Fitlock vs Brick: a Brick alternative with no hardware to buy

Brick and Fitlock both make unblocking cost something, which is what makes Fitlock work as a Brick alternative. They just ask for that cost in different ways: one physical, one measured by your body.

How Brick works

Brick is a small NFC tag, sold as a one-time $59 purchase, paired with an iOS or Android app (iOS 17+, Android 12+). You choose which apps to block, then tap your phone against the physical Brick to start a session; your phone stays disconnected from those apps until you’re back with the Brick and ready to reconnect. A “Strict Mode” stops you from deleting the app or changing settings to get around it, and the app includes five built-in “Emergency Unbricks” for when you can’t get back to the tag, with more available on request.

How Fitlock works as a Brick alternative

Fitlock needs no hardware. Apps stay blocked until you complete a real health goal: steps, an exercise session, or push-ups and squats counted by your phone’s camera, measured through Apple Health or the camera itself. Nothing to buy, carry or lose. The key is something you do, not something you tap.

The trade-off

Brick’s cost is physical distance: if the tag is in another room, getting back to your apps takes real, deliberate effort, and that friction doesn’t depend on what your phone can measure about you. That’s a genuine strength: it works the same regardless of your fitness level or health data. Fitlock’s cost is physical effort instead. There’s no tag to lose or forget, but it does depend on Apple Health, or the camera, to confirm you’ve moved, so it can’t verify anything a health sensor doesn’t see.

What Fitlock does differently

• No hardware to buy, charge or misplace. The whole thing lives in the app.
• The unlock is movement, tracked through steps, a workout, or camera-counted push-ups and squats.
• Escalating breaks. Each extra break makes the next one wait longer.
• Free blocks up to two apps behind one schedule and one goal; Fitlock Pro removes the two-app limit, adds allowlist mode, every goal type, and lets you combine goals with AND. See pricing for what’s included at each tier.

Where Brick may suit you better

Brick’s Strict Mode plus a tag you must physically reach is a harder wall than any purely on-device app can build, and it works identically whether or not you’re willing to exercise. If you want blocking with zero interest in fitness, or you like the idea of a physical object you can hand to someone else to hold, Brick’s approach may suit you better than Fitlock’s. If you’d rather compare Fitlock to a timer-based blocker instead, see how it stacks up against Opal.

What Fitlock does with your data

Analytics are anonymised, so we can’t identify you from them, and the only personal details we hold are ones you choose to share with support. Screen time data is securely managed by Apple and inaccessible to us. Health data is stored only on your device and never externally. We never sell user data to third-party companies.

Try Fitlock free on the App Store.