term. I'd love to get to the point where I can easily ignore my phone, but right now my priority is to finish unpacking after a move and getting back into the rhythm of going to the gym. As James Clear says in Atomic Habits: To break out of a bad habit, make it invisible, unattractive, difficult, and unsatisfying. Locking a phone down to barebones functionality does all three.
Finally, maybe you have a deficit of attention. I've had diagnosed ADHD since I was a child - my level of self control for addicting systems is significantly diminished compared to a "normal" person. Yes, a certain level of this learned behavior: With dedicated effort and practice, I can develop that skill and get better about distractions. However, my baseline is still lower and my progress will be slower than a neurotypical person. Crutches like this help me preserve mental energy for my day-to-day tasks instead of spending a significant portion of my mental energy fighting the urge to check my phone all day every day.
Just my perspective at least. I know everyone is different and I aspire to be the kind of person that doesn't need to employ blockers and safeguards just to ensure I don't end up getting sucked into doomscrolling for 2 hours, but right now I'm working with what I've got.
For me it's a bit different: It's phases.
Some phases of extreme self-control, others where I tend to give in a bit more (usually induced by external stress).
But that tells me I have it in me to do it without external fences.
I guess it’s like when recovering alcoholics, though ideally should just “simply” have self control, in reality it’s about removing booze from your apartment, getting rid of triggers, changing habits, friends, etc.
Usually it works better to exercise willpower to constrain your future self's available actions. For example, by not buying chocolate or cigarettes when you are at the store.
The same principle applies to your phone. Use your willpower to constrain what your future self can do with it.
Like, I want to eat healthier. I can try more self-control to not eat the Oreos in the pantry, or I can stop putting Oreos there. Putting guardrails on my devices is just easier to help me live the life I want.
It's not the phone, it's you...