Orbit - Stop doomscrolling. Earn every app unlock.
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Doomscrolling is free. Orbit makes it cost something. Pick a schedule and your apps lock themselves. Want back in early? Earn it: hold the orb, do squats, ask a friend, pay a little more each time, or win a shift at The Gate. Most times, you’ll stay out.
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Hey Product Hunt 👋
I’m Alara, one of the builders and the head marketer of Orbit!
Last month, my Screen Time report said 10h 19m a day. More than 80% of it was doomscrolling. I was a full-on blue light zombie: in bed at 1 AM, saying “just one more video,” waking up tired. Finally I asked myself, what am I doing with my life??
I tried every digital detox trick. Deleting apps only to reinstall them in the next hour 😅. Grayscale mode. A “dopamine detox” weekend. Strict blockers I learned to bypass in two taps.
That last one showed us the real problem: getting back in was free. One tap and I was scrolling again. So we built Orbit around one idea: every unlock should cost you something.
🔒 Pick a schedule (No scroll till evening, Deep work mornings, Sleep) and your apps lock on their own
🏋️ Still want in? Earn it:
• Hold the orb and breathe
• Do squats in front of the camera, or play a head-movement game
• Ask a friend. Your accountability partner gets the request and says yes or no
• Pay: $0.99, then $1.99, up to $9.99 that week. Or send it to a nonprofit instead
• Work a night shift at The Gate Inc.: judge 8 residents’ requests to go online. Make 2 mistakes or fewer, and you earn your break. Only 3 shifts a day, so the game never becomes the new feed (My personal favorite)
👯 Together: lock a whole group’s phones at once, for dinner, a study night or a trip
A month later: 10h 19m → 6h 14m a day. My social media time? Cut in half. No phone in bed means no blue light before sleep, and I sleep noticeably better.
The research points the same way:
• 1 in 9 teens across 44 countries now show signs of social media addiction, up from 1 in 14 in 2018 (WHO/HBSC)
• In a 2025 randomized trial, blocking mobile internet for just 2 weeks improved attention, mental health and well-being; over 90% of participants improved on at least one (PNAS Nexus)
This math is making me scared: at 10 hours a day, the next decade would have cost me 4+ years of waking life.
I’d love to know: what would stop you faster: 20 squats, asking your mom, or $9.99? 😅
Feel free to use 20% discounts special for this launch:
20% OFF on annual plan PHA20
20% OFF on lifetime plan PHL20
Uff, just out of curiosity – what were ou doing 10h 19 min on your phone? :D
@busmark_w_nika LOL! Mostly social media 😅 but before judging, I need to say that I'm a marketer, so I spend a lot of time on different accounts, trying to catch trends 🤓
@noyanidin @oistenhickorkmaz @alara_akcasiz The clever bit is making the escape hatch harder to reach than the feed. Love that design choice.
@noyanidin @oistenhickorkmaz @harshyadav That's exactly it, thank you! 🙌 Most blockers make the way out one tap away, so the feed always wins the moment you're tired. We flipped it: the feed takes a tap, getting back to it takes squats, a friend, or a shift at The Gate. There's research behind it too: in one study, even a short forced pause before opening an app made people give up on 36% of attempts. I insist on downloading & trying 👀
The limit of three Gate shifts a day is a smart way to keep the game from turning into another feed. Did most early users end up picking squats or the friend approval?
@neerajnathany Thank you for the question 🙌 So far the two that get people most excited are the night shift game and friend approval. The game because it's genuinely fun and still makes you say "no" to others most nights, and friend approval because asking a real person turns "just 5 minutes" into something you have to say out loud; we have a lot of couples ✨. Which one would you pick for yourself?
The shared lock for dinner is a nice detail. Agreeing to put the phones away together feels easier than having one person keep asking.
@oleksii_sekundant Yes! That was the whole idea: nobody has to be the "phones down, please" person anymore. One person starts a moment, everyone joins with a code, and every phone at the table locks at once.
Capping The Gate at three night shifts a day, so the game can't become the new feed, is a clever bit of design. I think AI is about to do to our attention for creative work what TikTok did for entertainment, so tools that make the way back in cost something will matter well beyond social apps.
@simon_moxon Love this, and as someone who works in AI marketing all day, I feel it. 😅 Infinite scroll trained us to never hit a natural stopping point; endless "one more prompt" could do the same to deep work. That's partly why Orbit isn't tied to social apps: you choose what to lock, apps, whole categories or websites, and the way back in costs the same. Honestly, the next frontier might be friction that protects focus without blocking the tool you need.