How to turn your Iphone into a light phone with no 3rd party apps

After watching a bunch of dumb phone videos, I wanted to try one myself but none of them quite fit my needs. The Mudita came closest, but it doesn’t support all banking apps.

I tried different screen time limits on my iPhone, but it always felt kind of weird to have the app and just restrict the time I could use it. Instagram or Youtube were still just there.

However, you can disable Safari completely and prevent app downloads. That way, even if you're tempted, you can't install anything. With screen time restrictions, you can basically turn your iPhone into a Light Phone but with a few extra essentials like ridesharing, banking, and a great camera.

Here’s how I did it:

1. Download all the apps you want on your phone — for me that’s WhatsApp, an authenticator app, banking, Anki, chess, Maps, Audible, and Podcasts.
2. Delete everything you don’t want — social media, browsers like Chrome, YouTube, etc.
3. Go to Settings > Screen Time
   • Turn on Screen Time
   • Turn off “Share Across Devices”
4. Go to Content & Privacy Restrictions and turn the toggle at the top on
5. In iTunes & App Store Purchases, set everything to Don’t Allow except for deleting apps
6. Go to Allowed Apps and disable Safari and News
7. Finally, set a Screen Time passcode. Either have someone else set it for you or use a password generator and delete the password immediately so you can’t remember it. I used a password generator and wrote down the password on a piece of paper, so I can make changes if necessary.
   • You can connect an Apple ID to recover the passcode if needed — otherwise, you’ll need to reset your phone if you forget it.

Optional tweaks for an even more minimal experience:

• Turn on grayscale (black and white) filters
• Disable tap to wake, raise to wake, and always-on display
• Enable dark mode
• Use Home Screen customization to make your app icons black and white for a cleaner look
• put a bunch of Home Screen pages between the app library by adding some widget like the weather

For me, this is the perfect minimal phone solution: I still have access to the essential tools I need (like banking), but I’m not tempted to jump onto Instagram or browse endlessly and its FREE

I'm sorry if somebody already posted sth. like this but basically all tutorials on youtube use some form of screen time limitations and don't disable everything outright.