You can add a delay for the apps, so you have to wait 5 or 10 minutes before you can use the app - it would make all the difference.
The person wouldn’t open the app because it would take so long, and even if one day when they open it, they have 10 minutes to deal with the thoughts: Do I really wanna open this app/website?
The 10-minute rule is a very successful self-control tip used by the Diary of a Ceo.
support conversation with Diogo
It could be another mode for the digital detox app allowed you to open a distracting app, but you had to wait a certain delay (set by the user) to do that, and you could cancel it at any time?
e.g. 30s delay to open YouTube. You click on the YouTube button and you see ‘YouTube will open in 30s … 29s … 28s …’ countdown, with a prominent ‘Cancel’ button below it.
This way, a user can open YouTube (or any other distracting app) if they really need / want to, but they’re going to be far less tempted to open YouTube in a two minute break (and get themselves caught scrolling shorts for an hour).
To make this work you would likely want to change the on/off switch for apps to a dropdown list - Allow, Block, Delay.
You could say something like:
Digital Detox
Opening YouTube in 30s …
[Hourglass icon which flips every second to show that the screen hasn’t locked?]
[Cancel button]
[Emergency override button]
And have nothing other than the hourglass change on the screen until YouTube opens … ?
They could choose 10s time increments, perhaps.
support conversation with Andrew