App of the Week: OFFTIME

Turn off distractions on your phone with OFFTIME. Available as a beta version for iOS and as a full app on Android, it allows users to block disruptive notifications, texts, calls or apps for a set duration.

OFFTIME iOS Light has many of the same features as the Android app.

The iOS app includes goals, usage-tracking and the ability to block disruptive notifications, texts, calls or apps for a period of time.

The app requires you to give it access to SMS messaging, apps and phone calls in order for certain notifications to stop appearing on your phone’s home screen.

You can pick apps or contacts which will not be restricted during your “offtime.”

These will be visible on your phone.

If you try to access a blocked app during this time, it will automatically close with a reminder saying you are on your offtime.

After you have completed your offtime, your phone will vibrate to remind you that you are finished, and then it will take you to an activity log page.

There, it lists notifications or messages you missed during your offtime, as well as any apps you tried to access during that time.

You can also set daily offtime limits under the “goals” tab of the app.

This allows you to control how many minutes your daily offtime will be once you push the start button. You can see your average off-time minutes compared to the national average of other users.

It is important to note that the app performs detailed analysis of your phone and app usage. The personal data collected is encrypted and can only be accessed by you.

An analysis of your data can be found under the “my day” icon on the top right of the app.