The 21-Day Digital Detox That Changed My Life

Tips to help you put limits on your technology use and start living more of your life offline.

Technology has changed the world. It’s increased our productivity, changed the way we work, and altered how we communicate with each other. But there’s a side to it that doesn’t get talked about enough. Nothing online is truly free. Social media companies make money by selling your attention. Your time has real value to them, which is why these apps are designed to be as addictive as possible. Keeping you scrolling isn’t a side effect. It’s the whole point.

In 2025, the average person spent over five hours a day on their phone. Let that sink in for a second. That is equivalent to about two and a half months a year. If you made a 5-year life plan, would you include spending a year of your life looking at your phone? Something tells me the answer is no.

When it comes to technology, everyone has reasons they want to form better habits. Here are the 5 reasons I did a digital detox:

1. I don’t think it adds enough value to my life. There was a time when social media made sense to me. When I moved 2,500 miles away from everyone I loved, it was genuinely how I stayed connected. Now my feed is full of random posts from strangers, and it’s almost impossible to find anyone I actually know. When I’m honest about what I’m getting versus what I’m giving up, the math just doesn’t add up anymore.
2. I want to be more productive with my time. With TikTok and Instagram Reels, I found myself constantly looking at short, pointless videos. Sometimes I’d look up and realize hours had passed. That’s time I’ll never get back. And it wasn’t just social media — I was checking email ten times a day out of habit, not necessity, constantly pulling myself out of whatever I was actually trying to get done.
3. I don’t like feeling manipulated and watched. I truly dislike the algorithms that feed me things based on what I’m doing. It’s creepy. Social media used to be a fun way to connect. Now it’s full of ads trying to get my attention. As the saying goes, If something is free, you are the product. And honestly? I’m just tired of it.
4. I think we need more real human connections. One of the main problems I see with the world today is we’ve drifted away from connecting offline. And that kind of connection is so important for our happiness, our mental health, and our sense of belonging. We were made for community. And I think a lot of us are lonely because we’ve been mistaking online interaction for the real thing.
5. My kids deserve better. The obvious reason is I want to give my kids all my attention, but there is more to it than just putting my phone down and playing with my kids more. Did you know that Steve Jobs said in an interview he did not allow his kids to play with the iPad at home. Think about that. The inventor of the iPad knew that it wasn’t healthy for his kids to use technology all the time. He wasn’t alone. According to the article, many industry leaders in the tech world limit their kids use of technology. They trade devices for real books, activities, and time spent together as a family. I want that for my kids, and I know I need to set a good example for them.

I’m an older millennial. I remember life before smartphones. In college, I’d only get on Facebook a few times a week because there wasn’t a phone sitting in my pocket everywhere I went. Then, I got my first iPhone in 2010 and haven’t put it down since. That’s over a decade of giving my time and attention to a screen. Somewhere along the way I decided I wanted my time back. That doesn’t mean giving my phone up entirely. It just means having a healthier relationship with it.

Time is the most valuable thing you have. How much of it you give to your phone is completely your choice. But my hope is that we get back to a place where social means being in the same room with someone, and our time is spent on things that actually bring us joy. If social media does that for you, then you’ve already found the balance. If it doesn’t, a digital detox may be exactly what you need.

I’ll admit my goal of 21 days without technology wasn’t easy. Like any habit, stepping away from what’s comfortable is hard, especially at first. But I knew it was something I needed.

What surprised me most was how much time I got back. Hours I didn’t even know I was losing. When the boredom hit — and it did — I made a list of small things that made me happy outside of technology.  Things that had slowly disappeared from my life without me even noticing. When I felt restless, I’d pick something off the list instead of reaching for my phone. It felt so good to finally do all the things I’d been telling myself for years I was too busy for. Turns out I wasn’t too busy. I was just distracted.

If you are ready to try a digital detox, here are some tips from my experience:

• Start by writing down why this digital detox is important to you and what you want to accomplish by doing it. If it helps, make a pros and cons list for your digital habits to determine which technology you overuse or is not adding value to your life.
• Decide how long you want to do the detox. I did 21 days, but I started with a 10-day reset first to ease my way into the longer detox.
• Delete all social media apps from your phone to help break your habit of opening them without thinking.
• Use Downtime on your iPhone to set limits for other distracting apps. Go to Settings-Screen Time to find the Downtime feature. In Screen Time, you can also see how much time you send on your phone daily, set app and communication limits, and customize your screen settings to help with your personal technology goals.
• Make a list of other things you want to do with your time. For me this was a must! It helped me when I realized how much free time I had without my phone.
• Cut off the email feature on your phone. If you use the email app on your iPhone, you can turn off a certain mailbox by going to edit in the top right of the app and unchecking inboxes you don’t want to see. Easily turn this feature off and on to set time limits on your emails.
• Put your phone in another room during the day. I have an Apple Watch and use that instead to make sure I still get calls and texts.

My biggest takeaway from the detox was getting clear on what technology actually adds to my life — and what it doesn’t. Instagram, for me, has become less of a social platform and more of a tool. I use it to find a new restaurant or see what’s happening in the community. That’s the value I get from it now. For actually keeping up with friends and family, I call, text, or show up in person.

The rules I live by now are simple. No phones at family dinner or by my bed at night. I only get on social media a few days a week. I have a book in my bag for waiting rooms and carpool lines instead of defaulting to my phone. These small boundaries have made a bigger difference than I expected.

Taking control of my relationship with technology has genuinely changed my life. I’m more present, more focused, and more connected to the people who actually matter. And that’s what this was always about.

If you’ve tried a digital detox, I’d love to hear from you. What worked? What didn’t? Leave a comment — I’m always looking for new ways to keep getting better at this.