How to lock your phone for an hour (Android and iPhone)

To lock your phone for an hour, use a blocker app with a timer that has no stop button, or a timed lock box. Built-in Focus mode, Screen Time Downtime and Guided Access all take a time, but your own passcode ends each of them early.

That difference — whether the lock can be cancelled by the person it is meant to stop — is the whole question. Everything below is sorted by it.

The short version:

• Just want fewer notifications? Built-in Focus or Do Not Disturb is free and enough.
• Want the apps gone for an hour? Android's Focus mode or iPhone's Downtime do it, but one tap or your passcode lifts it.
• Want a lock you cannot cancel? A blocker with a hard timer, or the phone in a timed box.
• iPhone can't lock the whole phone from an app. Only chosen apps, through Apple's Screen Time.
• Restarting the phone does not reset a good blocker's timer.

The five ways, compared

Every option here lets you choose a length. What separates them is what it takes to get out before the time is up.

The built-in tools are well made. They are built for people who will respect a reminder, which is exactly who you are not at minute twenty of a study session — the reason Screen Time limits and Focus Mode stop working for a lot of people after the first week.

Built-in options on Android

Focus mode in Digital Wellbeing pauses the apps you pick — their icons grey out and their notifications stop. You can set it to end after a chosen time or run it on a schedule. The catch is in the notification itself: "Take a break" and "Turn off now" are one tap each.

App timers cap how long you can use an app per day, not per session. They are good for "no more than an hour of YouTube today" and poor for "nothing for the next hour", because they only bite once the allowance is used up.

App pinning (sometimes called screen pinning) keeps the phone in one app until you unpin it. There is no timer, and unpinning is a button gesture plus your PIN. It is meant for handing your phone to someone, not for locking yourself out.

Menus differ between Samsung, Pixel, Xiaomi and the rest — search Settings for "Focus mode", "App timers" or "Pin" rather than following a fixed path.

Built-in options on iPhone

Focus on iPhone filters notifications and can hide home screen pages. It does not stop an app opening if you go looking for it.

Screen Time Downtime is the closest thing to a phone lock Apple builds in. During Downtime only the apps you allow, and calls, are available. When you open a blocked app you can ask for more time — and unless a Screen Time passcode you don't know is set, that request is granted by you.

Guided Access is the most honest-sounding and the most misunderstood. Turn it on under Settings → Accessibility → Guided Access, open an app, then triple-click the side (or Home) button. Under Options you can set a time limit.

What it actually does is lock the phone to one app. It doesn't lock the phone shut. When the time runs out the screen locks, and you leave with your Guided Access passcode or Face ID — which works just as well five minutes in. It is excellent for keeping a child inside one game, and weak as a self-control tool.

The physical option: a timed lock box

A timed lock box is a container with a countdown lid: phone in, set the time, and it stays shut until zero. They are sold under names like "phone lock box" or "time-lock container", in plastic and in clear acrylic.

It is the only option on this page that works on any phone and that no setting can undo. The trade-off is that it locks the whole phone, so no calls, no maps, no music — and if you need the phone in an emergency, you're breaking a box to get it.

For a lot of people the cheapest version works almost as well: the phone in another room, on charge, with the door shut. It is not a lock, but it does remove the cue, which is half of what any lock is for.

Blocker apps with a timer you can't stop

A blocker app is the middle ground: it locks only what you choose, keeps the rest of the phone working, and — in its strictest setting — has no way out until the timer ends.

Free options exist. Digital Wellbeing's Focus mode and Apple's Screen Time are already on your phone, and several third-party blockers have free tiers; at the time of writing, check each listing for which features are paid. The question to ask of any of them is the one from the table: what does stopping early take? Our comparison of app blockers on Android goes through the main ones on that question.

Where it is weaker, honestly: there is no whole-phone lock on iPhone, because Screen Time has no "all apps" option for a third-party app to use. On iPhone, turning off the app's Screen Time access in Settings ends a block — Apple keeps that switch in the user's hands, and no app can take it away. Blocks also don't repeat on a schedule; you start each one yourself. And the app is free with ads; Pro removes them.

What happens if you restart the phone?

This is the first thing most people try, so it is worth knowing before you start.

Built-in tools carry on: Screen Time Downtime and Android's scheduled Focus mode are system settings, and a restart doesn't touch them. Guided Access ends, because a restart drops you back to the lock screen.

A blocker app depends on how it was written. In our own code, a Phone Block stores the clock time it ends, not a countdown, so a restarted phone picks the block back up and it still ends at the same time. Switching the phone off for forty minutes of a sixty-minute block leaves twenty minutes, not sixty. On Android, "Prevent power-off" goes further and closes the power menu while a block runs.

A lock box doesn't care — the phone is inside it.

Which one to choose

Pick by what you are actually trying to stop.

• Notifications pulling you away: Focus or Do Not Disturb. Free, built in, enough.
• One or two apps for an hour, with an easy way out: Focus mode on Android, Downtime on iPhone.
• Chosen apps, no way out: a blocker with a hard timer — on either phone.
• The entire phone, no way out: a whole-phone blocker on Android, or a timed lock box on iPhone.

Whatever you use, make the length honest. A 45-minute lock you finish does more for the habit than a three-hour one you spend bargaining with. If you are setting one up to study, blocking apps while studying covers which apps to put on the list and when Hard mode is worth it.