I pick up my phone 111 times a day – it doesn’t matter how much time we spend on it
Here’s how much I use my phone by the numbers: my screen time last week averaged six hours and 45 minutes a day. This week, it went down: five hours and nine minutes a day.
I picked up my phone 111 times a day on average, usually to open the Messages app – I love texting. I received on average 297 notifications a day.
My most-used app over the course of last week was Instagram (three hours and 20 minutes over seven days); followed by Safari (two hours and 50 minutes); TikTok (two hours and 45 minutes); and Messages (two hours and 30 minutes). Two weeks ago, it was Netflix, with eight hours and 55 minutes – I binged Castlevania.
All of these minutes, in aggregate, are my life. I would no sooner call the time I spend using it wasted than I would call my life wasted. I edit technology news for a living. To me, digital life is real life.
This is my screenager’s manifesto: it does not matter how much time you spend on your phone.
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Phones now inhabit every aspect of our lives. That is not bad. It is not good, either: screen time is not a moral choice. However much time you spend on your phone should not be a judgment of your character.
The measure of whether you are living a good life is up to you – relationships, career, your own inner peace and happiness. The graph of the hours you’re using your phone is not that metric. Your screen time is no more significant than the number of minutes you spend taking photos, running or reading – likely all activities you do with your phone in hand, but not ones you would castigate yourself for were they done with a camera, a Walkman or a book.
When I do resent my screen time, it is not the phone itself I’m frowning at. It is some burden which is digitally delivered to me. The same, I imagine, is true for you: an overbearing job transmutes the device into a ball and chain of emails and Slack chats. The Guardian’s app alerts you to a politician’s inane and offensive remarks. A dating app match flakes via text. The phone is only the conduit for some unpleasant other thing.
There are certain things I can’t do on my phone. I can’t write in a serious way. I can’t edit news stories, which is my job, or write fiction, which is my hobby. In certain unproductive weeks, I look at my screen time and feel like those hours are indeed ones spent skirting work or challenging, fulfilling outside pursuits. But the measure of hours spent in Google Maps navigating the subways of New York City is not an indicator of whether I give others