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What is on my phone in 2026

· 6 min
My phone in 2026

As we go into another year, I have paired down even further as to what is allowed on my mobile device.

You can see my previous posts about smartphones here, here and here.

I am running a Samsung s24 - with ADB you can disable much of the bloat, but it is not perfect. I would recommend going with a Google Pixel device in order to run GrapheneOS.

Theory#

The phone is (without argument) the biggest distraction and addiction point for most people in the modern technological world.

The screen is great for consumption of media, but for production it is sorely lacking - I can type ~3x slower my phone compared to a laptop keyboard, and even with voice controls, the precision of input that could be had is lacking. Therefore, I believe in making the smartphone an auxiliary device, one in which I reach for as a last ditch for computing.

While going the “dumbphone route” (or altogether throwing the phone in the river) is attractive, I would suggest that the smartphone does have utility. We just have to be strict as to make it serve us and not the other way around.

My aim is to make the phone a mobile computing environment in which I can actually get work done (in desperate times), using it as a tertiary camera when I have no other camera on me, and for navigation and my own curated media consumption (reading, music, prayer). I would, in an ideal world, like to spend less than 45 minutes a day on the screen on my phone - with as much of that time being purposeful as possible. I believe Android Auto counts as screentime, so some days are higher if driving, but obviously that is for maps and media, not mindless consumption.

I have thought about the folding phone route, as it is attractive as a pocket computer, but I am not sure if that is the path I will take. The Google Pixel Fold offers GrapheneOS support, which is a must have for any future device.

What I think a smartphone is for#

I think a smartphone has utility for:

What I DO NOT Allow on my phone:#

Launcher and setup#

I left behind Nova Launcher in mid 2025 (before they sold out). I couldn’t see the benefit any more to spend a ton of time on customizing my android environment. I now use MicroLauncher, permitting simple customization of hidden and shown tabs. As you will see in the screen shots of my phone, my home screen and primary drawer are minimal, only offering applications I use daily. I use the “hidden apps” feature to offload much of the stuff I don’t use daily to a hidden workspaces, or things I find distracting and don’t want to give any headspace to.

As for the apps I allow on my phone, I am migrating toward a GrapheneOS device in the near future, and I believe in using as many free and open source apps as possible. F-droid is where I get the vast majority of apps from, and I then use Aurora Store for anything Google Play related.

The Applications#

Communication#

Media#

Utility#

Other#

Termux is still the GOAT#

Termux is my interface to my workstation via tailscale - so I can effectively run a linux environment on my phone without issue. People do much with termux, and I have shifted to nix-on-droid in order to declaratively setup the environment. While Google phones offer a Linux terminal environment, I will review in the future which I stick to. I mostly mosh into my workstation, run a full emacs environment, and run various scripts I have written for utility and quality of life. I have tried to bring texting into emacs on my computers to varying degrees of success, KDE connect being an inspiration to this workflow.

Greyscale is the norm#

The phone remains in greyscale mode likely 95% of the time, and when it is not, it is because I am reviewing photos with family, or consuming educational content. Greyscale keeps the addictive properties of a phone down drastically, while not hampering the utility.

NO social media#

I have no social media applications on my phone for the reason I know they are highly manufactured and engineered for addiction on the smartphone - if I have to use social media, I do it in a browser on a computer, but for Lent I have given all socials up.

This is the #1 thing I could recommend for anyone that wants to spend less time on a phone screen, and I saw great improvements in my mental health when taking these apps off my phone.

NO browser#

For me, the browser on my phone was another grave timesink, as well as offered too many windows and doors into things I would rather not look at (news, pornography, smut, arguing, etc.), so I nipped that in the bud and just removed all browsers. I have F-droid accessible if I need a browser in the wild, but frankly, that happens maybe once every month or so - and it’s better to make notes of things to look up when in front of a computer anyway.

Mobile Org mode#

My one major pain point has been echoed by the emacs community: the mobile org mode ecosystem is sorely lacking. I have experimented with various apps that try to bridge my org files to mobile, and have always felt they are not there (yet). The solution for me is to use “note to self” in signal and to then sit down with my notes and ingest them to org-mode on my machine in the evenings. I know some to have left org mode in favour of obsidian as the mobile offering is far better, but I don’t personally care all that much - the less time my phone’s screen is on, the better for me.

What is on your phone in 2026? How are you keeping your screen time to a minimum? Have you gone the full dumphone route? Comment below or send me an email.

As always, God bless, and until next time.

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