Why Adults Are Switching to Dumbphones to Escape Social Media

May 12

Written By Michele Edington (formerly Michele Gargiulo)

I realized last year how addicted I am to my phone. I hated those little screen average notifications that popped up all the time because I would see how long I was on my phone for. I set my social media apps to 5 minutes for Facebook, 10 minutes for Instagram, and 15 minutes for LinkedIn.

Turns out it’s not just me, there’s a quiet revolution happening, and not in the headlines, not in the chaos of your feed, but in the pockets of silence that we all deserve. The revolution isn’t happening with flags waving and the French hiding in the shadows, but in dusty flip phones and pixelated screens.

It’s the sound of something ancient returning, some god damn peace and quiet.

More and more adults are trading in their fancy shiny rectangles for something dumber, slower, and a lot quieter. Not because they’re technophobes (which sounds like a cool dance, but is just the fear of technology), and not because they’re out of touch, but because, like me, they’ve finally had enough.

Enough of the constant scrolling, the dopamine spikes and emotional crashes, the performance, the filters, and the noise that never ever ends.

This is the story of the dumbphone comeback, and what science has to say about why it’s working.

The Smartphone Hangover

Let’s start with the obvious and give credit where credit is due, smartphones really are miracles. They let us work, date, map, shop, create, and connect in ways our great grandparents could only dream of.

But for all their magic, they’ve also become dopamine slot machines, completely engineered to hijack our brains.

Social media, in particular, is a psychological circus of variable rewards (likes, comments, shares), social comparison loops (scrolling through curated perfection), time distortion (what felt like five minutes was actually forty), and sleep disruption (blue light, doomscrolling, and mental overstimulation). My dad calls social media the dumpster fire that rots your brain and it isn’t even limited to us, even AI is getting brain rot these days.

According to a 2023 study in JAMA Pediatrics, screen time has doubled among adults since 2010, and heavy use has been directly correlated with higher rates of anxiety, depression, and sleep disorders, which shouldn’t be shocking to anyone.

And the scariest part of all of this is that the more you scroll, the harder it is to stop. Your brain begins to restructure itself to prioritize fast content, shallow connections, and distraction over anything of depth. Now, luckily, you’re reading this which means your brain isn’t completely lost in the noise.

What the Studies Say About Social Media & Mental Health

While social media isn’t inherently evil (sometimes I think it is), our brains weren’t built for the way we’re using it.

A 2023 randomized controlled trial I found thank to Google in Cyberpsychology, behavior, and social networking found that people who reduced their social media use saw actual measurable improvements in mood and overall well-being, even when it was just a tiny reduction of time. Simply spending less time scrolling on social media can boost your mental health, which is kinda scary.

The American Psychological Association also reports that heavy social media use (more than two hours per day is what they say) has been linked to lower self-esteem and higher rates of anxiety and depression, especially among younger people. Obviously, these effects depend more heavily on how people use social media, passive scrolling tends to worsen your mood, while reaching out and making meaningful connections can improve it.

Neuroscience research increasingly shows that the constant digital stimulation all the damn time can affect attention networks in the brain, especially in the prefrontal cortex (the region responsible for focus, emotional regulation, and decision-making). While this doesn’t mean scrolling “damages” the brain, it does kinda hint at our neural wiring struggling to process such a high volume of rapid, and overly emotional information.

Yup, your brain wasn’t designed for endless input, constant notifications, and the emotional rollercoaster of a digital feed.

Why Dumbphones Are Making a Comeback

So what happens when you remove the notifications, the infinite feeds, the micro-stressors of every ping?

You get silence, and in that silence, something beautiful begins to grow again.

People are choosing dumbphones (basic models with limited functionality) not to disconnect from the world, but to reconnect with themselves.

They report improved sleep, lower anxiety, more presence in conversations, greater focus and productivity, and a strange and beautiful sense of calm. Okay, maybe I took that a little too far at the end, but you get my point.

And what I think is most important, you stop feeling like a product with your data being collected to sell to the highest bidder. Like every scroll is being harvested, every moment of boredom is an opportunity for someone else’s profit.

If you’re ready to unplug, here’s a great place to start:

Minimalist Phone
A thoughtfully designed, distraction-free phone for people who want to be present without going fully off-grid.

This Isn’t Just About Phones, It’s About Identity

To choose a dumbphone in 2025 is to go against the grain of what society is trying to shove down your throat.

Personally, I’m not here to be optimized, I’m not here to be consumed and packages for sale, I’m not here to compete for attention.

It’s a reclamation you deserve for your time, your brain, your boundaries. It’s not anti-technology (okay, maybe a little bit), it’s pro-consciousness. This whole movement isn’t some anti-connection, anti-social movement, it’s pro-intention and learning how to be present again in real life and not the digital world where most of what you see is fake anyway.

You begin to notice things again. You go back to reading the back of your shampoo bottles while you’re on the toilet instead of doom-scrolling. You get bored sometimes again, and in that boredom, you get ideas. You daydream and your creativity pokes its head back up from the hole it was hibernating in.

You stop reaching for a screen in every pause, and instead start inhabiting the pause itself.

This is what’s on the other side of the algorithm.

But What If You Need a Smartphone for Work?

This is the biggest hurdle for most adults, because phones are no longer just communication and doom-scrolling tools. They’re wallets, calendars, GPS devices, cameras, inboxes, and all the things that keep our lives still spinning.

The solution isn’t always total abstinence, it’s creating healthy boundaries and maybe using a dumbphone during non-work hours. Keep your smartphone in grayscale mode to reduce dopamine addiction according to something I found on the interwebs, delete your social apps entirely, set limits on them, or log out after each use for the annoying factor of logging back in. You can install website blockers during writing or work time which might help too. Or try to use “Focus Mode” or “Downtime” features to limit screen time

This isn’t about being perfect, it’s about trying your best to limit as much screen time as you can.

Social media addiction isn’t obvious enough for most of us to think about it in our day to day. It doesn’t look like shaking or withdrawal, it looks like numbness, restlessness, and mindless checking those phantom vibrations, or the inability to sit in silence without feeling like you’re wasting time.

But that silence is where your intuition lives and where your ideas form, and your nervous system heals.

Don’t forget that every scroll away from it is a scroll closer to yourself.

From FOMO to JOMO (The Joy of Missing Out)

Once the noise fades, something else arrives: the joy of missing out. One of my favorite things ever honestly.

You’re not missing news, you’re missing noise. You’re not missing trends, it’s just some anxiety. You’re missing data designed to manipulate your behavior and mess with your mind.

JOMO is where you start to live your own life again, instead of watching everyone else’s highlight reel and wondering how they afforded that second vacation in two months. Because, let’s be honest with each other here, they didn’t. They put those vacations on a credit card, and then had to work twice as hard to pay them off. You just didn’t see that part.

Celebrities like Chris Hemsworth and Selena Gomez have publicly spoken about taking extended breaks from smartphones and social media for their mental health, so it really isn’t just us who are getting that fatigue.

Minimalist influencers and digital detox coaches are building entire careers around helping people restructure their attention on the things that actually matter. You’re welcome for me writing this for free for you!

And on TikTok (super ironically), there’s an entire corner of creators dedicated to “tech minimalism,” sharing the joys of dumbphones, analog planners, and going back to basics.

Don’t forget, while you might be giving something up (doom-scrolling), you’re also getting back your mornings that learn again to be unrushed and unhurried. Your evenings with screens down, will have your nervous system softened, and sleep better than it was (might take a while to get back to this). Don’t forget about the magic of eye contact, real laughter, and presence with your partner.

Eventually you’ll get back some focus on whatever work you are looking forward to, some better creative flow, and less tabs open in your brain. Your self-worth won’t be just tied to likes, follows, or that algorithmic praise we’re all trying to capture.

It’s not just a phone switch, it’s a soul shift that might just change your entire life (too dramatic?).

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Why I Chose to Disconnect

There was a moment (not overly dramatic, but real), when I looked down at my phone and realized I hadn’t had an unfiltered thought in days. Everything I thought felt like it was somehow algorithmically tinged. My joy was measured by notifications and my peace, was interrupted by someone else’s drama as they spewed about politics that I genuinely didn’t care about.

So I stopped just for a weekend and it was glorious. Then I did a week. Eventually I bought a cheap phone that couldn’t scroll mindlessly when I was bored. Don’t get me wrong, I kept my smartphone for weeks when I worked and set timers on all my social media apps.

And I started writing again, daydreaming again, reading more books for fun, and living in real life again. I didn’t give up my smartphone entirely, but I gave up the idea that I owe it my attention 24/7.

You don’t have to disappear from the face of all social media, you just have to come home to yourself because you really owe it to your poor brain eventually.

The dumbphone movement isn’t a fad, it’s a reckoning for all the apps that tried to addict us to our phones.

We’re remembering something we forgot: that we were never meant to be this overstimulated, we deserve presence, and in a world where our most important form of currency is time, our attention is sacred.

So if you feel called to unplug, even for a day…follow that instinct. Your nervous system will thank you, your creativity will bloom, and maybe your soul will stop shouting over all the noise.

You don’t need another app, you just need a little bit more space for you, and a phone that can only call the people you love.

Michele Edington (formerly Michele Gargiulo)

Writer, sommelier & storyteller. I blend wine, science & curiosity to help you see the world as strange and beautiful as it truly is.

http://www.michelegargiulo.com