I’ve never found Screen Time all that useful, for the same reason as the article - it can’t distinguish good usage from bad usage. Screen Time only counts time - but it can’t tell which minutes is doomscrolling and which are used more positively.
Maybe that’s an application for Apple Intelligence, although there would be some pretty big privacy issues there.
Screen Time is also not helped by only working on Apple devices. It can’t account for time spent using using non Apple devices like TVs, consoles, PCs with other operating systems etc. it might have been more useful if there was an external API screen time software for other platforms could report to.
Apple has to keep it generic or the software providers will have a fit. It cannot start making judgments that 9 hours of Facebook is bad, or Meta would throw a fit.
And Apple will never just let users decide that. They consider it anti-user to force us to make choices.
And Apple will never just let users decide that. They consider it anti-user to force us to make choices.
Apple lets you set app, category (“Social” is a category), and website-specific limits, though, so you can absolutely make that choice.
I think it’s still important to measure “good usage,” because whether you really need to shop for that dress or not, it’s still sedentary time and that affects your body.
But it does seem like they could do a better job of knowing when you are actually sitting still looking at the screen. Google maps time while driving shouldn’t count for anything at all.
