The Commons™ – Make Focus Common Again
Let’s be real—phones are amazing. But in class? They can be a total distraction.
The Commons helps you stay focused during school hours without having to give up your phones - no locks necessary.
It’s a privacy-first app that pauses access to the most distracting stuff, like social media, games, and endless scroll traps, during the school day, so you can reconnect with what matters most.
The Commons was created because we believe school should be a place to connect, not just scroll.
It helps you take back control by automatically pausing access to distracting apps during school hours, while your academic, medical, and critical communication apps stay functional, supporting your growth without restricting your independence.
The result? Less stress. More focus. Real connection.
What You Can Do with The Commons:
* Stay present in class without missing what matters
* Cut distractions, not communication
* Build stronger tech habits, starting now
How It Works:
* Turns on automatically when you get to school
* Blocks distractions during school hours
* Keeps school-approved apps and essential tools available
* Shuts off as soon as the school day ends
No tracking. No snooping. No weird data grabs.
We never access messages, browsing history, photos, social media content, or location history.
We’re not here to monitor.
We’re here to help you take your focus back.
DEVICE PERMISSIONS REQUIRED BY THE APP
The Commons student-facing app requires several device permissions to function in accordance with school policy:
* Location Permission – Allows the app to detect presence within the designated school zone, ensuring features activate only during school hours. The App does not track precise GPS location. It only detects whether a student is inside or outside the school zone based on Wi-Fi or motion triggers, not continuous tracking.
* Notification Permission – Enables the app to send alerts about compliance status or missing permissions.
* Motion Permission – Helps the app optimize performance and battery life while at school.
* VPN Permission – Establishes a secure connection that filters distracting content during school hours, without logging browsing history. The VPN operates strictly within a school-defined window (e.g., during school hours and within school zone) and is configured to block non-educational content. It does not log browsing history, inspect private content, monitor app usage or affect internet traffic outside of school hours. Once school hours end, the VPN deactivates automatically.
These permissions are used strictly for technical functionality and are never used to collect personal content, track movement outside of school zones, or share data with third parties. Disabling these permissions may prevent the App from working as intended. School administrators may be alerted if a required permission is missing.
Learn more about our privacy commitment → the-commons.app/privacy-policy
Just an absolutely garbage app. Turns on randomly on weekends, uses up more phone battery than watching a netflix movie, and yet, still is unable to know whether I’m in class or in the north pole.The app oftentimes sends threatening notifications to me and my administrators, but funnily enough, does so on weekends too! Good luck explaining how I had my phone’s location services disabled while I was at 0% battery!Also, I don’t know much about the confidentiality of your data, but as a rule of thumb, never trust an app with your location. It’s your right to keep your data private and you shouldn’t be forced to deliberately send your data to a chinese database selling your information, all in the supposed name of “social media addiction”.
Developer Response
Thanks for taking the time to share your feedback. We’re sorry to hear you’ve had a frustrating experience.The Commons is designed to operate only according to the school’s configured schedule, and it should not be activated outside of those hours. If you’re seeing behavior like activation on weekends or unexpected notifications, we’d definitely like to investigate that further.We also want to clarify that The Commons does not collect personal content from your device or sell data. The app uses limited system permissions to help schools reduce distractions during the school day while keeping students’ devices private and secure.If you’re open to it, please reach out to our support team at support@the-commons.app so we can look into what’s happening on your device and help resolve it.
Great Idea!
citacathy
This social media issue is such a hot topic with school districts trying to figure out the best way to comply with local policies as well as the many, and more coming, state mandates. This app is a great way for students to learn to manage their phone usage. Reading some of the reviews, it is obvious some students are not yet on board which is understandable they do not want to give up their phone time during school hours. However, this is actually a great life skill for students and adults to manage their social media time whether at school or on the job.
Stupid idea
Endcapp
This app doesn’t even work. It tracks my precise location from my house to my school, yet it only turns off long after I left my school. It doesn’t let me send texts, and turns off everything on my phone, thus making it useless. I often need to contact people within a moments notice, and when I am on campus, I can’t do that. This app has so many problems, I’m surprised it’s not being published under the title of a prototype. They can say what they want, but this app is idiotic. The only it has reconnected my school is that we all despise it, because it doesn’t work, and is a stupid idea.
Developer Response
Thank you for sharing your concern — we want to be very clear about how The Commons works. The Commons does not track or store a student’s location. Our app uses Apple’s approved geofencing technology, and iOS is required to display notifications whenever location services are active.Apple simply verifies when a student enters or leaves a school zone and then informs our app to turn on or off. That’s it — the location data itself stays on the device and is never sent to The Commons.We built The Commons to be privacy-first, and our practices are outlined in our privacy policy. We take this seriously and encourage anyone with questions to reach out directly at support@the-commons.app
We all hate it
Bellaballa bot
I already self regulate and this does nothing for me except block apps that I use for school making it inconvenient to check my schedule, turn in and do homework. It’s not the schools job to parent me and what is on my phone. People will only use social media and their phones more whenever they’re not at school, and they can still do things in their laptops (I’ve seen it). Everyone just gets more sneaky. School already takes our phones during class, that’s enough to protect our education regarding phones. This is so dumb.
This update includes performance improvements and behind-the-scenes updates to keep things running smoothly and support distraction-free school days.
Version 1.1.5
The developer, The Commons, Inc., indicated that the app’s privacy practices may include handling of data as described below. For more information, see the developer’s privacy policy .
Data Linked to You
The following data may be collected and linked to your identity:
Location
Usage Data
Data Not Linked to You
The following data may be collected but it is not linked to your identity:
Diagnostics
Privacy practices may vary, for example, based on the features you use or your age. Learn More
Accessibility
The developer has not yet indicated which accessibility features this app supports. Learn More
Information
Seller
The Commons, Inc.
Size
61.9 MB
Category
Education
Compatibility
Requires iOS 15.6 or later.
iPhone Requires iOS 15.6 or later.
iPad Requires iPadOS 15.6 or later.
iPod touch Requires iOS 15.6 or later.
Mac Requires macOS 12.5 or later and a Mac with Apple M1 chip or later.
Apple Vision Requires visionOS 1.0 or later.
Location
This app may use your location even when it isn’t open, which can decrease device battery life.
Languages
English
Age Rating
4+
4+
This app has an age rating of 4+ with content restrictions. Some content may be rated higher, but access is managed by the developer through in-app controls.
