Anyone considered being phone-free?

Learn to seperate tools from garbage. Maps is a tool (actually i still like navigation without it). Social media is a garbage. all push notifications are garbage. Messaging is a tool without push notifications. Banking is a tool. Most phone games are garbage. Many apps are garbage because any hint of adult content is banned. And guess what: I’m an adult.

I am dreaming of the day I can yell “f*ck you!” And throw my phone into the ocean, walk off and never need it again. Live in a little town somewhere, read books, write about stuff. Dress up as a wizard and read the hobbit to children.

If you have a chance to get rid of it and make it work, go for it. We survived before without it, we can do it again. :)

I've managed to resist getting a smartphone for as long as possible. This got to be impossible for me at roundabout the year of 2018 with some of the developments in the 2FA space. For example two of my banks now make it impossible to use their online banking unless you have their 2FA apps and I can't log in to my employer's systems without a 2FA app (and you can only get those on the Apple App Store for iOS or Google Play for Android).

The pragmatic solution for me has been to have a smartphone without a SIM card, only connected to WiFi, lying around in my office and not carrying it around with me.

But I fear that the next development is around the corner that will now finally force me to carry a smart phone with me, namely things like Corona checkin apps or restaurants no longer doing printed menus and instead having QR codes at tables for fetching their menus from the web. -- The cost-benefit tradeoff of such developments strikes me as insanely bad, but unfortunately it seems to be where humanity is headed.

I have lived 4 years of my adult life phone free. It was quite liberating. I know have a phone because I am working on an iOS app (and I enjoy having a phone as well so far)

But I think I might go back to having no phone next year. I would not define myself as "the guy who has no phone", and I definitely allow myself to change my mind, it's not for tracking or privacy reasons, mostly that sometimes I feel the need to be a lot more creative and explorative than social. Remove a phone from your life can definitely make you see the world differently.

I survived the first 40 years of my life without a cell phone. Then I carried one phone and smartphone after another, first to keep track of my kids (who have always had phones), then for business and convenience. I have learned how to mute notifications and turn the phone off when I don’t need it. I don’t have it in my bedroom. It’s a tool that I can control, it doesn’t control me. Anyone can take control of their phone without throwing the useful features out.

When the original iPad 2 released with a SIM card slot, I happily went phone-free for about two years. I had a messenger bag that allowed me quick access to the iPad (https://www.previousmagazine.com/hex-recon-15-charcoal-messe...).

I no longer use an iPad, in fact I haven't used anything Apple since ~2013 post-Jobs.

These days, phones are increasingly used for multi-factor authentication via apps, and a lot of these don't ship with a tablet version of the app, or they rely on a phone number as well as the app. Unfortunately, I do use an Android phone.

Do I miss being phone-free? Yes. But here's what's changed with how I treat my phone:

All of my social media notifications are completely disabled. I look whenever I feel the urge or I'm doing a marketing campaign.

I no longer use umpteen different comms apps, the cognitive load and battery life was terrible because of it. Instead, I aggregate everything via bridges into my Matrix Synapse server, and access it via Element, meaning all of my devices have one app for all of my comms.

I triage email once every 2h automatically. The exception being that important notifications containing x in the subject line or y in the from field will get my attention on each device, and flash my lights a certain colour until the message is read. (Gmail scripts are cool)

I no longer give out my personal phone number. I only give out SIP numbers, this way I have greater control of who can contact me, and blocking numbers en masse is simple. Android has SIP support baked into the default dialler on most ROMs. This also means I can use my SIP accounts from any device.

Other than a handful of the absolute most essential apps, my smartphone is increasingly like a feature phone, and that's not a bad thing.

I do most of my reading on an Android e-ink device. My eyes thank me for it. For about six months I was using eyedrops to mitigate sore eyes from staring at screens all day, every day, but then realized I had to treat the source.

FWIW, despite having a high-end desktop, most of my day-to-day work, particularly stuff most people would use a phone for, has been replaced by a modded ThinkPad. Swappable batteries are great.

Some of us spent half or more of our lives without cellphones. It's not hard if you plan ahead, buy a map if you're going somewhere new, maybe throw on a watch if you really need to know what time it is. I'm not going to do it, but at worst it's a minor inconvenience.

I have a smartphone without the SIM card installed phone. When I leave home, I use exercise, clock/alarm, and flashlight apps.

At home I use Google Voice on my laptop for Voice/SMS service.

The level of interruption is quite minimal, especially when I leave home.

You could try going step by step. Either leave your phone at home when you go out, or slowly disconnect it from the things you don't like: notifications, emails, instant messaging etc. until you reach what you are after.

I did it for a while - because I don't like using a phone for browsing or app-based stuff vs. in browser on my computer, don't like notifications telling me what to do, etc.

After a while I got a 'dumb' phone in case of emergencies.

Navigation is harder, but actually it's nice to navigate London with your head up, remembering things, and realising how two familiar areas you know distinctly are connected, etc. Not to say I never looked up a route before leaving home.

Ultimately it was WhatsApp for family that got me to buy a phone again.

Having a phone with you that you keep turned off most of the time would be a good way to learn what sort of things you really need it for. Obviously you wouldn't be able to receive incoming calls, but how much do you use your phone to browse the web, or as a map? If you can time-shift those desires (until you are at a computer) or satisfy them with other devices, then you'll be able to go longer and longer without turning the phone on, but still have it for emergencies.

Personally I'd settle for a phone which doesn't connect to the mobile network unless I'm dialling out, or only connects when I'm in certain locations at certain times. Perhaps using a VoIP service and automatically connecting to specific trusted Wi-Fi networks would suffice for that use case, however I've often wondered if it would be possible for a mobile network provider to also operate an FM radio station, which would broadcast a pre-agreed code specific to one of their users whenever that user had an incoming call. I don't know how much battery it would drain for a phone to be constantly scanning FM radio data, though.

I have a phone, a soon to be useless, 3g candy bar phone. It serves as a notification and communications channel for me to other humans. It doesn't do email, or internet, it doesn't do images or apps. It does do texts.

If I didn't need to be on call for family or friends, I'd turn it off and only use it when I needed to communicate, but that's not an option for me.

I navigate without it because I'm old and learned to do so well before google was invented, let alone google maps. However, google maps has utility (specifically, real time traffic), so it's likely to be something my next soon to be useless phone might have on it.

I will not ever put Facebook or any other social media on something I carry everywhere, because I would become addicted to it.

As stated elsewhere, separate tools from garbage. You don't have to use this tool in the same manner as others. You can turn it off and pull the battery, and put all that in a ziplock bag inside a tin can if you want.

It's your tool, use it how you want.

I forward skype-in VoIP to wherever or voicemail. Verizon is going to kill my prepaid flip phone in December 2022 so I need to find a new flip phone that can do 4G at least. It's harder now that Walmart and similar stores are a few hours drive away. To be phone free I just power it off.

For navigation I have 2 portable GPS navigation systems. A really old one that I just can't get myself to throw away and a recent Garmin. If that fails I stop and ask for directions and meet new people.

Something you may find useful to reduce the phones attention-seeking behavior is to find a way to disable all sounds on your phone. I don't know if smart phones can do this but my little flip phone can be entirely silent and I can set custom ring tones in the phone book for important numbers. If something is important from a number I don't have they can leave a voicemail.

I have a phone, but use it primarily as a phone (voice + sms) and as a tool (maps, calendar, banking, pagerduty, 2FA).

For entertainment I have Spotify and use Firefox for youtube not often clicking suggested content, and then usually in the same topic as the original--except the physics ones.

Back when I commuted to an office, if I left the house without my phone, I might call one person to let them know I didn't have my phone that day but otherwise not miss it, except for music or reading downloaded text during my commute. Never got into podcasts, couldn't find a series that stayed interesting.

It comes down to habits and what you consider important. Is the virtually presented lives of others or endless funnies important? Act according to your beliefs. I'm not perfect--spend too much time on HN.

I've gone to a halfway house. My smartphone has become a small tablet that never leaves the house and I put the SIM into a Nokia that cost £17 for calls and texts. Composing SMS is painful compared to a smartphone. Other than that I really like leaving internet devices at home, but my wife and friends can still get hold of me. Apart from the occasional snake game, I have no compulsion to pull the Nokia out of my pocket when out. And it only needs charging once or twice a week. It's impractical for most tbh but I find it really helps to shut off. Especially when I've been working on phone apps full time, at those times even looking at a smartphone UI makes me feel sick.

I'm curious. Do you want to be phone free, pocket computer free, both or something else?

A mobile phone without a SIM card is still useful because you can connect to Wi-Fi when you want and be otherwise offline.

Another halfway measure is just block all incoming calls.

I use my phone mainly as a pocket watch; also it has a token generator thing on it which I need for work. The map app is sometimes useful, though I've never been very good at relating the map to the streets around me. I have a couple of news apps, for reading while commuting (not something I do much of ATM).

The key to successful phone usage is, when you get a new phone, don't tell anyone beyond your immediate emergency contact individual your new phone number.

I use appblock and when I want to take a step back from using my phone too much block everything except for Google Maps, WhatsApp, messaging and the actual phone. It has a strict mode that will prevent you from turning it off, uninstalling it or changing your settings that you can put on a timer. I find a couple of weeks resets the brain so even afterwards I don't use it as much for a few months, although it creeps back.

There are many different reasons to be phone free, like (1) avoid tracking, (2) avoid interruptions, (3) removing big tech from your life, aka. degoogling (4) general dislike of all electronics, etc.

all of this have different consequences and mitigating options, so it would be relevant to know what exactly is that bothers you.

Install a bare minimum of apps. No games. Turn off notifications on all apps except where it is really important. If you must just have visual notifications for preference. Ensure you are completely unaware of it at night. If you take it out keep it zipped up (say in a pencil case).

Had a mobile phone over 30 years.

I've considered doing this and keeping a device like a LTE smartwatch or maybe one of those pinephones.

Every once in a while I look around to see if there is something that seems like it would reasonably work, I haven't really found it yet. Maybe in the near future though.

https://skysedge.com/unsmartphones/RUSP/index.html

Haven't owned a phone for 4 years, my partner and I use small Baofeng UV-9R+ VHF/UHF handheld radios to coordinate for market runs. AMA :)

navigation is an easy one, a physical map is as portable and efficient enough.

re. the rest i feel the most important thing is to develop a solid social infrastructure. e.g. know your neighbors and be on good terms with them. know the places where you can get a hold of your friends if you need to. know your community and actively participate in it. that sort of thing. this is your safety net in case something goes awry.

You're not waiting for the bus because you don't know what time it comes. You are thinking and watching the people go by.

I cancelled my cell phone contract right at the end of 2013. I haven't paid for a phone service or carried a phone since.

I don't take my cell when I leave the house. You could lose it. For emergencies they can be helpful.

I switched to using a cellular apple watch.

It's been great. However, I still need to use a phone during work hours

Phones are customizable. Just remove everything you don't need.

Just don’t install apps that upset you more than give you value.

I have a cellular apple watch and usually leave my phone at home.