You don't get blocked. You get a problem to solve.
A hard wall just makes you resent the tool and disable it. Sphinx adds friction with a purpose: the two minutes you'd lose to a doom-scroll go into a rep instead โ and you actually get in afterward.
Three things make the habit stick instead of getting uninstalled by Tuesday.
Procedurally generated math (from quick GMAT/GRE-style word problems to modular arithmetic and calculus) or a short JS coding challenge graded against real test cases. Difficulty is yours to set.
Each site gets a small budget of active time per hour โ no puzzle needed. It only ticks while you're actually looking at the tab, so a quick legit check never costs you a problem.
Every solve buys a timed session. When it runs out, the site re-locks โ even on the tab you're sitting on. Stuck? A deliberately tedious emergency unlock always works.
Add the sites that derail you. First-run setup suggests common distractions like X, Reddit, YouTube and Hacker News โ edit the list anytime.
Open a blocked site and you're met with a fresh problem instead of the feed. Solve the math, or pass the coding tests.
A correct answer unlocks the site for the time you set. When it expires, it re-locks โ and the next visit is a new rep.
Trade the reflex tab-switch for a tiny coding kata. Keep the muscles warm between real tasks.
GMAT/GRE-style quant and college math baked in. Every distraction becomes a timed practice question.
You don't need to love math. You need one good speed bump between you and the infinite scroll.
No. Sphinx runs entirely in your browser. Puzzles are generated on the fly, your settings live in local storage, and nothing is sent to a server. There's no account to create and no tracking.
There's an emergency unlock that always works: retype a short passage exactly after a short forced wait. It's intentionally tedious โ enough to stop a reflex, but never a true lockout.
Yes. Choose math or coding challenges, set the difficulty, and tune session lengths, the free hourly window, and the emergency-unlock delay โ all from the settings page.
The free window only counts active time โ when Chrome is focused, you're not idle, and the blocked site is the tab you're actually viewing. A background or idle tab doesn't burn your budget.
You can โ it's a focus aid, not a prison. The point isn't to make quitting impossible, it's to add just enough friction that you don't drift onto a distraction without noticing.
It's free. Add it to Chrome, pick your sites, and you're set.
Add Sphinx and turn your next "quick check" into a quick win.
๏ผ Add to Chrome โ Free