Should You Get A Dumbphone And Ditch Your Smartphone?

[00:00:33]  Hey guys! Welcome back to The Digital Diet Podcast. I’m your host, Marisha Pink, aka The Digital Diet Coach, and I’ve got an interesting one for you today. Technology is generally going forward, right? Every advancement that we have gives us something that we need. It probably also gives us something that we didn’t want. But we generally think of the momentum for technology and the pace of change as moving forward.

[00:00:58] So when the first iPhone arrived in 2007 and the subsequent iPhones were released, there was so much excitement. It was amazing. But we now find ourselves in this time where we’re really stressed out by our smartphones. We’re stressed out by the constant notifications. We’re stressed out by the idea of always being switched on and always being contactable. And there are some people now that just want to return to a simpler time, or throw their smartphone across the room and be done with it.

[00:01:25] So what we’re seeing is that there’s now this surprising trend where technology is now going backwards. And not only is it going backwards, but we’re happy about it. And I am talking specifically about the rise of what is known as the “dumbphone.” So obviously, smartphone, clever phone does lots of stuff. Dumbphone, doesn’t do so many things. Dumbphones are simpler phone models. They have more basic features. They don’t have the bells and whistles and the connectivity of modern smartphones. And they’re cool, at least if you talk to members of Gen Z.

[00:01:59] And as a digital wellness coach, this is so interesting to me because I remember the iPhone hysteria. I remember how hard it was to get a pre-order, and when there would be queues around the block of every Apple store from three days before a new model was released. So we definitely embraced the change and the advancements in technology, when it comes to phones. And it really got me wondering, well, then why are we taking this step back now? And why are we so happy about it?

[00:02:28] And I think it comes down to a couple of things. The first is the impact of smartphones on mental and physical health, which we’ve spoken about many times on this podcast, and probably will continue to do. Smartphones are causing us stress and anxiety, and affecting our mood. We have this information overload. There are too many notifications. There are constant app updates. There are all these diverse functionalities and complex settings, which can be overwhelming and stressful, especially if you don’t consider yourself to be that tech savvy.

[00:03:01] There is this pressure of having people always expect that you will respond immediately. One of the worst features is the read receipts and the last seen feature on WhatsApp, because everyone just knows you’ve read a message already and they can see when you were last online. In fact, my mum doesn’t usually call me, she’s more of a texter, but she has this little panic sometimes if we haven’t spoken in a few days.

[00:03:22] And I will get a message from her that says, “It says that you were last online at 4.00 pm three days ago. So I’m just checking that you’re alright and I’m a bit worried about you.” And I’m absolutely fine. If she called me, if she was more of a call person, she’d just pick up the phone and find that out. But it creates this anxiety and this stress that doesn’t need to be there, not just for yourself and your own use, but the people that you are normally connected with and are normally having conversations with.

[00:03:46] Smartphones have made us all end up doomscrolling and accessing negative content that we weren’t necessarily anticipating, thanks to the algorithms serving up whatever they feel like on any given day. And that impacts our mood, sometimes when we’re least expecting it. Lots of people feel this huge pressure to maintain some sort of online personality or persona, or to keep up with the Joneses because they can see what everybody else is doing. Or at least the window that everybody else provides into the curated view of their lives.

[00:04:15] And the same goes for issues of body image and self-esteem and FOMO. All of these things have become growing issues, thanks to the fact that you have a smartphone in your pocket. Physical movement has dropped because we just sit around on our phones all day, instead of getting up and moving our bodies. Sleep is disrupted, sometimes because of the screen time that we have before bed resulting in a delayed bedtime, or insomnia thanks to the impacts on melatonin, and even nightmares as you heard in a recent episode. I will link Episodes 29 and 30 in the show notes, where we talk about sleep and about social media-induced nightmares in a bit more detail.

[00:04:53] But suffice to say, the impact of a smartphone and all the things it gives you access to has a huge impact on your mental and physical health. So it’s fairly obvious why you might want to try and get away from your smartphone and towards a dumbphone, to try and avoid all of that mess.

[00:05:10] There’s also very serious concerns around privacy and security. Phone companies and apps are collecting data, they’re surveying your behaviour. And, despite the GDPR regulations, which are all around your right to privacy and the opportunity to opt out of asking apps to track your data, there still seems to be a general lack of clarity about what personal, and potentially sensitive data, your phone and your apps is accessing. How they’re actually tracking your behaviour. Who’s got access to all of that data and how it’s being used. And also how they’re storing it.

[00:05:47] No-one really knows what data is being held about them. Even though you have a right to ask. Even though you could sit and read a 50 page privacy policy before signing up to something or committing to accessing and using something, most of us don’t do it. Whenever you get those emails that say, “Oh, the privacy policy has been updated and you can read it here, and you will accept it by default,” who actually goes and reads them?

[00:06:11] I think there was a famous story once around a company hiding a free £10,000 or a free car or something in the bottom of a privacy policy. And all you had to do was send an email and say that you’d like your car or you’d like your money. And basically it was years before anyone actually claimed it because nobody reads those policies.

[00:06:31] And the problem is we are using our phones for absolutely everything. We’re using them for our health records. We take photos of our kids and our families. Mobile phones have replaced ticketing. They’ve replaced loyalty cards. They’ve replaced bank cards and financial transactions, so you’ve got apps that can be collecting and exposing your financial data.

[00:06:52] And data breaches are increasingly common. There are hacking and malware attacks all the time, and that’s creating this lack of trust in companies. Because we don’t know what data they have, we don’t know whether they’re storing it securely, and we keep hearing all of these stories about how there’ve been these data breaches.

[00:07:08] Already in 2024, AT&T Telecoms has had two breaches that were just months apart. There was a stolen cache of data that had phone numbers and call records of nearly all of its customers, which is something like 110 million people. And in one of the breaches, 73 million customer records were dumped into an unknown cybercrime forum for anyone to see. Those records included names, they had phone numbers, they had postal addresses, and even encrypted passcodes, which would give people access to customer accounts.

[00:07:41] And it doesn’t even have to be the companies that we’re dealing with. So you would probably think if you have a telephone contract with AT&T, that that is who you are giving your data to and that’s who’s responsible for it. But all of these big companies use other companies to store and handle and manage their data.

[00:07:58] And there’s a big hack at Snowflake, which is one of the cloud data giants for corporate customers, and hundreds of millions of customers’ data was accessed from loads of companies, which you would be familiar with and probably are using. An alleged 560 million customers of Ticketmaster, which does obviously ticketing for concerts and events, and sporting events and things like that.

[00:08:20] So it’s not just whoever you think that you are sharing your data or sharing your information with, whether you’ve handed it over willfully by creating an account or whether they’re tracking your user journey. It’s all of the other companies and all of the other technology platforms that they interface with in order to provide that service to you. And we’re becoming more and more distrustful of those companies.

[00:08:41] We also know that since smartphones were introduced and smartphone use has increased that social interaction has reduced. So we’re spending less time interacting with people in real time, because when we’re alone we just go on our phones by default. And when we feel bored, we just reach for the phone and we entertain ourselves, instead of thinking that maybe we should get in touch with someone or go and have a conversation or a coffee.

[00:09:04] We spend time managing our online presence, which is not something that we had to curate and carefully manage before smartphones and social media were introduced. So now there’s all these extra duties and extra tasks that we feel that we have to fit into our time, which we do alone.

[00:09:18] And this is happening across age groups. Across age groups, people are spending less time with each other in person than they were two decades ago. And the effect is most pronounced in young people who are aged between 15 and 24, who have got 70% less social interaction with their friends.

[00:09:35] And even if you make it to a face to face social interaction with your friends or with your family, so many of us are still using our phones. We are on our phones during mealtimes. We are on our phones when we’ve got together to maybe watch a movie at someone’s house. We all just kind of have them out or keep checking them intermittently, and it’s distracting from being present in the moment of that social experience.

[00:09:57] Because smartphones allow us to connect with people in a virtual capacity, we’re also substituting real life interactions for digital ones. So, you’re investing more time in your online relationships at the expense of investing time and effort in your real offline relationships. And the impact of this is that we are really lonelier than we’ve ever been before. Because we have all of these different connections, but they are just connections. They’re not necessarily real friendships that translate into all the weird and wonderful things that friendships can offer you in a real life situation.

[00:10:30] Loneliness has huge impacts on your mental health as well as your physical health. And I talked about this in Episode 19, which was specifically about social media and the loneliness epidemic that we are experiencing; I’ll link it in the show notes. But just imagine now we have smartphones in our pocket and we feel like we don’t need to go out and socialise. Or when we are out socialising, we’re more concerned with what’s going on on the world that’s in our phones, or on the social networks that our phones give us access to, than what’s right in front of us.

[00:10:59] And that’s probably the biggest issue, is that smartphones are inherently distracting. You have the whole world at your fingertips in your pocket, even when you don’t need it. You get notifications, there’s social media, you have internet browsers, you can have phone calls, there are games, there are entertainment apps, you can download. There is always something that you could be doing using your phone.

[00:11:24] You are carrying around an attention-seeking device in your pocket. Even when it’s on silent. Even when it’s face down on the table in front of you. Even when it’s in your bags or in the next room. It is still calling to you because that’s the way it’s been designed. Your willpower is being eroded. Your willpower is almost non-existent now, when it comes to refusing that call. You just want to reach for your phone at every opportunity.

[00:11:50] So it kind of makes sense that, if smartphones have this chokehold on us, why not just get rid of the source of that chokehold altogether by investing in a dumbphone. And I thought about this a little bit because there have been many times where I’ve considered getting a dumbphone, and my approach has been to instead adjust the settings on my smartphone. Turn off the notifications. Delete the apps that I’m not using or I don’t want to be distracted by. And it got me thinking, why don’t people just do this or more people try and do this? But actually I can see quite a few reasons why you might want to go to the other extreme and invest in a dumbphone.

[00:12:26] The first is probably ease and simplicity. Smartphones are complicated by design. Dumbphones are not. It is probably easier and faster to create a more focused, distraction-free experience by limiting the functionality of a phone to just basic calls and texts, without the option to introduce more complex features, or have to have specific settings in place to be able to control those features.

[00:12:53] I don’t know if anyone’s ever tried to adjust your notification settings for Instagram or for LinkedIn. It’s an absolute minefield. There are so many different options and things that you have to turn off. I always feel like they magically somehow turn themselves back on again without me going in and turning them back on at some point, maybe when the app does a refresh or an upgrade.

[00:13:16] But it drives me absolutely up the wall. And for many people, it’s too overwhelming. There are just too many choices, too many things to turn off. So, invariably, you don’t bother to do it all. And then you continue to get the notifications and you continue to get stressed out and fed up by it. So if you think about having a dumbphone that doesn’t even have all of these things, there’s just no need to be that tech savvy.

[00:13:35] They have easier to use interfaces because they’ve been designed to be simple. There’s no need to rely on your willpower. There’s no need to worry about updates. Or that there will be changes that will change your settings without you asking, like I’ve described. There’s no need to worry about battery life accidentally being drained by apps running in the background, or because your camera was on, or you accidentally butt-dialed someone. You don’t even need that much battery, if your phone is just making calls and sending messages. So you don’t constantly need to think about charging your phone or worry about running out of battery.

[00:14:10] Life would altogether be a lot simpler with a dumbphone. And if we take the privacy concerns, well again, dumbphones have privacy by design, and can offer you reduced security risks. So you would definitely experience less anxiety over privacy issues because if the phone doesn’t collect anything, it doesn’t track anything, there’s nothing there. Those dumbphones don’t store personal data. They don’t track user behaviour. Hackers can’t steal what’s not there, and they won’t be interested in trying to attempt to steal something that isn’t there.

[00:14:40] And the broader risk of cyber threats is also lower because you’re not constantly upgrading apps or software on your phones or operating systems. And to be honest, because they are so minimalist when it comes to their features, hackers and the hacker community are less invested in finding ways to get into dumbphones because the payoff for them would be so minimal. There’s absolutely no value to be gained in hacking a dumbphone because there’s nothing there that they can sell on the dark web or use to blackmail a company, for example.

[00:15:11] It’s also probably quite cost effective. It is cheaper to buy and maintain a dumbphone, than it is to buy and maintain a smartphone. And smartphone prices are just through the roof now because they are like mini computers, so you’re basically paying to have a mini computer in your pocket. And it’s not just the cost of buying a smartphone that might be an issue. They’re really expensive to fix. And I know anyone who has ever dropped their iPhone and experienced that catastrophic screen smash that just renders the entire thing completely unusable, and then been quoted something eye-watering to try and fix it and replace the screen, will know exactly what I’m talking about.

[00:15:49] So if you compare that with a dumbphone that has a really simple black and white screen. That doesn’t have any bells and whistles. It’s not in colour, it doesn’t do anything. You can see how, even if you did manage to drop and break the screen, it would be less expensive to replace. And from a maintenance perspective, because the phones are so simple and they’re only designed to allow really simple functions, there’s no expensive upgrade needed to accommodate newer technologies.

[00:16:16] One of the most frustrating things is, even if you’re able to hold on to your device for a really long time, at some point it can no longer upgrade to whatever the latest version of the operating system is. And that means that all of the apps and any software that you have will no longer be compatible. So there’s always going to be a limit. Even if physically the hardware works, at some point you’re going to be pushed to upgrade to whatever the latest and greatest is within that ecosystem.

[00:16:42] So with a dumbphone you can get around that. You also don’t have any need for a really expensive phone contract and a data plan because you don’t need the data. You’re not going to be using apps that are just burning through gigabytes of data day-to-day. And right now there is a cost of living crisis going on. So anybody who is looking for ways to save might consider looking at a dumbphone to replace their smartphone.

[00:17:05] Another reason might simply be nostalgia and aesthetic appeal. And I think this is how I first came to be interested in the rise of dumbphones as a replacement for smartphones. There is some kind of retro appeal about old phones like the Nokia 3310, which was the original brick phone, which seemed to have this everlasting battery life. And I can see that there would have been people that had that phone in their childhood or in their youth that just wanted the opportunity to play Snake again, and relive their youth and return to that simpler time.

[00:17:36] But what I think is interesting is that when the Nokia 3310 was relaunched in 2017, part of its success was actually ironically fuelled by TikTokers posting under the hashtag #bringbackflipphones and flip phones have become a whole thing fuelled by TikTok content. So it’s possible that maybe some people are just drawn to this sort of vintage design and the physical keypad that you have on dumbphones, instead of the touch screen.

[00:18:03] This extends beyond just smartphones. I saw a video the other day by Ali Abdaal, who is, I think, one of the world’s foremost experts on productivity. Great channel to follow, I’ll put a link in the show notes. He had invested in a mechanical keyboard, so an old-fashioned keyboard where the keys are actually raised and you can type, like old school. These are the keyboards that I grew up on and there’s a whole community of people that like and love mechanical keyboards, and are bringing them back in these kind of vintage and stylish designs.

[00:18:34] And there seems to just be this growing trend, perhaps fuelled by TikTok, but this growing trend among Gen Z of reinventing retro cultural artifacts, that’s known as Newtro. And that Newtro trend has seen the revival not just of flip phones, but also of vinyl records and cassettes, and fanzines and 8-bit video games, as well as even, I guess, mechanical keyboards. But whatever the reason behind it, the numbers are clear, because the Nokia 3310 sales had doubled by April of 2023.

[00:19:04] And if not for any of those reasons, then I would suggest that the biggest driver is this desire for digital minimalism. I don’t think that this is just a trend or a fad. I don’t even really think it’s about the smartphone or the dumbphone. I think it’s about what the dumbphone represents, which is a true lifestyle change.

[00:19:24] It’s the difference between a crash diet, where you maybe just don’t use your phone for a little bit or you scale back the ways in which you use it. And a healthy diet, where you actually physically change the hardware from a smartphone to a dumbphone, and commit to living in that simple way, not just for a week or a month, but actually permanently.

[00:19:45] I think that the rise in dumbphones is actually just a rejection, a full on rejection of this “always on” culture. It’s a rejection of being connected all the time and the perils and pressures of social media. It’s a rejection of caring about status. You no longer are concerned about having the latest, greatest, all-singing, all-dancing phone. You are no longer a smartphone user at all. You’re a dumbphone user.

[00:20:11] And I think it’s about this desire to live more in tune with yourself and thrive offline, with your phone relegated to being a communication medium, which is what it was always meant to be. Instead of being the gateway to a billion other things that you didn’t necessarily want or ask for.

[00:20:27] When you look at it this way, then it’s not really that surprising. 3 out of 5 Gen Z’ers say that they would like to be less connected to the digital world. And this move to offlining or digital minimalism, whatever you want to call it, is also reflected in the declining use of social media by Gen Z. They are in fact the only generation whose time on social media has fallen since 2021, according to the research company GWI.

[00:20:55] Obviously there are older people who are digitally detoxing too, but there is this growing desire to start focusing and start getting back to the behaviours and the life that you used to have pre-smartphone. So really the move to a dumbphone is the ultimate digital detox. The signal that you intend to permanently disengage from the constant barrage of digital stimuli. That you take your mental wellbeing more seriously and that you want to improve it. That you want to live more mindfully and intentionally when it comes to technology. And to just have better balance with healthier tech habits. And of course, at The Digital Diet Coach, that is what I’m all about.

[00:21:34] Now, you don’t have to go out and buy a dumbphone. In fact, I actually don’t suggest that that’s something that you do. If you are looking for a little respite, then you might want to consider my #TechTimeoutChallenge, which is a 30 day digital detox designed exclusively for busy women. I will put a link in the show notes for how you can get hold of the guide, which maps out the plan for you and encourages you to take a little bit of time each day for 30 days to be disconnected from all of your devices. And to use that time to do something that really brings you joy, and improves your mental or physical or emotional wellbeing.

[00:22:08] I normally run a coordinated challenge every so often, and there’s going to be one coming up. So, if you sign up, you will definitely get notified when that coordinated challenge is happening. And then you can run your 30 days alongside myself and loads of other great women who will be doing it for that extra bit of support and accountability. But it’s a good way of dipping your toe into being more intentional and mindful about the way in which you use technology.

[00:22:31] And toe dipping is good because it’s actually not that easy to give up your smartphone. Even if it is appealing to you inherently to have a dumbphone and to not have all the pressures of having a smartphone and all that connectivity. Dr. Anastasia Dedyukhina, who is the founder of Consciously Digital, which is where I did my digital wellness coaching certification, actually came into the space after deciding to ditch her phone.

[00:22:56] She ditched her smartphone for one and a half years and she talks about this in one of her TEDx talks; I will put a link to it in the show notes. I’ve had the pleasure of learning from Anastasia and being part of the digital wellness coach community that she’s created for a number of years now. But in her TEDx talk, she talks about how it took around four to five months from making the decision to ditch her smartphone to actually making the leap practically. And she talks about how she relapsed after a year.

[00:23:27] She shares some really great learnings that she had about herself and how she wants to show up in the world, and how she adapted to using a dumbphone during that time. And ultimately now she has a balance, I believe, and specific times and spaces where she will now use a more feature-filled phone. But she does still try to keep things simple and I think the evidence is pretty clear.

[00:23:49] She used to work as a digital marketeer, and after giving up her phone and kind of investigating this wonderful world of digital wellness, which was still very nascent at the time, she then was able to found Consciously Digital, which is training this amazing network of coaches. She wrote a book. She’s done two TED Talks. She’s on the speaking circuit. So, undoubtedly, for Anastasia, at least, among the many other things that she describes in her TED talk as benefits of ditching her smartphone, it clearly gave her the time and the space, and attention and energy, and focus to be able to do all those incredible things.

[00:24:21] Another coach that I know, who’s actually how I came to discover Consciously Digital in the first place, as a result of the training also got a dumbphone, and now leaves his smartphone in the office, locked in a drawer. And he only goes to the office a couple of times a week. So he has really specific spaces and times where he uses it, and has found that that works as a balance while most of the rest of the time, the dumbphone works for him in his life.

[00:24:47] So that’s why I say, don’t rush out and just buy a dumbphone, even if it seems really appealing. And of all the reasons, nostalgia and aesthetic appeal, or because you think it’s really trendy, is the least sensible reason. Even cost -effectiveness is kind of redundant, if you’re not actually going to use the dumbphone. You’ll just be wasting your money. And you will find this the minute you start researching anyway, that the dumbphone is not one phone.

[00:25:10] There are a million options now. There is the Nokia 3310 that we’ve talked about. There’s also a couple of other Nokia models. There’s an Alcatel phone. There’s a Jitterbug. Punkt. Light Phone. The Boring Phone, which was unveiled in Milan earlier this year. Doro. And all of them are slightly different. They all have slightly different features. Some of those are true dumbphones, or what I would call true dumbphones where they literally only allow texting and calling. But some of them will have an internet browser or some of them will allow you to load WhatsApp on, for example.

[00:25:42] They’re all slightly different and you will be overwhelmed, if you don’t truly know why you want to ditch your smartphone and what features you need, and are looking for, in a dumbphone. I may even start doing dumbphone reviews on my blog or on a YouTube or something. If you think that that would be a good idea, if that’s something you’d be interested, in leave me a comment, let me know. I will definitely consider it.

[00:26:02] But today I just want to help you try and decide if a dumbphone is for you. So step one is to assess your personal needs. And I need to be really clear here that your needs are different from your wants. Because probably you want to still be able to use WhatsApp. But your need is really about being able to communicate with people in a text-based medium, and not having to make a phone call because sometimes it’s not convenient to be on the phone.

[00:26:28] So you need to think about the functionality here. Decide if you need all the advanced features of a smartphone or if basic calling and texting will meet your needs. Think about what else you use your smartphone for, and think about what those features or functionalities could be replaced by.

[00:26:46] If you use the camera to take pictures, you could obviously get an actual camera. If you use Google Maps or Waze or Apple Maps, you can obviously get an old fashioned map or a GPS device. Or you could just look up where you’re going before you go and write down or print out the route. Maybe you use the alarm on your phone. You can get an alarm clock. You might be part of community groups. You would still be able to access those through a laptop, or a tablet, or a desktop computer, you just wouldn’t be able to do it through your phone.

[00:27:14] Maybe you use your phone for health tracking. There are other health trackers. You might think about having something like a Whoop or a Fitbit. Maybe you listen to music. I don’t think Walkmans are necessarily making a comeback and vinyls are too hard to carry around, but maybe there’s something else that you could look into for being able to have your music on the go. For books, obviously there are things like the Kindle. There are always going to be other options for you to replace those features. The question to ask yourself is, do you need those in your pocket and in your smartphone?

[00:27:44] And I think this is really important because, actually, if you go and Google for dumbphones, one of the most common search questions or search queries is “dumbphone with Whatsapp and maps.” So clearly when people do want to reject some of the more advanced features, there are some things that you want to maintain in your pocket, in your phone. And as I said, all the different dumbphones have got different features, so that will help you, if you do decide to go down this route, to find the one that’s right for you.

[00:28:12] You also need to consider the impact of moving to a dumbphone on your lifestyle. How would that fit into your daily routine? How would that work for parenting? For example, if you have an app that your child’s school or nursery uses to communicate with you. Is there another way that you’d be able to access that or is it only via an app?

[00:28:32] What do you use your smartphone for when it comes to work? Do you need to be able to access email or other editing apps, for example, the Office suite on the go? Do you use dating apps? What would your dating life look like if you didn’t use apps to connect and meet people? How would it impact your socialising? Or your travel? Or your banking?

[00:28:50] For example, I use Starling Bank, which is a mobile only bank. They don’t have branches. You can do stuff in the Post Office, but actually it would make banking impossible for me if I switched to a dumbphone where I couldn’t have that app on it, because they don’t have a website through which you can do the banking. It is literally only an app.

[00:29:08] Maybe you take taxis often. Or you need to take them because you travel at unsociable hours and it’s a bit safer. So how would it impact you if you could no longer call an Uber, or a Bolt, or Lyft, or whatever taxi firm you use, using your phone? These are all really important things to think about. What do you need to maintain the kind of lifestyle that you want? And how does your smartphone enable that? What features and functionalities would you need to preserve if you were going to switch to a dumbphone?

[00:29:35] The second step is to evaluate your digital habits, and this is a little bit more around your wants, I would say. So, first of all, you need to understand your current usage. You need to spend a bit of time reflecting on how much time you actually spend on your smartphone, and whether you find that detrimental to your productivity or your wellbeing.

[00:29:55] So to do that, take a look at your screen time stats. They normally cover a period of seven days. Sometimes they can be a bit longer, depending on the device that you have. What are you actually doing on your phone? Which apps are you spending your time on? And when you look at that, is that intentional? So does that make sense for you in your life and what you spend your time doing? Or is it surprising to you? Are you actually spending more time on apps that you didn’t realise you were spending that much time on?

[00:30:20] And then with that information, you need to think about how dependent you are on your tech. You need to assess if you rely really heavily on smartphone apps and internet access for your personal life, for work, for communication, or any other aspect of your life really. Or whether relegating that to just being something that you do when you are sat in front of a desktop computer or on a laptop could work for you in your life.

[00:30:43] My belief about this is quite strong. I always think that if your work needs you, or needs to be able to contact you, then they should be the one to provide the phone. And if they provide the phone, then you’re able to keep your work interests and your personal interests separate. Which means that you could keep the smartphone for work, and you could switch your personal phone to a dumbphone.

[00:31:03] However, on a practical level, there is often an expectation by employers that you will use your personal phone for work and maybe they will pay a contribution towards your bill, or they’ll pay for your bill but you actually own the handset. And of course in a practical sense, if you’re someone whose job involves being on the go a lot, maybe you travel a lot, whether it’s internationally or it’s between client sites or meetings, then actually having access to email and Teams, or Slack and Office apps. Or if you’re a social media manager, all social media management apps. Or if you’re an entrepreneur or a solopreneur or a freelancer who’s trying to run your entire business while you’re doing various things, it’s maybe not going to be so practical to only be able to access those things from a laptop or desktop computer.

[00:31:47] So you really need to assess how much you are dependent on tech to make all these aspects of your life work. And there are some things that are now just ingrained, almost, in the way that we live and we work and we interact with each other. I think there is probably an expectation that if you are sent an email, that you’re gonna receive that email on your phone. Nobody really thinks, well, the other person or other people on the email chain are only going to access email from a desktop. There’s an expectation that you can probably access it on the go.

[00:32:15] The same goes for QR codes. There have been so many bars, and restaurants, and cafes that I’ve been to recently where the menu is accessed via a QR code, and they have dispensed completely with paper-based menus. Now that works if you are with somebody else, I guess, and the other person has a smartphone that can access it. But if you are on your own, and you’ve got a dumbphone and you can’t actually look it up, then you’re going to run into a problem.

[00:32:40] And the same goes for people that have loaded up their digital wallets with their bank cards, with loyalty cards, tickets and passes. So if you get mobile concert tickets and things like that. It’s going to become a problem because more and more retailers also are moving towards that as the standard way of ticketing and loyalty card distribution. So it’s definitely something to think about.

[00:33:02] And then the third thing that you need to consider is your own personal goals. Really sit and ask yourself, why do you want to do this? Why do you want to ditch your smartphone and move to a dumbphone? What is it that you are hoping to achieve? And it might be a digital detox goal, maybe you’re looking to reduce your screen time and reduce the digital distractions in your life. And so a dumbphone might align with your goals.

[00:33:27] It might be about saving money, in which case you want to weigh the cost benefits of switching to a dumbphone against your current spending on smartphones and on data plans, and whatever else is associated with having a phone. So having a nice cover or a holder or extra mobile battery pack.

[00:33:43] Maybe it’s just that you want to rid yourself of the anxiety that’s associated with all of these privacy concerns. Also a good reason. But you really need to consider what it is about a dumbphone that is attractive beyond just the retro nostalgia or thinking that it’s a trend or it’s trendy. And that kind of links to my next piece of advice, which is about thinking long term.

[00:34:05] The dumbphone is not meant to be a fad. So I really encourage you to think about how this is going to work in your life over the longer term. You need to consider how switching to a dumbphone might affect your long term tech needs and whether you might eventually return to a smartphone. It’s okay if you do, that’s completely your prerogative. But it could potentially be a costly and time-consuming switch, to switch to a dumbphone and then try to switch back and reset up a smartphone.

[00:34:32] I also think it’s important to consider your family and social connections. You need to take some time to reflect on how a dumbphone might impact your ability to stay connected to other people who typically use smartphones. Now, this is probably one of the main reasons why people think that they can’t leave apps, never mind switching out the actual device. We seem to have forgotten that we can still text people, even if we can’t WhatsApp them. And we can still call them, even if we can’t WhatsApp them, or Telegram them, or whatever it is you’re using as an instant messaging app.

[00:35:04] And maybe that’s better. Maybe it will encourage you to see people face-to-face more. Maybe it will encourage you to call them and have actual real time conversations. The only real disadvantage that I can see, if you want to call it that, is that it’s not possible, at least I don’t think it is, to create groups on text message. Right? Text messages are one to one interactions.

[00:35:26] So again, it just depends on how creative you want to be. There’s nothing stopping you being able to send around an email, and you can put multiple people on the email, if you’re trying to arrange something in a group. You can access different community groups and community chats on desktop and laptop, depending on the platform.

[00:35:45] And I actually have a university friend who did this. So he still has his smartphone, but he left WhatsApp. He deleted it from his phone. And that means that he left all the groups with our wider university group of friends. The groups with all the boys where they just had a lot of football banter, whatever it might be. He told everybody that he was doing it beforehand and said, obviously, you can text him and you can call him.

[00:36:06] And I will say that we have less frequent conversations and less frequent interactions, but I do think that the conversations we have are much richer for it. I don’t think I’ve spoken to him on the phone for about two months, but the last time I spoke to him we ended up on the phone for about two or three hours, and had a really great catch up.

[00:36:25] And he says that it has definitely allowed him to have greater focus on the things that are important to him. Much like Dr. Anastasia described her experience, he’s done some really incredible things in the time that he’s ditched WhatsApp. Maybe the two are not connected at all, but I think there’s probably something in that. It’s just less distracting.

[00:36:44] I know for myself WhatsApp is one of the most distracting apps that I have, and that’s one of the reasons why I try not to work with my phone anywhere near me, and I don’t have WhatsApp on my laptop or on my desktop computer. It’s literally just on my phone. So really think long term, how is the switch to a dumbphone going to affect you in the long term, and how it might impact on your family and social connections.

[00:37:05] And I guess the last point to make is that you can treat this like a trial period because nothing is permanent. This is not a one way street. As I’ve already said, there are many different dumbphones on the market. And hopefully if you’ve worked through all of these other questions and considerations, then when you come to do your research, you’ll be able to find the dumbphone that aligns perfectly with your needs.

[00:37:28] But then when you do go out and switch to it, road test it. Treat it as a temporary switch. Try the dumbphone for a short period, see how it impacts your daily life, and if it meets your needs. You don’t have to get rid of your smartphone, just switch the device that you’re using and see how it feels.

[00:37:45] That also means that you don’t have to buy a brand new dumbphone either. You can try picking one up on eBay, or on Gumtree, or on Craigslist, or one of those other platforms where you can get a second hand one. Probably, undoubtedly, from someone else who tried to make the switch to a dumbphone without going through all of these steps. Or maybe they did go through the steps and decided that it just wasn’t for them.

[00:38:05] I think it’s also important to be aware that you might have to try a few different dumbphones before you find the one that works for you. So, if the first one that you pick after doing your research doesn’t quite align with your needs, doesn’t mean that you have to give up and go all the way back to the smartphone. Maybe look at a different one. Maybe if you realise that you do need a few more features, that you need a different model that offers you those features and that functionality.

[00:38:33] And of course, the only way that you’re going to know whether this is working for you or not, is to actually take the time to evaluate the impact that this change has. Monitor the changes in your stress levels. Have a look whether your screen time has changed. And ask yourself if, overall, you’re satisfied with the switch. And if it’s really not working, and if none of the other dumbphone models are working and aligned to your needs, you can always go back to a smartphone. It’s totally fine.

[00:38:59] That’s it for today’s episode, but I will not leave before giving you this week’s weekly challenge. The challenge this week is to see if you can live without your smartphone for 24 hours by turning it into a pseudo dumbphone. I suggest that you try this from 8.00 pm on Friday or Saturday to 8.00 pm the following day, so it’s a full 24 hours. And I say this because if you try it out on a Saturday or a Sunday, it’s usually a non-working day for most people. You don’t have school or childcare issues. And also, this episode goes out on a Tuesday, so if you’re going to do it, it gives you a bit of time to prepare.

[00:39:35] And this is how you’re going to turn your phone into a pseudo dumbphone. You’re going to remove all of the apps from the home screen. This doesn’t delete the app, it doesn’t delete the data, it just removes it from view. So don’t worry about losing anything, it will all be there when you put it back or if you decide to put it back.

[00:39:51] I want you to leave only the calls app and the messaging app, and make sure if you are using an iPhone that you turn off iMessage. So it means you’ll only be able to receive text messages. And then think through what you might need in that 24 hours that you would normally use your phone for. So things like the alarm, things like the camera, things like maps, and make sure you put in place alternatives.

[00:40:14] I don’t want you to get lost when you’re driving. I don’t want you to not wake up on time for a Sunday morning class that you normally take because you’re doing this week’s challenge. So you do need to think through that a little bit, that’s a little bit of prep that you would need to do. And also think about who you need to tell, so that they know to contact you via phone or text if they need you, and don’t rely on sending you a WhatsApp that you’re obviously never going to see.

[00:40:38] You can still email people. You can still technically use social media from a laptop. You can look up driving routes on the GPS device in your car, or on Google Maps on a laptop computer before you actually leave; print them off. It’s only 24 hours, but I think it’s a really good challenge because it will really tell you how dumb you can go with a dumbphone. This is returning it to its absolute basics. You won’t be getting any notifications. You won’t be able to do anything except call and text, and that’s kind of the point.

[00:41:09] I’m going to do this one too this week, because I think it’s a really fun challenge, and I will report on my experiences in The Digital Diet Lounge, which is my dedicated community space for all things digital wellness and women. I will link it in the show notes, but I would love it if you would come in there and join me too, and let me know how your 24 hours went with your pseudo dumbphone. I’m really curious to see how you navigate life without a smartphone for 24 hours.

[00:41:34] The show notes can be found on my website, as always, over at thedigitaldietcoach.com/032. And you will find lots of other episodes there to listen to, just don’t listen to them on your smartphone in that 24 hours. Thanks for tuning in today because I know you’re busy and your time is incredibly valuable. So I appreciate you choosing to spend a little bit of your day with me and I’ll catch you on the next one.