It’s been awfully easy over the past year, in particular, to ‘lose’ hours on our phones – whether scrolling through Instagram, checking news websites or planning bucket-list dream holidays for When This Is All Over.

Conscious of how easy it is to fall down the rabbit hole that lurks inside our phones, we’ve experimented with various apps in the past that aim to help us cut down our screen-time – but we’re sharing this because it’s the best we’ve tried, and is really working for us.

There are lots of ways that the Moment screen time tracker can nudge you towards spending less time on your phone, and more in the real world. And ‘nudge’ is really the word: unlike some rather bossy apps, Moment cleverly uses humour and gentle encouragement to help you switch off. (You get an idea, from the visual above.)

First of all, it invites you to take phone ‘fasts’. You simply choose a chunk of time – half an hour, an hour, a couple of hours – when you’d rather NOT be scrolling. (Weirdly, just embarking on a ‘fast’ really makes you think twice – or thrice – about picking up your phone.) There’s a nice congratulation if you make it through, too.

You also get a suggested ‘Moment’, each day, to help you be more present. Yesterday’s, for instance, was to listen to an entire five-minute song, all the way through, without looking at your phone. And truly, when was the last time you truly immersed yourself in music in that way…?

You can also see at a glance how often you’ve picked up your phone (VERY SCARY!), how much time you’ve spent online each day – but more encouragingly, how much time you’ve spent ‘in the moment’, too.

There’s also the opportunity to create a ‘Family Group’ or a ‘Friend Group’, whereby you all share info with each other by way of offering support and positive reinforcement.

So if you’re keen to ‘be here now’ a bit more (or maybe a LOT more), in 2021, we can’t recommend Moment too highly…

It’s free at the Apple App Store – and you can find it here

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