Does a social media detox actually work?

The all-or-nothing kind usually works for the duration and then reverts, because it removes your friends along with the feed. Separating the two, keeping a way to see what your people post while dropping the ranked feed, is what tends to stick.

How do I know if it's the feed or the people I'm hooked on?

Open the app and go straight to a friend's profile instead of the feed. If you look, close it and feel fine, it's the feed. If you keep going to profile after profile, it's still the feed, just a different door into it.

What replaces the feed if I still want to see friends' posts?

A chronological, friends-only feed. It ends when you've caught up. POINT's feed is only your friends and groups, newest first, so there's no infinite scroll to detox from.

Social media detox without going dark: keep your friends, drop the feed

Deleting everything for thirty days usually ends with reinstalling everything on day thirty-one. The version that lasts separates the two things you were getting: the feed, which you don't miss, and your people, who you do.

Most social media detoxes fail the same way. You delete the apps, feel great for two weeks, miss a friend's news, reinstall "just to check", and you're back. The problem was never willpower. It's that the detox threw out two different things at once: the feed, which was the problem, and your people, who were the reason you were there.

Here's a version that separates them.

What you're actually trying to quit

Be specific. Nobody is addicted to their cousin's baby photos. What hooks people is the ranked feed: a bottomless list of things chosen because someone like you looked at them for a long time. It auto-plays, it never ends, and it's seeded with just enough of your actual friends to feel like keeping up.

The friends are the bait. The feed is the hook. A detox that removes the bait with the hook feels like loss, which is why it doesn't last.

Step 1: find out what you'd miss

For one week, before changing anything, keep a note on your phone. Every time you open a social app, write one word for why: bored, friend, news, habit, message. Don't judge it, just log it.

Most people's list is mostly bored and habit, with a handful of friend and message. That handful is what you keep. Everything else is the feed.

Step 2: move the handful somewhere that ends

The friend and message reasons need a home that doesn't come with a ranked feed attached. Options, from least to most effort:

Messages, not feeds. Group chats and direct messages with the people you actually talk to. Works, but you lose the low-effort "saw your post, nice trip" layer that keeps looser friendships alive.
The chronological option inside the big apps. Instagram's Following feed, Facebook's Friends tab. They work, but they reset to the ranked feed every time you open the app, so you're relying on willpower at every launch.
A network with only a friends feed. POINT's feed is your friends and the groups you're in, in order. No For You, no suggested posts, no promoted anything. You scroll to where you left off and it's over. The design does the detox for you, every time, because there's nothing else to show you.

Whichever you pick, the test is the same: can you open it, see what your people posted since yesterday, and close it with nothing pulling you back in?

Step 3: make the feed hard and the people easy

Now change the phone.

Delete the feed apps from your phone. Not your accounts, the apps. If you want to look, you can use the browser, which is slower and uglier, which is the point.
Put the people app where the feed app was. Same spot on the home screen. Your thumb goes there anyway; let it land on something that ends.
Turn off every notification that isn't a person. Keep messages, comments on your posts, friend requests. Kill "someone you may know posted", "trending", "memories", everything the app sends to pull you back.
Tell the five people who matter. "I'm off Instagram, message me here." It takes one text and it's the step everyone skips.

Step 4: expect the boredom

Around day three, you'll reach for the phone and there'll be nothing to scroll. That's not a withdrawal symptom to push through. It's the thing you were covering up. Let it be boring for a few days; the brain fills it in. People report reading again, finishing thoughts, noticing the dog.

What you shouldn't feel is cut off. If you do, go back to Step 2: the people layer isn't working and needs fixing, not the detox abandoning.

Step 5: decide what to do with the accounts

After a month, you'll know. Some people deactivate for good. Some keep the account as a phone book and log in on a laptop once a month. Some go back to the ranked feed and find it's lost its grip now that their real friends are somewhere else. All three are fine; the goal was never deletion, it was getting your attention back.

If you're leaving Facebook entirely, get your photos out first. If birthdays were the thing keeping you there, there's a fix for that too.

The short version

You were using one app for two things. Keep the people, drop the feed, and put the people somewhere the feed can't follow. POINT is built for exactly that: friends in order, nothing else, and it ends when you're caught up.