What do you need?

Motiv is a focus app for iPhone and iPad. It does three things: shields distracting apps and websites, helps you run the routines that shape your day, and rolls both into one daily Focus Score.

The score is what makes it stick. Only what you did counts. Showing up adds to it, a quiet day adds nothing, and nothing you skip is ever deducted. There's no red state, so a rough week never becomes a reason to give up.

Motiv is built for iPhone and iPad. There's no Android, Mac, or Apple Watch version.

Blocking runs on Apple's Screen Time frameworks, which only exist on Apple's mobile platforms. An Android version wouldn't be a port, it would be a different product with different guarantees. We'd rather do one thing properly.

On iPad, layouts adapt to the extra space in portrait and landscape.

Nothing syncs between devices either. If you switch devices, your setup doesn't carry over. See what happens on a new device.

No. There's no sign-up, no password, and no Motiv sync backend. You open the app and start.

That's by design. With no account, there's no database of your routines and blocks for anyone to leak, subpoena, or sell. The trade-off is that your setup doesn't follow you between devices.

Motiv Plus is tied to your Apple Account, not a Motiv account, so a subscription restores on any device signed in to the same Apple Account.

Yes. Free is a real plan with no time limit. It includes one block profile, three routines and reminders between them, schedule, daily usage-limit and instant blocks, custom website filtering, the Focus Score, and the day view in Insights.

Motiv Plus lifts the limits and adds location blocks, Holiday Mode, and more. See the full comparison.

Motiv doesn't replace Screen Time. It drives it. iOS does the shielding and Motiv decides when.

On top of Apple's own controls you get:

• blocks that switch by schedule, place, or daily usage limit, or with one tap;
• friction you choose when you try to bypass your own block, instead of a two-tap override;
• routines and reminders that give the protected time a purpose; and
• a Focus Score that turns all of it into one number, where only what you did counts.

Motiv needs iOS 26.5 or later on iPhone, or iPadOS 26.5 or later on iPad.

The bar is high because blocking uses Apple's newest Screen Time frameworks, and older versions can't do what Motiv needs. If your device can't update that far, Motiv won't install.

Yes. Motiv follows your phone's appearance, and Settings → General → Appearance lets you pin it to light or dark instead if you'd rather it didn't.

It earns its place here more than in most apps, because Motiv is used at the hours a phone is dark — a bedtime block, a wind-down routine, the shield you meet when you reach for something at midnight. The parts of Motiv you already saw at night were always dark: the Lock Screen banner, the Dynamic Island, the block shield. Now the app matches them.

Widgets follow your phone rather than your in-app choice, the same as every other widget on your Home Screen.

Motiv is still English-only.

Yes, and we treat it as a requirement, not a nice-to-have.

Every screen holds together at the largest Dynamic Type sizes, controls carry VoiceOver labels, and Reduce Motion turns animation off instead of shortening it. Tap targets have a minimum size that tests enforce.

If you find somewhere it falls down, tell us. That's a bug, not a limitation.

Yes, and they're all free.

There are widgets for your Focus Score, for what's currently protected, and for your routines, plus combined ones that show two of those at once and a larger dashboard that shows everything.

The routine widgets are interactive. You can tick a task straight from the Home Screen without opening the app.

A Live Activity, the panel that sits on the Lock Screen and in the Dynamic Island while something is running. Motiv can show one for a block or focus sprint counting down, and one for a routine you can tick straight from it.

It's a Motiv Plus feature. Each surface has its own switch, and you can turn them all off in Settings.

There are no Lock Screen widgets, which are a different thing. What you see there is the Live Activity.

Motiv is currently available on the App Store in Europe only, including the UK.

Availability depends on the country or region of your Apple Account. If your account uses an App Store outside Europe, Motiv won't be available to download.

Yes. Once a block is on, iOS does the shielding, not Motiv. You can close Motiv, swipe it away, or leave it untouched for a week. The block holds.

Blocks also repair themselves. Motiv checks what it registered against what iOS is really holding and fixes any gaps, so protection comes back on its own instead of waiting for you to notice.

You can shield individual apps, whole categories, and websites. There are four ways to decide when:

• Schedule: a recurring weekly window, like weekday mornings or every evening after nine.
• Location: arriving at or leaving a saved place. (Plus)
• Usage limit: once you've passed a daily time cap you set. Included in Free.
• Instant: right now, for as long as you choose.

You can combine them either way round. A block can need a schedule and a place, so it only holds at the office on a weekday morning, or it can start on either, whichever happens first.

The free plan includes one saved block profile, whether it uses a schedule or a daily usage limit. Both count towards the same allowance. Location rules need Plus. Motiv Plus raises the profile allowance to 20.

Twenty isn't a limit we chose. It's the number of monitors iOS lets an app register at once, and we won't promise more than the operating system can enforce. In practice twenty is plenty. Two or three that cover work, evenings, and weekends is usually enough.

Yes, on purpose. A block you can't escape becomes a block you delete in frustration at the worst moment. Motiv makes escaping deliberate instead of impossible.

When you hit a shielded app you can bypass it after clearing the friction you set:

• wait out a countdown;
• write down why you need the app;
• type an exact phrase; or
• enter a code from your authenticator app (Plus).

Bypasses are capped per block, per day: choose anywhere from one to twenty on either plan. Two blocks means two separate allowances, and an instant block you start yourself doesn't count against the cap at all.

Choosing never bypass means a shielded app stays shielded. It isn't a device lock, though, and Motiv doesn't pretend it is. You can still turn that block off or delete it from the Protect tab, but Motiv asks you to type out a phrase first so it stays a deliberate act, not a reflex.

They come back on their own.

Restarts, iOS updates, and permission resets can all clear the registrations an app holds with the system. Motiv checks its own state against what iOS has registered and repairs any gaps, so a block you set months ago is still a block, not a setting that quietly stopped working.

Almost always a permission, and Motiv will usually have warned you already. Check in this order:

1. Screen Time access, under iOS Settings → Screen Time. If it's off for Motiv, nothing can be shielded. Motiv shows this on the Protect tab too.
2. Location. A location block needs "Always" with precise accuracy to switch while Motiv is closed. See why iOS asks for this twice.
3. Notifications. If these are off, you won't have received the warning that something stopped enforcing.

If all three look right, email support and we'll dig in.

Shared. A daily limit on a block is one allowance across the apps, categories and websites you select in Apple’s Screen Time picker. Spend it all in one selected app and the whole block starts shielding.

You need at least one app, category or website selected in that picker to set a daily limit. Website addresses you type into Motiv and the adult website filter do not count usage towards the limit. If you add those filters to the block, they take effect when the picker selection reaches its shared allowance.

If you want two apps to have their own budgets, give them their own blocks with their own limits.

Per-app limits may come later. For now the allowance belongs to the block.

Daily app limits are included in Free. Your saved usage-limit profile counts towards the same one-profile allowance as a scheduled profile.

iOS replaces the app with a screen from Motiv. It names what's blocked, says "Stay with it — this can wait", and offers Stay Focused as the main button.

The second button opens Motiv, so you can deal with the block properly instead of fighting it from behind glass. If you'd rather not have that door at all, you can hide it. See can I get past my own block.

Turn on Take a break in Settings and the shield can also offer a short pause. Choosing one opens Motiv and runs that block's friction first. The shield never hands out free time on its own.

Not without going through the friction you chose. Disabling a block, deleting it, and editing the teeth out of it all run the same gate, and the switch stays on until you clear it.

That's what makes the friction worth setting. A bypass you have to earn is no use if the block has an off switch beside it.

If you picked never bypass, turning the block off asks you to type out a phrase instead, so you can never be locked out of your own block. See can I get past my own block.

Yes. A block can be set up either way round: the hours it blocks, or the hours it allows.

Set up as allowed time, a block protects the whole day and stands down only inside the windows you name. So "social media, but only between six and seven" is one block, not several stitched together.

Motiv describes it back to you in plain words when you save it, so you can see at a glance which way round you built it.

Thirty minutes unless you change it. You can set anything from one minute to twenty-four hours.

Instant blocks are the ones you start yourself when you need to concentrate now. They end on their own when the time is up, and they don't count against your daily bypass allowance.

Yes, in two ways. A block can switch on Apple's adult-content filter, which works in every browser on the device and keeps its own list current, so there's nothing to maintain. It's free, and it sits alongside whatever apps the block already covers.

A block can also hold a list of websites you name yourself, included in Free. You type an address, Motiv tidies it up, and that site is blocked for as long as the block runs. Both options live with apps on the "What to block?" step, so a block can cover any mix of the two.

Websites follow the block, just like apps. When the block stands down for the evening, or you pause it for the day, or you go on holiday, the websites come back with everything else.

The site shows Apple's own restricted page, not Motiv's blocking screen. Websites are held by iOS itself, through the same filter Screen Time uses, and Motiv never gets to draw over it.

One thing follows from that, and it's worth knowing before you build the block: the unlock options cover apps only. The countdown, the phrase, the authenticator code and your daily bypasses all work on the apps a block covers, and none of them work on its websites. There's no way past the page itself.

So a blocked website stays blocked until the block stands down on its own, or you stop the block from the Protect tab. That makes websites the firmer half of a block, which is usually the point.

iOS filters a limited number of websites at a time, and the limit is shared across every block you have running, not set per block. Motiv keeps the list below that ceiling so you never hit it by accident.

The caution is because of how iOS behaves at the limit. It gives no warning and shows no message. It just stops filtering, all of it, including the sites that were working a moment ago. Motiv would rather say no up front than fail quietly.

You'll see how much room is left once you're close, and adding a site beyond the limit is turned down with a note instead of being accepted and dropped. Apple's adult-content filter doesn't count towards this, so you can leave it on however long your own list is.

One number, each day, for the focus you put in. Protected time from your blocks and completed routine and reminder work both feed it.

The rule that shapes everything else: only what you did counts. Doing something adds to it. Doing nothing adds nothing, and nothing you skip is ever deducted. Two deliberate acts do cost you: pausing a block and ending one early. Both are capped. Consistency over time raises the ceiling.

Never. A quiet day just doesn't add points. Nothing is deducted, the day isn't marked as a failure, and there's no red "failed" state anywhere in the app.

A below-target day reads as "Good." An app that punishes you for a hard week is an app you delete during a hard week.

Your success streak is the one thing a quiet day does end, because a streak counts consecutive good days. It's the same rule Duolingo and Apple Fitness use. The streak is separate from your score, and it never costs you points. If you know you'll be away, Holiday Mode freezes it instead of breaking it.

Five things:

• protected time, from blocks that held;
• routine tasks you completed, with a bonus for finishing the whole routine;
• reminder items you ticked, scored more quietly;
• today's tasks you completed; and
• shields you walked away from, worth a point each, up to five a day.

Routine points are capped per day, so one enormous checklist can't dwarf everything else. Day and streak bonuses sit outside that cap.

Your streaks, your trends over time, a daily breakdown of what fed your score, and Apple's Screen Time report for your actual usage.

All of it is worked out on your device from your own activity, and none of it is sent anywhere to be analysed.

On the free plan you get today and yesterday. The weekly and monthly views are Plus. Your patterns over the last 28 days and your all-time records stay free either way.

Turn on Holiday Mode and Motiv stops expecting anything of you. Your streak is held, not broken, the day multiplier freezes, and routines stop nudging.

It exists because "don't lose your streak" is exactly the kind of pressure Motiv tries not to apply. A week off should feel like a week off. (Plus)

No. Running a focus sprint earns no points and adds nothing to your Focus Score, on purpose.

If you switch on "block apps during focus", the protected time that creates does count, the same as any other block. Scoring the timer on top would count the same minutes twice.

So the timer is a tool, not a target. Use it because it helps, not because it moves a number.

Because a day you haven't acted on doesn't get a score at all. Motiv shows a dash instead of a zero, and calls the day Rest.

That's on purpose. A zero would read as a mark against you for a day you may have spent away from your phone, which is the opposite of what the score is for. The number arrives when there's something to count.

Because Home and the widgets carry your last real score forward instead of showing an empty circle while the day is still young.

The carried number eases down over a few idle days and never drops below a neutral middle, so it reads as "here's where you were", not as today's verdict. It stops carrying after several idle days.

Insights always shows the truth of each day, and a carried number is never stored as your score.

Points are the running total behind the daily score. You earn them for the same things the score counts, and unlike the score they only ever go up.

Enough of them moves you through seven levels, from Starter to Master. A daily multiplier grows as you keep showing up, and freezes instead of resetting when you take a holiday.

Points are a slower, longer story than the score. The score is how today went. Points are the fact that you kept turning up.

Around 70 means a day that went well.

Your ceiling isn't 100 on day one, though. It starts lower and climbs towards 100 as you build consistency. A perfect day is something you unlock, not something handed to you at the start, which is also why the number still means something after a fortnight.

Real protected time puts a floor under the day, so an afternoon that held is never worth nothing.

Once there's enough of a pattern to act on, Insights names the hour you most often reach for something you've blocked, and offers to build a block for it. Tapping through opens the block editor with the times already filled in.

It's free, and it's the one thing in Motiv that makes a suggestion instead of just reporting. It stays quiet until the pattern is clear enough to be more than noise.

Yes, and not just as a promise. There's no account and no Motiv backend, so there's nowhere for your routines, tasks, blocks, saved places, or Focus Score to go. They live on your device.

Apple handles some things on its own terms: App Store purchases, and map searches if you use place search. Optional analytics and crash reporting are off unless you turn them on.

The Privacy Policy sets out every category in detail.

By default, nothing that belongs to Motiv. The exceptions are Apple's own services: an App Store purchase, and Apple Maps if you search for a place to use in a location rule.

If you opt in to analytics or crash reports, what's sent is kept narrow: event types, counts, durations, app version and device model. Never task titles, notes, place names, coordinates, or which apps you've blocked.

Both are off until you switch them on, and you can turn either off again in Settings → Privacy at any time.

They start off, and stay off unless you turn them on, during onboarding or later in Settings → Privacy. Each is a separate choice.

Turning one off stops the provider immediately and deletes what it had stored. While they're off, nothing builds up either. The events aren't recorded at all, not kept on your device in case you change your mind. Motiv also keeps a local record of the choices you've made under Settings → Your consent record, so you can see exactly what you agreed to and when.

Two ways:

• Reset Motiv, in Settings, clears everything you've created (routines, blocks, saved places, score history, settings, and consent records) and stops any active analytics or crash reporting.
• Deleting the app removes its data from that device.

Neither cancels a subscription. That's handled separately in your Apple Account. If you'd turned on analytics or crash reporting, email us and we'll help with anything a provider may still hold.

Motiv has no backup or restore of its own, and no cloud copy of your data exists anywhere. That follows from having no account. Its database is kept out of your device backup too, so there's nothing to breach.

You can still take a copy. Settings → Export my data writes everything Motiv holds on this device to a file. It's a record, not a restore, as there's no import to read it back, but at least a setup you're happy with doesn't have to exist in only one place.

So if you delete the app or move to a new phone, treat your setup as something to rebuild. That's the trade for a product with nothing to breach, and it's worth knowing before you delete the app to test something.

Yes. Settings → Your consent record lists every privacy choice you've made, when you made it, and which version of the wording you were shown.

It's kept on your device, nothing is ever removed from it, and it records withdrawals as well as grants. Turning something off leaves a record of that, not a gap where a choice used to be.

Yes, and some of it already is. The numeric Focus Score is kept off the Lock Screen unless you ask for it, and StandBy starts at the most private setting.

You can also keep block names out of notifications, so a block starting doesn't announce which apps it covers to anyone glancing at your phone. Reminders default to a generic title for the same reason.