Brick, built by a small Wisconsin-based team founded by two university students, takes an approach almost nobody else in this category attempts: blocking is tied to a physical object, a small NFC "Brick" you tap your phone against to activate or lift a block. It's a one-time $59 purchase with no subscription, and it's arguably the single hardest self-bypass mechanism researched across this entire comparison set — worth crediting exactly for what makes it different, since the founders clearly built it around the observation that any purely software-based block is, in the end, just a setting you already know how to change. The company has also been explicit in its own marketing that it built Brick specifically in response to founders' own failed attempts with software-only blockers, which gives the physical-object design a clear, stated rationale rather than being novelty for its own sake.
What Brick actually does
You tap your phone's NFC to the physical Brick device to activate blocking of your chosen apps and sites; they stay blocked until you tap the phone to the Brick again. There's no timer running down in the background — the block persists indefinitely until you physically return to the device, which could be minutes or days depending on where you decided to leave it. A "Strict Mode" closes some software-side loopholes (like deleting the app to escape a block), and the app ships with a small number of "Emergency Unbricks" as an intentional safety valve for genuine emergencies, so the system isn't quite absolute even by its own design. The app also lets you configure which specific apps require a Brick tap versus which stay freely accessible, so essential tools like maps or messaging can be exempted while the genuinely distracting apps stay locked behind the physical device.
Where Brick is honestly the better pick
Tying the unlock to a physical object you have to walk to is a genuinely stronger friction mechanism than anything purely software-based can offer — you can't think your way past not having the Brick in front of you the way you might talk yourself through a quiz question, no matter how determined or clever you feel in the moment. The one-time $59 price with no ongoing subscription is also a real, fair point in Brick's favor for anyone tired of recurring charges, and it means the cost of the tool doesn't keep climbing the longer you rely on it. It's also worth noting that a one-time hardware purchase, unlike a subscription, doesn't create any ongoing incentive for the company to loosen the product over time to keep you paying — the business model and the strict, no-nonsense design point the same direction.
| Feature | Brick | Mr. Grummel |
|---|---|---|
| Platforms | iOS, Android — requires the physical Brick device | iOS & Android (in development) — no hardware required |
| Core mechanism | Tap your phone to a physical NFC device to activate or lift a block | Answer a quiz question from the app's curriculum to unlock |
| Self-bypassable without extra hardware? | No — unlocking normally requires the physical device (a limited number of "Emergency Unbricks" exist as a built-in safety valve) | N/A — no hardware needed, quiz-only |
| Physical hardware required? | Yes — a $59 NFC "Brick" device | No |
| Price | One-time $59, no subscription | Not yet announced — join the waiting list |
The one mechanical difference that actually matters
Brick's friction is physical and spatial: the Brick has to be somewhere specific, and you have to go there, which turns the whole question of willpower into a question of geography instead. That's an extremely strong deterrent precisely because it doesn't depend on your mental state in the moment — willpower and cleverness don't help you if the object simply isn't within reach, and no amount of internal negotiation changes where you physically left it. Mr. Grummel's friction is cognitive, not spatial: the question is always available, wherever you are, but it demands something of your attention rather than your location. One is unbeatable by being inconvenient; the other is beatable in principle, but demands genuine engagement every single time rather than a one-time act of placing an object somewhere annoying. That physical-versus-cognitive distinction is also why Brick tends to get recommended specifically for the most severe cases of phone dependency, where previous software-only attempts have already failed repeatedly and something outside the phone itself is what's actually needed.
Who should pick which
If you want blocking that doesn't depend on your state of mind at all — something that simply can't be reasoned around because it isn't a mental obstacle in the first place — Brick's physical-tap model is doing something no software-only tool, including Mr. Grummel, can fully match. If you'd rather not manage a separate physical object, and are fine with friction that lives entirely in the app itself without needing to remember where you left anything, that's the trade Mr. Grummel makes instead, exchanging Brick's absolute spatial barrier for a lighter, more portable kind of resistance. It's also worth being honest that Brick requires a real behavior change of its own — remembering to bring the device places, or committing to leaving it fixed in one location — which is its own kind of friction some people will find harder to sustain than simply answering the questions.