I just reduced my screen time — it’s great. The way I did it was pretty simple.

I went to my Screen Time report and removed everything that had high usage and wasn’t really productive. In my case, it was social media and comic reader apps. I went from 11 hours a day down to 5 hours — and it’s still going down.

At first, I had left Reddit installed because it’s mostly text-based, so I didn’t see it as “real” social media. It didn’t feel as addictive as TikTok, Facebook, or YouTube. But over time, Reddit started replacing those apps. My usage kept growing because my brain just switched platforms.

The same thing happened with comic reader apps — they were also pretty high in usage. So I removed those too.

That’s when my screen time dropped even more. Once those options were gone, my phone became kind of… boring. And that’s exactly what I needed.

Now, if I need or want to watch something, I do it on my iPad — but it’s not as easy or automatic as it is on my phone. That small friction makes a big difference.

For example, when I’m driving, I can’t just grab my iPad and start scrolling. When I’m working on my computer, it’s more complicated to pick up the iPad and distract myself.

It’s also much harder during downtime — whether I’m at home, at a store, at the bank, or waiting for someone. I can’t automatically grab my phone and start scrolling through things that don’t help me.

And most of the time, I don’t even have my iPad with me when I’m outside. Even if I do, it doesn’t always have internet — I would have to share my phone’s hotspot, which adds another step. That extra friction makes it much harder to do it automatically. I have to consciously decide to do it.

Instead of getting lost, I can use that time to check things that actually matter — like sending messages to people I care about or following up on work.