When was the last time you put your phone down and didn't pick it up again for a few hours? If you're drawing a blank, you're not alone. Between classes, meetings, emails, assignments, and the ever-present pull of social media, most of us are spending more time staring at screens than ever before.
The average adult spends more than five hours per day looking at a screen. But that number can easily climb higher for busy students, faculty, and staff. If you suspect excessive screen time is causing more harm than good, don’t worry. Digital wellbeing can help.
🌙 Bedtime for Your Phone
There’s a good chance your phone is the first thing you see when you wake up and the last thing you see when you go to sleep. But, as you probably already know, your phone can seriously disrupt your wind-down routine.
Reducing screen use in the hour before bed — and keeping your phone out of reach at night — is one of the most evidence-backed ways to improve sleep quality. Better sleep leads to better focus and better mood.
Practical steps to try tonight:
- Enable Night Light on Windows or Night Shift on your iPhone or Mac to reduce blue light exposure in the evenings.
- Set a phone “bedtime” in your device's screen time settings so apps go quiet automatically.
- Charge your phone outside your bedroom — or at least across the room — so it's not the first and last thing you reach for each day.
🔕 Tame Your Notifications
Notifications are one of the sneakiest drains on your focus and energy. Every buzz, ping, and pop-up is a tiny interruption that pulls your attention away from what you're actually trying to do. And once you’re disrupted, getting back can take a while.
You don't have to turn everything off to reduce your notification noise. Go through your notification settings and ask yourself: Is this app important enough to send me notifications at any time? For most apps (and I’m looking at you, Chipotle app), the answer is no.
Take back your notification control:
- In Outlook, turn off notifications for emails that aren't urgent and add a few designated times to check your inbox into your daily schedule.
- Use Do Not Disturb or Focus Mode on your phone during study sessions, deep work, or meetings.
- In Microsoft Teams, set your status to Do Not Disturb when you need uninterrupted time so your colleagues will see it and know to wait.
⏱️ Build Breaks into Your Day
Back-to-back meetings and marathon study sessions might feel productive, but they may be working against you. Constant digital connectivity has been shown to increase stress, which over time contributes to burnout and exhaustion.
One of the simplest things you can do is build small, intentional breaks into your day. Step away from your screen, take a short walk, look out the window. Anything that gives your eyes and brain a chance to reset will do the trick.
🤝 Set Some Norms with Your Team or Study Group
Digital wellbeing is a team effort. Social stigma can keep you tied to your phone, even with these tips. When a team agrees that messages after a certain hour aren't urgent, or that chat notifications don't require an immediate response, the pressure on each individual drops significantly. These kinds of shared norms make healthy habits easier to maintain and more sustainable in the long term.
Whether you're a student working on a group project or a staff member managing a busy department, it's worth having a quick conversation about communication expectations. A simple agreement like "we respond to non-urgent messages within 24 hours" can reduce anxiety for everyone involved.
🌿 The Big Picture
Digital wellbeing is about making sure your relationship with your devices is actually serving you. Small, sustainable habits — a quieter phone, a scheduled break, a healthier social norm — add up to a meaningfully different experience of your day.
You don't have to overhaul everything at once. Pick one tip from this list, try it for a week, and see how it feels. The best digital habit is the one you'll actually keep.
— Pitt Digital
