Brace: Block Apps, Screen Time

Take back hours in your day. Brace blocks the apps you can't stop opening — and it makes turning the blocker off harder than turning it on.

Most focus apps fail the moment you want them to. One tap on Screen Time's "Ignore Limit" and you're back in the feed. Brace is built for the opposite: the 5 seconds between opening the app and scrolling the feed, where you'd quietly disable the timer and pretend it was never set.

Here's how it works.

YOU PICK THE APPS
Each app on your phone is one of three things: FREE (no restriction), LIMIT (daily time cap), or BLOCK (never usable). You set it once. It persists until you override.

TWO MODES
Gentle mode (free): a 10-second countdown before any override. Fine for mild habits.
Commitment mode (premium): 5-minute wait + type a reason in your own words (minimum 20 characters) + biometric re-authentication. It's hard to skip — that's the point.

FOCUS SESSIONS
Tap "Start Focus Session." Pick a duration. Pick which apps to lock. Your chosen apps are unusable until the timer ends — at the override cost of your current mode.

PREMIUM CONTENT BLOCKERS
Shorts. Reels. Adult content in browsers. All three toggleable separately. All three require premium.

HONEST ABOUT WHAT WE CAN'T DO
We use friction, not lockdown. Determined users can still uninstall Brace through Android's system settings — that's a hardware-level protection, and we respect it. We don't use Device Admin tricks, we don't intercept your uninstall flow, and we don't claim to be "un-removable." We make it hard enough that impulse quitting fails. That's what a commitment device does.

PRIVACY
Everything stays on your device. We don't sell your data. We don't ship third-party trackers. We don't read your messages — the accessibility permission only sees what app you opened and, if you turn on the 18+ blocker, what URL is in your browser's address bar (nothing else). All local data is encrypted.

PRICING
$10 per year. One tier. Cheapest premium in the category — OneSec is $30, Opal is $60.

14-DAY REFUND
If Brace doesn't work for you within 14 days, email us and we refund. No questions.

INCLUDED IN PREMIUM
• Commitment mode (biometric override)
• Unlimited restricted apps (free is capped at 3)
• Unlimited Focus Sessions (free is capped at 1 per day)
• Shorts blocker (YouTube)
• Reels blocker (Instagram + Facebook)
• 18+ content blocker (browsers only — Chrome, Brave, Firefox, Samsung Internet, Firefox Focus)
• Hours recovered insights
• Settings export / import

REQUIRED PERMISSIONS
Usage Stats — to count app usage against your daily limits.
Accessibility — to detect app launches and show the block overlay. We only watch the apps you've restricted. We never monitor content beyond what's needed for your chosen blockers.
Display over other apps — to show the block overlay.
Notifications — to warn you when a limit is close.

Brace is an app blocker, website blocker, and screen time tracker built to break phone addiction and help you stay focused. If you've tried a digital detox, a focus timer, or a self-control app and bounced off the feed anyway, this one is built to hold.

Made by an indie developer. Android-first at launch. iOS later.

focusguardian.app/privacy
focusguardian.app/terms
support@focusguardian.app