How to put a time limit on apps iphone

• You can limit screen time on your iPhone using the aptly named "Screen Time" feature, which will lock your apps and make them temporarily unusable. 
• There are two ways to use Screen Time on your iPhone, both of which can be found in your iPhone's Settings app. 
• Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories. 

We spend a lot of time looking at our screens, between our TV, computer, and phone. A lot. 

If you've ever wanted to limit the amount of time you spend on your iPhone, though, Apple's "Screen Time" function allows you to do just that, in two different ways. 

You can limit the time you spend on certain apps, or schedule a daily period of "downtime" where all apps (with the exception of essentials like Phone, Messages, and Maps) are blocked. 

Here's how to enable it.

Check out the products mentioned in this article:

iPhone 11 (From $699.99 at Best Buy)

Using the Downtime feature 

1. Unlock your iPhone and launch the Settings app from your homescreen. 

2. In Settings, find the "Screen Time" tab and tap to select it. 

3. If you've never used Screen Time before, Apple will ask you to set up a Screen Time password — this can be different from your lock screen password, and is four digits long. Tap "Use Screen Time Passcode" to set one.

4. Once you've set a password, in the Screen Time menu, find "Downtime" and tap it. 

5. After you've entered your Screen Time password, make sure Downtime is turned on — you will know when the switch to the right of Downtime turns green. 

6. Next, select the time frame during which you want to have apps blocked on your iPhone. 

7. To finish, make sure you've selected "Block at Downtime" — this will lock all your non-essential apps during the time period you selected. 

Apple will lock all of what it considers to be "non-essential" apps, a list that automatically excludes Phone, Messages, FaceTime and Maps — though you can block any app with the exception of the Phone app. 

You can add apps to your "Always Allowed" list by going to back to the main Screen Time menu and selecting "Always Allowed." Any app you add to the "Allowed Apps" section will be unblocked.

By locking certain apps 

1. Launch Settings and tap Screen Time. 

2. In the Screen Time menu, select "App Limits." 

3. Tap "Add Limit" at the bottom of the menu.

4. Here you can choose which apps you want to limit. They're sorted by various groupings like "Productivity" and "Social Networking" — tap a category to see what apps it includes. You can set limits on all apps by selecting "All Apps & Categories" and tapping "Next" in the upper right-hand corner of the screen.

Resetting Time Limits by Deleting and Re-Installing

The prob­lem: Kids are delet­ing apps after they’ve hit Screen Time lim­its and rein­stalling via Fam­i­ly Share or iCloud. This resets the clock on time lim­its and nul­li­fies any pre­vi­ous restrictions. 

Solu­tion: If you dis­cov­er that your kids are using this parental con­trol workaround, you should com­plete­ly dis­able the App Store. It will pre­vent your child from access­ing Fam­i­ly Share with­out your assistance. 

Next, set strict store restric­tions, select­ing the ​“Don’t Allow” set­ting for installing and delet­ing apps and mak­ing in-app pur­chas­es. It will block the abil­i­ty to delete and rein­stall apps for the pur­pose of extend­ing screen time past pre­de­fined limits.

Bypassing YouTube restrictions via iMessage

The prob­lem: Kids are bypass­ing Screen Time lim­its for YouTube by send­ing them­selves videos and using the YouTube iMes­sage app to view them. iMes­sage apps don’t adhere to the same lim­its as the over­all Screen Time function.

Solu­tion: The best way to pro­tect your kids from unsu­per­vised or unap­proved YouTube usage is by delet­ing the YouTube app entire­ly and block­ing the web­site at the sys­tem set­tings lev­el. To block YouTube at a sys­tem lev­el, go to the Set­tings app and tap Screen Time > Con­tent & Pri­va­cy Restric­tions > Con­tent Restric­tions > Web Con­tent and tap ​“Lim­it Adult Web­sites.” You can then tap ​“Add Web­site” under ​“Nev­er Allow” and enter https://​www​.youtube​.com/.

Screen Recording to Discover Parental Control Passcodes

The prob­lem: By screen record­ing what’s hap­pen­ing on their device after hand­ing it back to a par­ent, kids are cap­tur­ing Screen Time pass­codes and using them lat­er to bypass, dis­able or change limits.

Solu­tion: You’ll know your screen is being record­ed if you see a flash­ing red icon in the top left nav­i­ga­tion bar of the device. Always check for this icon before enter­ing your pass­code. You can also dis­able screen record­ing com­plete­ly. To do this, go to Set­tings > Screen Time > Con­tent & Pri­va­cy Restric­tions > Con­tent Restric­tions > Screen Record­ing > Don’t Allow.

Factory Reset

The prob­lem: Chil­dren are doing a com­plete fac­to­ry reset and set­ting phones and tablets up as a ​“new” device. This com­plete­ly eras­es Screen Time set­tings and allows kids to use the device with­out restrictions.

Solu­tion: Make sure your child isn’t using their own Apple ID on the device. If the ​“Find My” fea­ture is enabled, it will require an Apple ID pass­word to be entered upon set­up of the reset device. It’s also a best prac­tice to check Screen Time met­rics on a reg­u­lar basis. If a reset occurs, you’ll know imme­di­ate­ly by the sud­den absence/​drop off of any usage metrics.

Time Zone and Device Time Changes

The prob­lem: By mov­ing the device date back from the cur­rent one or set­ting the device time zone to a region behind your own time, chil­dren can access addi­tion­al screen time beyond what you have allowed. 

Solu­tion: Set the time zone and date to update auto­mat­i­cal­ly and block changes at the sys­tem set­tings lev­el. To dis­able changes to time zones, take the fol­low­ing steps:

Go to Set­tings > Screen Time > Con­tent & Pri­va­cy Restric­tions > Loca­tion Ser­vices. Under Sys­tem Ser­vices, ensure Set­ting Time Zone is tog­gled on. Tap ​“Don’t Allow Changes” at the top of the Loca­tion Ser­vices page.

Using Siri to Send Messages After Time Limits Have Already Been Reached

The prob­lem: Kids are using Siri to dic­tate and send mes­sages to their friends after they have reached the max­i­mum screen time allowed in the Screen Time settings. 

Solu­tion: Dis­able Siri by going to Screen Time > Con­tent & Pri­va­cy Restric­tions > Allowed Apps and tog­gling off Siri & Dictation.

Sending Messages Using the Share Function

The prob­lem: Kids are bypass­ing time lim­its by send­ing mes­sages through the ​“Share” func­tion built into many apps. For exam­ple, by tak­ing a screen­shot and using the ​“Share to Mes­sages” func­tion, they can bring up the Mes­sag­ing app and then delete the screen­shot to bring up a blank slate to send their text. They can also go into the Con­tacts app and elect to share a con­tact via text. They’ll then have access to iMes­sage in a sim­i­lar fashion.

Solu­tion: There are no com­pre­hen­sive solu­tions yet for iMes­sage, but in the case of the Con­tacts share workaround, you can set a short time lim­it (1 minute) for the Con­tacts app in Screen Time.

Accessing Messages After Downtime

The prob­lem: When mes­sage noti­fi­ca­tions come in after down­time is acti­vat­ed, kids can still swipe down on the noti­fi­ca­tion to read and respond to the message.

Solu­tion: Unfor­tu­nate­ly there is not an ide­al solu­tion for this loop­hole except to dis­able all mes­sage notifications.

Launching the Safari Browser from Inside 3rd-Party Apps

The prob­lem: Apps that use built-in brows­er expe­ri­ences allow kids to access Safari even when Screen Time lim­its are in place. For exam­ple, if a child opens an app like Gmail or Face­book Mes­sen­ger and taps a link, the web view with­in the app will open a new brows­er win­dow. Even if the address bar is hid­den in the view from with­in the app, kids can still click through links or send them­selves links to an app that pro­vides access to a brows­er window.

Solu­tion: Change sys­tem set­tings to Allowed Web­sites Only, which will restrict in-app browsers, and set strict lim­its on which web­sites are avail­able on the child’s device. To do this, go to the Set­tings app and tap Screen Time > Con­tent & Pri­va­cy Restric­tions > Con­tent Restric­tions > Web Con­tent and tap ​“Allowed Web­sites Only.” You can then con­fig­ure the cus­tomized list of web­sites that your child can access.

Staying Vigilant to Protect Our Kids

While parental con­trols on iOS devices can help lim­it screen time, they are far from per­fect, and cer­tain­ly not a replace­ment for parental mon­i­tor­ing of a child’s online habits and behaviors. 

The best solu­tion for build­ing healthy screen time habits is to help your child under­stand why they need lim­its and what the dan­gers of screen time addic­tion are if they don’t fol­low the ground rules you’ve set.

Can I put a time limit on my apps?

How do I set time limits on kids iPhone apps?

How do you put a lock on your iPhone apps?