Google’s new screen time widget puts your doomscrolling habits front and center
If you haven’t heard,widgets are backin a big,bigway. Just days afterAndroid’s new battery widget launched for Pixel phones, Google has returned with another helpful tool destined to find a permanent place among the icons on your home screen. A new screen time widget is the perfect way to keep an eye on your phone use, all without diving into another app.
Screen timesyncs directly withDigital Wellbeing, Google’s built-in tool for reducing time wasted that shipped as part of Android 9 Pie. It shows the total hours and minutes spent looking at your phone’s display for the day, along with the three apps you’ve used the most so far, all rolled into a neat little infographic. Depending on the selected size, the circles for each app grow larger or smaller, perfect for demonstrating just how much time you’ve wasted staring at your Twitter feed.
As you’d expect from a modern widget made for Android 12, it’s decked out in whatever colors Material You pulls from your wallpaper, perfect for matching up with all of those other tools on your home screen. Tapping it opens directly to the Digital Wellbeing menu, where you can set app timers, activate Focus mode during work hours, or retreat into Bedtime mode to help unwind before falling asleep.
We’ve known for a couple of months now that ascreen time widget was in the works, but it’s great to see it finally made official. Google’s done a great job over the last few monthsoffering more ways to use your phoneright from the home screen. In fact, with so many widgets now available, reducing your screen time might not be so hard after all.
The note-taking app I should have used all along
Broader branding hints at wider paid-tier ambitions
It’s never been cheaper
Your new browser chrome-panion
Stop me if you’ve heard this one before
New data from Circana affirmed that Nintendo Switch 2 is still a resounding success in the United States, having now sold 2 million units
