Silly life, like r/Dumbphones moderator José Briones told me that it’s about “reclaiming your time and attention for the things you really value.” Of course, getting sucked into a subreddit because it was algorithmically suggested to me (based on my extensive online browsing) is the antithesis of that. But that’s how I found r/dumbphonesnow my favorite place on the internet.
“The phone you had in 2009” is a decent approximation. Briones got into them in late 2019. At the time, he was logging 12 or 13 hours of screen time a day. One night, around 1 a.m., he was watching Netflix on his phone and thought, “Enough.”
He tried going cold turkey with a Light Phone, a basic little device with an e-ink screen and just a few basic features. It didn’t work. Life without Google Maps was too hard. The siren call of the smartphone was too loud, so she picked it up again. A few months later, amid the isolation and stress of the pandemic lockdown, he gave a dumb phone another try. This time something clicked. He walked his dog more, read more books, joined a sports league, and tried more hobbies. He also discovered r/Dumbphones (via the algorithm, of course) and soon became its moderator, helping the subreddit go from less than 10,000 members in 2020 to more than 50,000 four years later.
I am part of that growth. Like Briones, he had tried a Light Phone back in the day, and also like Briones, it had failed. When I moved apartments, the Light Phone didn’t come with me.
That was good, or so I learned from r/Dumbphones. In this community, having a dumb phone is not about succeeding or failing, or even being anti-tech. It’s about asking yourself what you really need from your phone. “It’s a happy, useful substitute,” says Alex Locklin, who joined in 2024. “We’re all looking for something similar but not identical. “I think everyone realizes that they move too much and miss out on life.” There are no tests of ideological purity. No one accuses you of being a fake if your device isn’t dumb enough. I haven’t had to throw my iPhone into the nearest body of water to come out clean and pure. The sub is more generous than that. In my six months there, I haven’t seen anything resembling an argument. Arguing with strangers on the Internet is not very stupid.
Newcomers to the subreddit often search the dumb phone finder, a tool Briones created to, well, find dumb phones. You answer a questionnaire with questions like: “Do you want smart apps?” and “What style of phone do you want?” (candy bar, flip, or touchscreen) and tells you whether a Cat S22 Flip or a Punkt MP02 might work for you. Briones recommends starting with what you have: Android phones can be rooted and modified; iPhones have parental controls that block apps.
All I had to do was put down my phone and use some tips and tricks I found on r/Dumbphones. I deleted all social media apps and tried grayscale. When I realized I was still using my phone to check the time, I looked at some of the photos users were posting and sure enough, almost everyone had a wristwatch. I obtained a cheap casio. I also started putting my phone in a bag instead of my pocket. It makes it much less convenient to absentmindedly pull it out on the subway.
Even these small steps have made the phone feel less like an extra appendage and more like the multi-tool in my bike repair kit. My screen time has dropped by about an hour a day, but it seems like a lot more. I still have a hard time leaving my phone in another room at the end of the workday, but I’m getting there.
On r/Dumbphones, there seem to be only a few long-time residents or recurring characters, unlike other subreddits. Here, people show up, find what works for them, and then disappear. Like a good dumb phone, r/Dumbphones is the best kind of technology: we use it when we need it.
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