Lummi vs Opal: One Honest Comparison (We Made Lummi)

Lummi is made by the same team that runs this directory. That’s the disclosure, and it stays at the top so you can weight everything below accordingly.

The honest version: for most people comparing Lummi and Opal, Opal is the safer pick. It’s been around longer, it runs on more devices, and you can try it without paying a cent. Lummi is the better choice for one specific problem. If that problem isn’t yours, Opal wins and you can stop reading here.

What each app actually does

Opal blocks apps and websites on schedules or on demand, hooks deep into Apple’s Screen Time, and can make a focus session genuinely hard to break. It has a Focus Score dashboard, a free tier that covers basic blocking, and paid plans that add deep focus, automation, and analytics. It runs on iPhone, iPad, and Mac under one subscription. Opal’s pricing moves around, so check its App Store page before paying.

Lummi blocks apps the same way, on the same Apple Screen Time stack. The difference is what happens at the wall. When you reach for a blocked app, Lummi doesn’t only stop you — it opens a real book, in a full reader built into the app, with public-domain classics included so there’s something to read on day one. Everything else it does (schedules, a screen-time dashboard, reading streaks) exists to support that one bet: that the cure for a compulsive open is a better thing to open. It’s $8.99/week or $59.99/year, iOS only, with a 1-week free trial on the annual plan and no permanent free tier.

Where Opal is the better app

You can try it for free, indefinitely. Opal’s free tier runs basic blocking with no card. Lummi gives you one week free on the annual plan, then asks you to pay; there’s no free version to settle into.

It’s on all your screens. If Instagram on the Mac is as much the problem as Instagram on the phone, Opal covers iPhone, iPad, and Mac together. Lummi stays on your iPhone.

It’s older and more polished. Years of iteration show in the schedule editor, the override flows, and the deep-focus lockdown that needs Face ID and a wait to break. If you talk your way past every soft block the second temptation hits, that hardness is the whole point. Lummi has a hard-block mode too, but Opal’s is more battle-tested. (If you want commitment without any subscription, the Brick alternatives guide covers physical locks.)

Where Lummi is the better app

One job, done differently: replacing the compulsive open instead of only denying it.

A blocker tells you no. The trouble is that “no” leaves a gap, and the gap refills with the next unblocked feed. Lummi drops a book into that gap. If your pattern is reach for the phone without deciding to, scroll for eight minutes, feel worse, repeat, a wall stops the scroll but never touches the reach. Lummi aims at the reach.

Whether that beats Opal’s hard stop depends on your problem. If you mostly know when you’re opening apps and just want them gone on a schedule, Opal does more. If the reflex itself is the issue (the reaching, the boredom, the void where the scroll used to be), a redirect can stick where a wall slides off.

I’ve slipped past Opal-style blockers inside a week by finding the override. I’ve also abandoned replacement apps once the prompts started to feel like nagging. Neither model works for everyone, and anyone who says theirs does is selling you something. We are too, technically, which is why the disclosure is up top.

Side by side

Which one to install

Want a structured blocking system with schedules, cross-device coverage, and a free way to test it first? Opal. It’s the right default and it takes most of the table.

Tried blocking and kept clawing your way around it, or the pull feels less like bad time management and more like a reflex you can’t argue with? That’s the case for Lummi: $8.99/week or $59.99/year, iOS only, one mechanic, one week to try it on the annual plan. You’re buying the bet, not the feature count.

Still deciding? The best app blockers for iPhone lays out the whole field, and the Opal alternatives guide digs into where Opal falls short for different people.