How I Reduced My Daily Smartphone Usage from 7+ Hours to 30 Minutes
A step-by-step guide to help you do the same and reclaim your life
As Uncle Ben said, “With great power comes great responsibility”, smartphones are double-edged swords.
While you can run million-dollar businesses using them, you can also let them fetter you to utter ruin — through doom scrolling, social media, porn, and video games.
With the average American spending a whopping 5.4 hours on their smartphone daily, it’s, unfortunately, the latter for most. Anxiety, eyestrain, headaches, depression, and rock-bottom motivation — the effects are terrible.
“The cell phone has become the adult’s transitional object, replacing the toddler’s teddy bear for comfort and a sense of belonging.”
— Margaret Heffernan
Back in college, I wasn’t any different — I’d spend 7 to 10 brain-draining hours glued to my smartphone on the regular. Over the past year, I’ve systematically pruned it down to 30 minutes — some days it’s even lesser than 20.
The result? An insane boost in my motivation, free time, and mental energy. Not to mention — deeper sleep and better relationships. All of these synergize into a higher quality of life.
I want to share the exact steps that have helped me achieve this — and will help you do the same.
Turn on Monochromacy
This step will single-handedly cut your usage by at least 50%.
Our brains are wired to crave color. With digital screens producing impossibly rich colors, they trigger a copious release of dopamine — the hormone that governs motivation.
The solution? Make your screen grey-scale — here’s how to do it for different phones.
When the color’s leeched from your smartphone, your compulsion to stay glued and constantly check it will vanish — your phone goes from an enticing pool of color to a drab electronic box.
Start with an hour of gray-scale, then a few hours every day. Next, use color only on the weekdays — before you know it, you’d have gone full B/W.
Want to go even further? Enable grey-scale on all your devices.
Disable (almost) All Notifications
The average person checks their smartphone a whopping 160 times a day. Let that sink in.
Just one “Beep” and the accompanying push widget will break even the most trance-like states. In fact, this study found the disruptive effect of a single phone ring to be comparable to that of texting while driving.
The worst part is it takes 23 minutes to regain your earlier focus and attention.
The combined result? Crippling anxiety, fractured focus, and a scattered brain all day; every day.
By turning off all notifications, you’ll maintain laser-sharp focus, feel serene, and check your phone infrequently — the best part is doing this takes less than a minute.
Apart from calls, messages, and banking apps, I have everything turned off.
Get Rid of All Video Games
Be it Brawl Stars, Call of Duty, or Mortal Kombat, video games devoured the lion’s share of my college time.
Ensconced in couches and pillow-padded chairs, we’d burn the hours away through shouts of, “Bro! Cover me”, “F*ck, he got me”, and “GG!”.
Video games are designed to be addictive — to get your dopamine rivers flowing.
Drained of your motivation hormone, why would you bother leveling up in real life?
Since I quit gaming, I’ve experienced a myriad of benefits — decimated screentime, a much-higher drive to achieve my goals, sharper focus, and mental clarity.
Here’s a game plan to help you quit it for good:
- Switch from mobile to PC. The eye strain’s lesser and since your PC isn’t portable, you won’t be able to spend your valuable commutes, breaks, or waiting times gaming.
- Barricade your gaming time. Set daily limits and make those tighter as time progresses — 3h, 2h, 1h, 30 minutes, and so on.
- Drop the number of games you play. One at a time cut back and uninstall the games you play.
- Limit gaming to the weekends. After a few weeks of doing this, you’ll be able to quit gaming forever.
Generously Use DND
My phone, by default, stays in Do Not Disturb (DND) or airplane mode. Only sporadically do I switch it to “normal”. The only downside is I miss quite a few calls, but I’m fine with that.
If you can’t afford to miss calls or messages, schedule DND times — for example, during your intense morning work or delicious afternoon siestas.
At night, unless you expect emergency calls, turn on airplane mode and tuck it in another room. This will ensure you don’t pounce on your phone the first thing you wake up.
If you need alarms, get a digital or analog alarm clock. Then your phone won’t devour your precious mornings — and a conquered morning means a conquered day.
Get Rid of (almost) All Social Media
Except for WhatsApp, I’ve uninstalled every single social media app. Since YouTube can’t be removed, I’ve enabled a permanent block on it — I still watch it but only on my laptop.
Nothing will revolutionize your mental health as much as getting off social media — free of the FOMO hellhole, you’ll feel much more satisfied, grateful, and proud of your own life.
You can’t do it right away though — even if you try, you’ll go right back in before long. The process has to be gradual:
- Remove the ones you can. Snapchat, Telegram, Facebook, and Reddit were the first to go. See what you can get rid of without hesitation.
- Use screen-time limits for the rest. For the rest — Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter, I put daily limits. You can use a free blocker app for this.
- Slash the accounts and pages you follow. Except for your prime interests and close friends, unfollow everyone and everything. Also, stop using the ‘Explore’ and ‘Recommended for you’ pages.
- Use them only on the weekends. My friend Niharikaa Kaur Sodhi uses Instagram once a week and uninstalls it once she’s done. This way, you won’t feel that you’re “missing out”.
- Test by deactivating your accounts. By now, you’re ready for a test drive. Deactivate your accounts and if you don’t feel a nagging need to dive back in, you’re free! Else, limit your usage further and try again.
Final Words
When you decimate your smartphone usage, you’ll be rewarded with tons of newfound free time — and motivation to do real-life things.
You can use this to nurture your relationships, achieve lofty real-world goals, master skills, improve your health, develop good habits, start side hustles, and explore your spirituality.
“Life is what happens when your cell phone is charging.”
— Anonymous
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