Screen time data and research

Short, sourced reads on what the phone-use data actually says. Every number is labelled by what it measures and links to its primary source.

By Ruslan Shchuchkin, who built PhoneStop · Updated 17 September 2026 · Read this page as Markdown

The reads

• How much of your screen time is really one app?: your most-used app is about a quarter to a third of your phone time, and less for heavy users. Sensor Tower, DataReportal, Common Sense Media and Gallup.
• How much time do teenagers spend on their phones?: the heaviest users alive, at about 8 hours 39 minutes a day, and why blocking one app does nothing for them. Common Sense Media, Gallup, Ofcom and the CDC.
• What happens when you block one app?: the time tends to move to the next app, not disappear. The substitution effect, honestly, from the 2020 India TikTok ban to how the platforms behave.
• Knowing your screen time is not the same as spending less: your phone already shows the total for free, so why another tool. The self-report research, and what a report cannot do.