Alice Beer's top tips to break your phone addiction
With nearly half of adults in the UK addicted to their mobile phone, Alice Beer’s here with her top tips on breaking up with your phone including adjusting settings, banning the phone in the bedroom or using apps to help limit your usage.
And if you want to go even further, Alice will be explaining the return of the ‘dumb’ phone, such as the viral ‘Barbie’ flip phone, which only offers basic capabilities and no social media.
ALICE BEER'S TOP TIPS FOR BREAKING A PHONE ADDICTION:
1. CONTROL YOUR EXPOSURE
If you compulsively check your phone every few minutes, wean yourself off by limiting your checks to once every 15 minutes, then once every 30 minutes, then once an hour.
If you need help, there are apps that can automatically limit when you're able to access your phone: + Screen Time - You can limit usage and also set up a Screen Distance which helps reduce eye strain. It alerts you to hold your phone at a distance (IOS users only).
Freedom - blocks apps and websites that you find distract you most throughout the day - Whenever you try to open an app, it focuses on the positive and reminds you that “you are free!”
Forest - You plant a tree both in the digital and the real world. The tree grows as time passes and if you leave your device untouched. If you leave the app, the tree dies.
2. ADJUST SETTINGS
You can use greyscale to make apps less attractive / set screen time limits / check your ‘average screen time’ / turn off notifications, turn off whatsapp read receipts, make use of ‘do not disturb’ mode.
3. USE AN ALARM CLOCK OR CAMERA
If you’re worried a Dumb Phone won’t have the necessary features, Alice suggests reverting back to old school behaviour and buying a digital camera and a physical alarm clock.
4. HOUSE RULES
Alice suggests never having your phone on the table and challenges us to go a whole meal without Googling something, she believes the older generation are worse for this.
No phones in certain rooms in the house. E.g. whilst you’re all engaged in a movie or TV - one screen should be enough.
No phones after a certain time e.g. try leaving your phone downstairs at night.
5. GET A DUMB PHONE
Dumbphones, also known as simple phones or feature phones, are trending as a way to limit screen time.
The phones are limited to basic functions such as making phone calls and sending text messages, and often can't connect to the internet.
According to Counterpoint, a technology market research firm, more than 98,600 feature phones were sold in Canada in 2023 — a 25 per cent increase from 2022.
A Barbie branded phone has been launched across the UK and Europe with the aim of helping young people break their smartphone addictions. The phone costs £99, twice as much as non branded similar phones. + It is a fundamentally basic phone, with no front camera, only one game and limited internet access.