📟 Dumbphones
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10 oct. 2024
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4 min read
It’s so easy to get distracted by our smartphones these days. And when that happens, we can’t focus, our productivity suffers, and we find ourselves disconnected when interacting with others in real life.
A great solution to this problem is to turn your iPhone into a dumb phone. This guide will walk you through the process of turning your iPhone into a dumb phone to help you manage your screen time.
What is a Dumb Phone?
A dumb phone is a basic cell phone with limited features such as only being able to make calls and text messages. They do not come with the typical features of smartphones that make it addictive, like apps and access to the Internet.
Smartphones are great as they allow us to make calls and texts, but some don’t want to get distracted with shiny toys that they offer. This is where dumb phones like the Nokia 3310 come in handy.
But most of us don’t want to go back to flip phones, as smartphones allow us to:
Capture photographs of our memorable moments
Find your way when traveling.
Take notes when inspiration hits you.
The good news is, we can turn our iPhone into a dumb phone and get the best out of both worlds. Let’s dive into how you can transform your iPhone into a dumb phone.
🗑️ Delete Non-essential Apps
The first step to make your phone dumb is to remove most apps from your phone.
To do this:
Go to your home screen and identify apps to delete.
A good way to decide which apps to delete is to ask yourself:
Is this app essential for work or my personal life?
Does this app distract me from what’s important to me?
Have I used this app in the past 6 months?
Delete apps that are not essential, are distracting, and haven't been used in a while. Some examples include Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and web browsers.
Once you’ve identified which apps to delete, press and hold the app icon until a menu appears. Click on “Remove App” and choose “Delete App” to remove it from your device.
Don’t worry about deleting apps. If you find that you actually have a need for it, you can always download it again.
📱 Disable the App Store
The App Store is full of wonderful apps, but they often distract us. By preventing access to the App Store, we can avoid the temptation of downloading the distracting ones.
To do this:
Go to “Settings” > “Screen Time”
Tap on “Content & Privacy Restrictions”
Turn on “Content & Privacy Restrictions” and set a Screen Time Passcode
Tap on “iTunes & App Store Purchases”.
Select “Installing Apps” and set it to “Don’t Allow” (or you can remove directly the App Store)
🌐 Disable Safari
After disabling the App Store, we should also disable web browsing.
To do this:
Go to “Settings” > “Screen Time”
Tap on “Content & Privacy Restrictions”
Enable “Content & Privacy Restrictions” if it’s not already on.
Tap on “Allowed Apps & Features”
Toggle off “Safari”
🔔 Turn off All Notifications
Notifications are the biggest source of distractions on our smartphones. To minimize getting interrupted from focus, you should turn off almost all notifications:
Go to “Settings” > “Notifications”
Click each app, and toggle off “Allow Notifications”
You can keep notifications off for essential apps, like Messages and “Phone”, or apps that send helpful notifications like Calendar and Reminders.
🌟 Turn Your iPhone Into a Dumbphone With Jomo
You can also use Jomo to turn your iPhone into a dumb phone. Here’s how:
Go to Rules > Sessions > Templates > Brick Phone Mode.
This template will block all your apps except the basic ones like your Phone. Select other apps you to enable in “Apps & Websites” > “All except”
We recommend allowing these apps:
📞 Phone
💬 Messages
🗓️ Calendar
📝 Notes
🗺️ Maps
📷 Camera
🕚 Clock
➗ Calculator
🎙️ Podcasts
🎶 Music
💳 Wallet
Next, setup the times where the Brick Phone Mode will activate. You can either activate it immediately for a fixed duration, schedule it, or keep it turned on by default.
You can also turn on "Breaks" to temporarily unlock apps and websites. This way, you can be more intentional with how you use them. You can set friction for your breaks such as delaying each break, writing your intention, or enter a random code. You can also pick the number of breaks per day and the maximum duration.
You can toggle “Strict Mode” to make it harder to bypass this blocking rule.
Click on “Start” or “Schedule”, depending on the timing you picked earlier.
That’s it! The Brick Phone Mode session will begin and turn your phone into a dumb phone according to the timing you set.
🔧 Additional Tips for Minimizing Distractions
The tips we’ve mentioned above should be enough to turn your iPhone into a dumb phone, but here are some more tips to minimize distractions from your phone:
Change your wallpaper. Use a plain or minimalistic wallpaper on both your lock screen and home screen. Studies have shown that seeing familiar faces or locations can distract us by drawing our attention more effectively.
Clean up your apps. Move all the apps on your home screen except essential ones to the App Library. Press and hold the app icon until a menu appears. Click on “Remove App” and choose “Remove from Home Screen” to move the app to the App Library. We recommend that you use the search feature instead of browsing for apps. To do this, pull down on your home screen to access the App Search. By searching for the apps, you’ll be more intentional with your use, instead of using it because you saw it.
Keep your phone in Do Not Disturb by default. Go to “Settings” > “Focus” > “Do Not Disturb”. You can either schedule it during your work hours or the times you need to focus, or set the schedule from 9am to 8:59am to enable it all day. You can allow certain people to contact you by clicking on People and set your “Allow Calls From” to “Favorites”.
Turn your phone grayscale. To do this, go to "Settings" > "Accessibility" > "Display & Text Size". Scroll down and turn on "Color Filters". Select "Grayscale" as the filter. Turning your phone greyscale will make your phone less visually appealing and reduce the dopamine hit you get from using it.
Tint your icons to make them black and white. It’s much less frustrating than turning your whole phone to grayscale, yet it still helps reduce the temptation from the bright colors used by many of our apps. To do this, go to your home screen. Press and hold on the screen until the icons start to wiggle. Then, tap "Edit" at the top left. Next, tap "Customize." Select the "Tinted" mode and slide the bottom slider all the way to the right.
Switch your phone to a different language. For example, if you’re French and have a decent understanding of English, you can set your phone to English. This will help you improve your English skills but, more importantly, shake up your habits. You’ll feel less comfortable and will have to focus on even the smallest action, making your brain want to do something else! To change the language, go to "Settings" > "General" > "Language & Region" > "Add language".
On espère que cet article pourra vous aider à continuer de bénéficier de votre iPhone, tout en réduisant au maximum les distractions. Si vous avez d'autres conseils, n'hésitez pas à nous les partager à [email protected]
