Want to unplug for the holidays? I bricked my iPhone to prevent doomscrolling – and it actually worked

ZDNET’s key takeaways

• Brick is a $59 gadget that blocks you from accessing your most-used apps
• It is on sale for $47 proper now
• It helped me develop a greater relationship to my cellphone
• Its optimistic reinforcements work higher than opponents or Display Deadlines.

nov / 2025

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As each side of our working and social life is digitized, display screen dependancy has change into much less an exception to our way of life and extra a broadly accepted attribute of it. I see this mostly after I ask my associates, household, and coworkers what number of hours a day they spend on their telephones. The solutions differ from three to eight hours. 

I common round 4 hours of my day on my cellphone, checking emails, responding to texts, scrolling social media, and checking the climate. That is 4 hours I might be spending studying a e book, writing an article, studying how you can predict the climate, calling a beloved one, and doing something apart from checking the time suck and mind rot that’s social media websites and messaging apps. 

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Each October, as common daylight dwindles and my vitality ranges deplete, this sense of discovered helplessness by the hands of know-how involves a head. I’ve no vitality to rise up from my mattress. It takes me some time to construct the braveness to transit to the gymnasium. What do I do as a substitute? I sit on my mattress and I scroll. 

I scroll by monetary recommendation posts telling me that I must be investing far more available in the market than I already am, I scroll by engagements and weddings my former classmates are celebrating, I scroll by reactionary content material strangers put up on the web for clicks, and I scroll by a number of the most sinister information my eyes can see and my mind can fathom. All this content material is mixed in, and I let it wash over me like I am mendacity on the sands of a pathetic ocean. 

As soon as I attain this level, I delete my social media apps. I attempt to put my cellphone in one other room whereas I work, eat, and do chores round the home. I create a stricter schedule and drive myself to depart the home extra. Then, per week or two later, as soon as I’ve returned to my pure, steady, ripen, not rotten, mind, I redownload all these apps. Maybe it is just some weeks or months, however the cycle continues.

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I’ve tried the closing dates, the app blockers, and utilizing social media on a browser as a substitute of the app itself. So this October, I attempted one thing new. I had seen protection of the corporate Brick and its miracle-working gadget that successfully locks customers out of their high-demand apps. Folks had claimed the minimalistic, magnetic dice gave them their time again. I will be the decide of that, I believed to myself. 

The parents at Brick despatched me a tool, which I instantly started testing upon reception and have been for the previous few weeks. TL:DR? This gadget has performed numbers on my relationship with my most addictive apps. This is how.

The way it works 

Brick is a grey, magnetic sq. with a appropriate app. Upon downloading the app, an individual selects the apps they need to disable as soon as their cellphone is bricked. Brick makes use of NFC know-how, which can also be present in contactless funds, digital wallets like Apple Pay, and safe entry controls, resembling digital keycards used to realize entry into buildings, to allow and disable app use. Tapping the brick, or “bricking,” blocks using these apps till the cellphone is tapped as soon as once more and “unbricked.”

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You possibly can arrange schedules to dam apps throughout particular occasions of the day and modes to dam sure sorts of apps. I started testing the product by making a mode that blocks my most-used apps, particularly Messages, Instagram, Fb, Threads, TikTok, and LinkedIn. 

Brick offers you 5 free “unbricks” you should use in an emergency, while you aren’t close to the bodily Brick. 

My expertise ‘Bricking’ my iPhone

I have not arrange a schedule but, as a result of I am glad bricking my gadget upon my very own volition and unbricking after I have to verify messages or posts from associates. Bricking the gadget after I acknowledge my very own want for distance from my cellphone felt like a straightforward first step at curbing my cellphone dependancy. A schedule felt too stringent. I can see the scheduling characteristic changing into handier as soon as I’ve spent a number of weeks bricking my cellphone and developed much less of a reliance on commonly checking it, of which I am nonetheless engaged on. 

My cellphone utilization is the worst (and makes me really feel the worst) whereas I am at residence. Scrolling by social media between subway stops or checking messages often on the workplace is not my concern. It is the hours I spend losing as soon as I get residence from a busy day of labor, or the time I spend losing away on the weekends that I might be dedicating to hobbies. 

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In order that’s the place I primarily use the Brick. My roommates, nonetheless, have used the Brick earlier than studying on the park, and so they reported that it helped them focus longer. One Monday night time, I bricked my cellphone after which journal for 90 minutes, fully and completely undisturbed. 

I like bricking my cellphone earlier than bedtime, which, within the phrases of my roommate, looks like “shutting the house pc down on the finish of the night time.” Sometimes, I will be mendacity in mattress and remembering I need to verify an app or ship a textual content. 

Doing so would drive me out of my mattress, down an extended hallway, and into the kitchen to unbrick my cellphone. It made me rethink my cellphone utilization selections. 

Within the morning, after waking, I am going to go to my kitchen, the place my Brick is caught on the fridge, and unbrick my cellphone. This provides me round an hour earlier than work, throughout which I can compensate for messages and the day by day happenings. 

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Then, as soon as I start work, I brick my cellphone once more. After not less than an hour of zero distractions, I am going to reward myself with a fast unbrick. I verify my messages or scroll for a couple of minutes and rebrick. It is just like the Pomodoro impact, however for cellphone dependancy. 

Working with out the fixed pings or quick access to social media jogs my memory of the productiveness I’d have whereas doing my homework on an airplane earlier than Wi-Fi turned out there — that undeterred, distraction-free sort of productiveness and clearheadedness that comes with disconnection from the surface world.  

Why it really works for me

Brick makes entry to my most-used apps a privilege I really feel like I need to earn by endurance, somewhat than one thing I can take as a right each time I might like. It additionally jogs my memory that the variety of occasions I verify my cellphone to see if somebody has reached out is disproportionate to the variety of notifications I obtain per hour. Briefly, there isn’t a want for me to be checking it as usually as I’m. 

Not like a display screen time notification or restrict, which is enabled as soon as somebody reaches their day by day app restrict, Brick positively reinforces my time spent with out my apps. A widget pops up when you brick your gadget, displaying a timer displaying how lengthy you have been offline since bricking. 

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It instantly contrasts the destructive reinforcement that’s the “You’ve got reached your day by day Instagram restrict” notifications I obtain by Display Time. Within the app, you may also see how a lot time you have spent bricking every day. All these options and touches assist me construct the case for myself that I can really go with out these apps for extended durations. 

What I might wish to see improved

You needn’t brick your gadget to provoke a schedule, say at 9 a.m., as soon as you have began work. However you’ll need your Brick available at 5 p.m., while you need to unbrick your gadget. That is irritating in the event you’re not in the identical location as your Brick as soon as the clock strikes 5 p.m., however there is a workaround, which a good friend let me in on. 

If you wish to unbrick your cellphone after the allotted brick time is over in your schedule, my good friend really useful creating one other schedule instantly after your first schedule ends, after which unbricking a random app. This permits the scheduling characteristic and unbricks the specified apps with out requiring the bodily gadget.

My good friend additionally talked about how Brick did not register his change in time zones when he was touring, one thing he’d like Brick to enhance. 

ZDNET’s shopping for recommendation

I extremely suggest Brick in the event you wrestle with commonly checking your cellphone or losing time on social media. Through the first full week I used it, my display screen time decreased by 7%. Its optimistic reinforcements, somewhat than admonishments while you’ve gone over your allotted display screen time, incrementally construct the case which you can, certainly, go with out these apps. 

I might suggest this most to individuals searching for a productiveness enhance — whether or not that is one you are looking for out on or off the job. After bricking my cellphone one night time, I made a decision to go on a not-so-addictive however still-distracting app earlier than mattress. I watched one YouTube video for round two minutes, till I spotted I might be studying my e book as a substitute. I am unsure if I’d have made that alternative with out Brick. 

I do know, $59 is a excessive value to pay for self-control. Nonetheless, from my expertise with the gadget, it’s price it for the standard of life improve and the long-desired autonomy from my gadgets that I’ve regained. Plus, in the event you purchase it throughout Brick’s vacation sale, you will get a $12 low cost that cuts the value by 20%. This is able to make a implausible reward for anyone, whether or not they’re a social media obsessed teen or unfocused father seeking to lay off their cellphone. 

When will this deal expire? 

Offers are topic to promote out or expire anytime, although ZDNET stays dedicated to discovering, sharing, and updating the most effective product offers so that you can rating the most effective financial savings. Our crew of specialists commonly checks in on the offers we share to make sure they’re nonetheless dwell and obtainable. We’re sorry in the event you’ve missed out on this deal, however do not fret — we’re consistently discovering new probabilities to save lots of and sharing them with you at ZDNET.com.