How to block Instagram and TikTok at night on iPhone

It is 11 PM, you meant to be asleep an hour ago, and you know which two apps are responsible.

Your iPhone can shut both down on a schedule tonight, at no cost. Setup takes minutes. The gaps take longer: one list in Settings that overrides the schedule, a browser that loads the same feed anyway, and a passcode you never set. Here is the free method done right, then the paid options, then what to do when the block works and you get past it anyway.

The fastest free method: Screen Time Downtime

Downtime is Apple’s scheduled block, described in Apple’s guide to setting Screen Time schedules as a way to “Block apps and notifications for periods when you want time away from your devices”. The steps below follow that guide, in the iPhone User Guide for iOS 26.

One thing first, because it explains most of the failures further down. Downtime is not a list of apps to block. It makes most apps unavailable and keeps a short list available. You do not pick Instagram and TikTok, you pick what stays open.

1. Open the Settings app, then tap Screen Time.
2. Tap App & Website Activity, then tap Turn On App & Website Activity if it is not on already.
3. Tap Downtime.
4. Tap Scheduled.
5. Select Every Day or Customize Days, then set the start and end times. For a bedtime block, 9 PM to 7 AM is a normal choice.
6. Turn on Block at Downtime.

That last toggle matters most. Apple notes that “By default, Screen Time limits can be ignored once reached”. With Block at Downtime on, Apple says restricted apps are blocked during downtime and appear dimmed with an hourglass icon. It becomes available once you set a Screen Time passcode.

The step everyone misses: Always Allowed

Always Allowed is the exception list. Apple describes it as the apps you can use “at all times”, including during downtime. Anything in it ignores your schedule, so Safari, Instagram or TikTok sitting there makes the whole block pointless.

Go to Settings, tap Screen Time, then tap Always Allowed. Apps under Allowed Apps stay open during downtime. Move Instagram, TikTok and every browser out of that list, so they sit under Choose Apps instead. Check it again after any iOS update. The same screen has a Contacts setting for who can still reach you.

Lock it with a Screen Time passcode, or it is a suggestion

Without a passcode, a schedule is a polite note. With one it is a lock, and Block at Downtime becomes available.

Per Apple’s guide to the Screen Time passcode: open Settings, tap Screen Time, scroll down, tap Lock Screen Time Settings, enter a four-digit passcode, then enter it again to verify. Apple also offers Screen Time Passcode Recovery, which resets it with your Apple Account if you forget.

Pick four digits your thumb does not already know. For what iOS is doing underneath, see our guide to how Screen Time app blocking really works on iPhone.

Blocking the web version too

A common failure: the app is blocked, and instagram.com loads in a browser you left in Always Allowed, or under an App Limit that only covers the app. Apple keeps website blocking somewhere else. Per Apple’s guide to blocking websites: go to Settings, tap Screen Time, tap Content & Privacy Restrictions and turn on Content & Privacy Restrictions, tap App Store, Media, Web, & Games, tap Web Content, select Limit Adult Websites, then tap Add Website below Never Allow and enter the URLs.

Apple’s guide describes no way to schedule that list, so a domain you add is blocked during the day too, and you add each site by hand. Downtime does cover other browsers, since it applies to most apps unless you allowed them. App Limits can cover a category such as Social Networking, but Apple calls those daily time limits, the wrong shape for a window running past midnight. Wanting apps, categories and domains in one nightly rule is why people move to a third-party blocker.

If Downtime is not holding

You tap through it, because you know the passcode

You can enter the passcode and carry on. You can turn off Scheduled. You can turn off App & Website Activity, which Apple says “turns off reporting, Downtime, App Limits, and Always Allowed” in one move.

This is not a defect. Screen Time was built for a parent managing a child’s device, where the person holding the passcode is not the person being blocked. Play both roles and the lock is worth whatever your 11 PM self decides.

The reminder hands you a five minute head start

Apple’s guide says that “When you schedule downtime, a 5-minute reminder is sent before downtime begins”, and that you can ignore it. Useful warning, and also a countdown inviting one last look. Set the start time earlier than the hour you want to stop.

You find another route to the same feed

Reinstalling rarely helps, since Downtime covers apps broadly rather than a list you picked. The gaps are ones you opened: a browser left in Always Allowed, a domain never added to Never Allow, or an iPad with no schedule, which is what Apple’s Share Across Devices setting is for.

At some point the problem stops being configuration. A block you can lift in two seconds is a reminder, not a block. That is when a separate app is worth considering, because its friction does not sit behind a passcode you already know.

Third-party apps built for a nightly block

What to look for, in order:

• A schedule that runs on its own, with nothing to open at bedtime.
• Apps, categories and websites inside the same rule.
• Something that resists a one tap override: a counted bypass, a delay, or a person.

No app can promise every route is closed. iOS does not offer that, and a blocker claiming otherwise is overstating what it does.

We make one of these, so weigh this paragraph accordingly. Goodwater Labs builds Habit Hound, an iPhone app blocker. For a bedtime schedule the feature is Time Lock in Habit Hound: put apps, categories or websites in the Doghouse, set a window, for example 9 PM to 7 AM, and the lock runs on the clock with no habit attached. It is part of Habit Hound Premium, $4.99 a month or $24.99 a year, with a 7-day free trial for new subscribers. The free plan gates apps on your daily habits instead, a different job and the subject of our guide to blocking apps on iPhone until your tasks are done. If a bedtime window is all you want, some of the apps below cost less than we do, and you should hear that from us.

The bedtime specialists, checked on their own pages on September 10, 2026:

• Bloky runs a nightly schedule and shows a full screen pause instead of the feed, with an override that costs twenty taps on its mascot for a five minute pass.
• SleepLock: Sleep App Blocker locks chosen apps and categories inside a sleep window. $1.99 a week or $9.99 a year.
• Sleep Lock: Bedtime Blocker blocks apps, categories or websites during a sleep window. $3.99 a week, $9.99 a month or $79.99 a year. Different developer from SleepLock above, so check the seller name.
• Sunbreak locks your chosen apps at bedtime until sunrise, says it has no override and no Ignore Limit, and emails friends you name as accountability partners. Sunbreak Pro is listed at $8.99 and $69.99, periods not stated.
• Dozzi locks up to five chosen apps on your sleep schedule. $2.99 a month or $24.99 a year.

Those prices are what the pages showed that day; this category changes them often.

A nightly setup that actually holds

1. Downtime scheduled, starting before the hour you want to stop.
2. Block at Downtime on.
3. Always Allowed trimmed to what you would want at 3 AM.
4. Web versions covered, under Never Allow or by one blocker that handles both.
5. A Screen Time passcode set, ideally held by someone else.
6. The charger in another room, if you are willing. No software can undo that one.

Questions people ask

Can I block Instagram only at night and keep it during the day?

Yes. Downtime takes a start time and an end time, every day or only the days you choose. Outside the window nothing changes.

Does this block the website too?

Only if the browser is blocked too. Downtime makes Safari and other browsers unavailable unless they sit in Always Allowed, so during the window the website is out of reach as well. An App Limit on Instagram alone does not touch instagram.com. Website blocking with no time window lives under Never Allow in Content & Privacy Restrictions, and some third-party blockers put apps, categories and websites into one scheduled rule.

Will I still get notifications?

Apple describes Downtime as blocking apps and notifications for the period you set, and says only calls, messages and the apps you allow stay available. Anything left in Always Allowed keeps notifying you.

Can I block TikTok without blocking messages?

Yes. Apple’s guide says calls and messages remain available during downtime, and Always Allowed has its own Contacts setting. Keep Messages available, keep TikTok out of the allowed list.