CAIRA: I’m Caira Blackwell, and you’re listening to The Wirecutter Show.
Hi, it’s Caira.
Have you ever checked your daily average screen time on your phone and been embarrassed?
We all know it’s bad. Whether you play games or check your social media feeds or read the news, it can be so hard to control your phone usage. Or maybe you feel okay about your screen time, but your child or your partner really struggles to stay off their phone. A lot of people are desperate for a solution.
Here at Wirecutter, many of our staff members have tried apps and techniques to reduce their phone time, from going black-and-white to using a dumb phone. But one tool stands out for many of them, it’s a device called the Brick.
The Brick is a physical app-blocking tool that senior staff writer Elissa Sanci tested for two weeks, and she hasn’t stopped using it since.
Today, I’m going to talk with Elissa about this device, and how it’s helped her limit her phone usage.
CAIRA: Elissa, welcome.
ELISSA: Hi. Happy to be here.
CAIRA: So happy to have you. And I’m excited to talk about our subject today. Tell me, what is the Brick, and how does it work?
ELISSA: The Brick is, like, this small, little refrigerator magnet. It’s a square, it fits in the palm of your hand. It has a magnet on the back, so you can stick it to the refrigerator, keep it in one place. Basically, you sync this little Brick with a Brick app that you download on your phone. And then through the app, you have to choose which apps you want the Brick to block. This is to stop you from scrolling endlessly, or really to block you out of whatever it is that is taking up all of your time. For me, it was TikTok and Instagram. But for some people, I bet it could be, like, work Slack on off-work hours. Essentially, when you’re ready to lock yourself out, you tap your phone against the Brick, and that’s it. You’re bricked. Your phone is locked, to the apps. You cannot open up whatever app you’ve selected. And the only way to get back in to unbrick is to touch your phone against the physical brick when you’re ready to get back in.
CAIRA: So, what made you want to test something like the Brick in the first place?
ELISSA: I was on my phone all the time. My screen time was appalling. I’m telling you, I could not get myself off my phone. When I set out to research and report this story, I obviously had to check my screen time as a starting point, and it was —
CAIRA: What was the number, girl?
ELISSA: Eight hours.
CAIRA: A day?
ELISSA: That’s, like, a whole workday.
It was really embarrassing, even just for me in my own house, just looking at it. I remember thinking, “Oh my God, that is a full workday that I had spent on my phone.” I was just addicted to social media, but for what? I don’t even know, because I just couldn’t stop doomscrolling. I’m like, “Am I even taking anything in?” My attention span was shot. I was getting it from every angle, and I couldn’t get myself to stop scrolling, no matter how hard I tried. I would make really big, concerted efforts to stay off my phone, and I couldn’t do it. I just would find myself back, scrolling.
CAIRA: It sounds like the Brick did work for you, and I want to talk about why exactly it worked in a minute. But before we even get into that, I have to know: What’s to stop people from just unbricking their phone? You said it’s a magnet that you can attach basically anywhere. Why wouldn’t somebody just carry it around in their bag with them, if they really want to unbrick whenever they want to?
ELISSA: You totally could. It’s really up to you. First and foremost, what’s stopping people from unbricking is the fact that you need to be physically next to the Brick to unbrick. That’s your first barrier. If you’re really serious about keeping yourself off of your phone, you’ll keep the Brick somewhere that’s super inconvenient or impossible for you to get to. If you work in an office, you can even leave the Brick in your car. Maybe it’s, like, you want to stay off social media in the office, so you brick before you go in, you leave the Brick in your car, and then you can’t get back on until you leave for the day.
For me, I work from home, and so I’m always in the same space as my Brick, but I keep it on the fridge, just so that way I don’t lose it. And it’s far enough away that I had to really think, “Do I want to get up and unbrick right now?” And then it also led to the shame spiral of it all, where I was like, “I could easily get up and go unbrick.” And then I’m like, “But what does that say about me that I really can’t keep it together long enough?” And again, I was doing this for work, specifically, in the beginning, so I was also like, “I need to actually lock in and do this, because I have to be able to write this story.” Even though in the beginning it was really hard. It sounds silly, but it’s, like, Instagram withdrawal. How many times did I open that app, just to be greeted with “You are bricked, go touch grass,” essentially is what it tells you. And you’re like, “Oh my God.”
CAIRA: It also tells you how long that specific app has been bricked for, right?
ELISSA: Yeah. Alternatively, if you’re out and about, and you’re bricked and there is no way for you to unbrick, the app has five emergency unbricks. There are five chances for you to unbrick your phone whenever you want, whether you’re next to the Brick or not. But the problem with that is that this little device only comes with five emergency unbricks. Once you use them up, that’s it. You’re done, no more unbricking.
It gives you that scarcity mindset. And I’ve only emergency-unbricked one time, and it was because I went on vacation and totally forgot to unbrick. And I was like, “Well, I would like to be able to post something.” And so I emergency-unbricked.
I have four emergency unbricks left, but … I don’t know. I think that really stops me from using it, because it scares me. I don’t know. and that also just bolsters the scarcity mindset.
CAIRA: It’s the shame game all over again.
ELISSA: Yeah. And you know what? It’s working.
CAIRA: Just to run it back a little bit, can you actually tell me more of the mechanics of how you interact with the Brick, and how it works?
ELISSA: Yeah. If you know that you want your phone to be bricked during work hours, you can set a profile. And it could be a workday, and so it can be, like, 9:00 to 5:00, and it’ll just brick and unbrick automatically, so you don’t even have to be standing next to the Brick at that point. Another fun way to use the scheduling aspect: If you’re a person who spends the morning doomscrolling before you get up, and you’re like, “You know what? I want to be able to get up and not look at my phone.” You can set something. Say your alarm goes off at 6:30, you can brick yourself from 6:00 to 9:00. And so that way, by the time your alarm goes off, you’re already bricked. If your first instinct is to open up Instagram, open up TikTok, whatever, you won’t be able to.
There are different ways you can use this. For me, I know myself, I know my personality, and unfortunately cold turkey really is the best way for me. And it helped a lot. But I know that not everybody needs to use it the way I use it. And I think it can be, again, a really helpful tool. I’m just a little extreme.
CAIRA: Brenda Stolyar, she’s a tech reporter here at Wirecutter. She also tried lots of methods to limit her phone addiction. She tried everything from Screen Time, which is a built-in limiting feature in the Settings app on iPhones. She switched to an old BlackBerry that didn’t have any social media. And she even tried an app called Focus Friend … I don’t know if you’ve heard of this one, but it’s this little avatar that can only get their work done while your phone is not in use. Basically, they get to work if you work.
ELISSA: That’s cute.
CAIRA: Yeah, she really did like that one. But she still said, above all, she likes the Brick more than anything. I’m curious to hear what other methods you tried, and why the Brick still reigns supreme for you.
ELISSA: Before the Brick, I tried a lot of different things. Like Brenda, I was using Screen Time, that comes built in with the phone. I had downloaded an app, not Focus Friend, it was called Opal. It’s similar to the Brick in that you set schedules, and it locks you out of whatever apps for however long you set it for. I tried things like just putting my phone in a different room. I tried a little lockbox for my phone.
CAIRA: Did you give somebody else the key or the code or something?
ELISSA: No, of course I didn’t, so I was able to get into it so easily. Yeah, that didn’t work. The Screen Time app and Opal, I found it was just too easy to circumvent the stoppage of the apps. When you have the Screen Time on, it’ll pop up, and it’s like, “You’ve reached your screen-time limit.” And then right there, there’s an option that’s like, “Remind me in 15 minutes.” I did that once for three hours.
CAIRA: It’s like an alarm for your phone, when you’re trying to wake up, and you just hit snooze over and over again.
ELISSA: Yes, 100%. And then, same with Opal. Opal had it so you could take 15 minutes at a time off. If you wanted to spend 15 minutes on Instagram, you would go into the app and say like, “Okay, I want to take a 15-minute break from this.” And then you’d have to wait 10 seconds, and then it lets you in and then it kicks you out. But again, you could just keep doing that. It’s the physical distance from the Brick that really helped in the beginning especially. To me, it’s pretty hard to get around, and that was exactly what I needed.
CAIRA: Is there anything that you hate about the Brick? Any downsides?
ELISSA: I would say the biggest downside is that it costs $60. It’s not cheap. But it’s a one-time payment, and it doesn’t require a subscription. Some of those apps, like, Opal does require a subscription, and so you’re paying every month for this. Whereas this Brick, I paid $60 once, and that’s it.
CAIRA: We’re going to take a quick break, and then when we’re back, Elissa is going to tell us who she doesn’t recommend it for, and bricking for the whole family. Be right back.
CAIRA: Welcome back. With me now is Elissa Sanci, who is a writer here at Wirecutter who wanted to test the Brick to see if it would help her get off her phone. So Elissa, who do you think the Brick is best suited for?
ELISSA: The Brick is best suited for anybody who wants to spend less time on their phone. You don’t have to be like me, a social media addict. You can just simply not want to be on your phone. I think anybody can benefit from having a Brick. Whatever it is about your phone that is distracting you, you likely can brick yourself out of, and that’s really helpful.
CAIRA: Can you share the Brick with multiple devices in one home?
ELISSA: Yeah. You can use a single Brick for however many people live in your house. Every person just needs to download the app separately on their phone and make their own account, and then you can sync up to the same Brick. If it’s you and a bunch of roommates, and you’re like, “Oh, New Year’s resolution, we want to spend less time on our phones,” you can get the Brick, split it between the four of you. If you want to implement screen time for your kids, screen-time limits, and they’re also savvy, and they’re figuring out how to get around the screen-time limits that you’re already putting in place, this could also work. If you are a parent, and you have a teen who is stuck on their phone, you can offer to do it as well, so they’re not going it alone. This one $60 Brick can really go far.
And if you decide it’s not for you, you can give it to somebody else who is in need of a Brick. As long as they download an app on their own and create their own profile, they’ll have no problem getting in and out. And you can also use the Brick with multiple devices, even if it’s just you, you just need to download the app on whatever device. For instance, I have it on my iPad too, but I had to create a whole separate account — like, different email — so that way it wouldn’t mess up the one on my phone. So my iPad has its own separate Brick account.
CAIRA: I think a lot of people might be worried, for instance, if you’re on Instagram a lot, and you get updates on the people in your life. And there’s a fear there, if you are not doing that, then you’re going to miss out on big life events of the people in your life. Did you feel that at all? Do you feel like you’ve been left out of people’s lives?
ELISSA: Yes and no. Yes, of course, I am missing out on all of the small updates for people who I’m not very close with, just people in my life who I don’t talk to all the time, but I still want to know what’s happening. But for my closest friends or my closest family members, I haven’t missed anything. In this past year, a lot of things have happened, a lot of big life events. My friends have gone through a lot of big life events, and I haven’t been left out, because they’ve reached out to me to let me know. And it also helps that when I started this endeavor, I did end up texting a bunch of friends just to be like, “Hey, just so you know, I’m kind of off Instagram. If you send me something, and I’m not responding, I’m not being a jerk. I’m not using Instagram anymore, just so you know.” And I think that also helps too, is if you just tell people.
CAIRA: But that’s sweet to hear. It is nice to hear. Just to be clear, you published this guide in October of last year, yes? How long have you been using the Brick now?
ELISSA: I started using the Brick before the piece was published in September. And so, as of now, it’s been almost 10 months. But yeah, I’ve been bricked out of Instagram now, at this point, for the last 59 days.
CAIRA: Wow. Good for you, girl. That’s a really big accomplishment. Do you have any plans of stopping the Brick?
ELISSA: No, I don’t think so. I think I’m just going to keep myself bricked. It feels like a security blanket in a way, so maybe I really haven’t overcome my addiction to social media, but whatever. It works, and it works really well, and it’s really kept me off of my phone, and I’ve been able to just do more with my free time. All of those excuses that I had been giving myself, “I would write a book if only I had the time.” It’s like, “Girl, you have the time.” I’ve done so much stuff with all of my time. I’m reengaging with all my old hobbies. I’ve just been able to redirect all of that time into things that give you a tangible result versus wasting eight hours on social media.
CAIRA: Well, I love to hear this, and I really do hope that you keep it up, Elissa. It sounds like you definitely will. Thank you so much for joining us. It was such a pleasure to have you.
ELISSA: Yeah, thanks for having me. This was fun.
CAIRA: You can find a link to Elissa’s story about using the Brick in our show notes or on Wirecutter’s website. We’ll also link to more articles about the techniques our reporters have tried to limit their phone time. Thanks for listening.
The Wirecutter Show is executive produced by Rosie Guerin and produced by Abigail Keel. Engineering support from Maddy Masiello and Nick Pitman. Today’s episode was mixed by Catherine Anderson. Original music by Dan Powell, Marion Lozano, Elisheba Ittoop, Catherine Anderson, Rowan Niemisto, and Diane Wong. Cliff Levy is Wirecutter’s deputy publisher and general manager. Ben Frumin is Wirecutter’s editor-in-chief.
I’m Caira Blackwell. Thanks for listening.
