I have tried for a couple of years now to reduce my screen time and focus more on other goals, specifically, reading more. Here are some of the things that have helped me reduce my screen time until now:

  • Turn both computer and phone to greyscale mode as often as possible
  • Constantly have phone on Do Not Disturb mode, notification sounds off, battery saver mode on (this last one has allowed me to only use 50% battery per day and only charge my phone every other day)
  • Apps I use for my (android) phone: minimalist launcher; lock me out; keep me out
    • minimalist launcher: a very simple launcher, black and white, apps are listed in a text list rather than using icons
    • lock me out: set timers for distracting apps (I use Firefox for Lemmy so half hour limit for Firefox, after which there is a 30m lockout; Instagram has 1h lockout after 15m; YouTube has 1h lockout after 15m. This has helped me better manage my usage and I have pretty much stopped using Instagram and YouTube as a result)
    • keep me out: I barely use this now, but you can voluntarily lock yourself out using a timer. Worked well when I was finding myself frustrated after scrolling for a long time and could not seem to stop myself (this was when I didn’t have quite as many “lock me out” restrictions).
  • view Lemmy, Reddit etc as website in browser instead of using individual apps
  • Not nearly as many restrictions on the computer but there is not as much of an urge to get distracted on the computer for me. There is an app called SelfControl which I have on Mac which is a very lightweight and strict timed website blocker, but I don’t have to use it very much.

This has helped me reduce my screen time very significantly recently to an average of probably 1-2 hours per day for recreational things. Probably closer to 1 hour most days.

I am mostly using my phone/computer for keeping in contact with friends or family, or doing work / school related things. I would like to continue cutting down on recreational screen use and switching to reading, especially on weekends…

I recently used the Reddit debacle as motivation to finally quit Reddit and switched over to Lemmy, which I hope will further decrease my screentime as Reddit was the final frontier of social media for me, so to speak. Regarding Reddit, I would recommend the book, “You Should Quit Reddit” by Jacob Desforges.