It is common to reassess your habits in January and I feel one factor the overwhelming majority of us might do with altering is how a lot time we spend mindlessly scrolling by social media.
Fortunately, Apple has loads of nice Display screen Time settings lately (head to Settings > Display screen Time) that aid you to get a greater deal with on the best way you employ your favourite apps. However if you wish to make some main modifications, it may be price downloading a third-party app that brings you much more options.
Consider the One Sec app like Apple’s Display screen Time settings, however with extra customization choices and options, bringing you much more methods to regain management over your digital life. It is out there on Mac, iPhone and iPad, which suggests you may maintain tabs in your social media use and add new interventions throughout your whole Apple units.
How is One Sec completely different to Display screen Time settings?
One Sec says that individuals who use social media repeatedly can use the app to reclaim an hour every day that they’d normally have spent scrolling. This appears like quite a bit, however if you happen to’ve ever delved into your Display screen Time settings, you will see how time spent opening and shutting Instagram, X and TikTok shortly provides up.
You may discover a number of customary app-blocking, app-restricting and timer-based choices right here. However a few of my favourite settings inside One Sec contain deciding on the little duties you should perform to entry an app, like rotating your telephone a number of occasions, taking deep breaths, observing a clean display for 10 seconds and even your self along with your iPhone’s front-facing selfie digital camera.
The aim of those interventions is to get you interested by what you are doing, including consciousness to your social media use and, hopefully, breaking that senseless, sleepwalking cycle.
Certain, generally you would possibly nonetheless select to open the app. However I discover that at the least 50 p.c of the time after I’m utilizing One Sec I do ask myself: did I actually wish to open TikTok? This easy act of reflection can disrupt essentially the most ingrained social media habits and, over time, might aid you develop a extra intentional and conscious strategy to the best way you employ your telephone.
The One Sec app is free to trial for per week, which is a good period of time to determine if its options work nicely for you. After that, you will must pay $1.99/£1.99 a month or $12.99/£12.99 a yr (this works out at about $1.07/£1.07 a month).
Sure, Display screen Time settings are already greater than sufficient for most individuals. However if you wish to add some additional oomph to your “slicing down on doomscrolling” decision in 2024, then One Sec could possibly be price it.