Luxia Le

Focus has always been a problem for me and that problem is only compounded by the wealth of distractions that exist in my mobile phone. From games to media, there’s no lack of immediate distractions I can glean from my phone if I allow myself a moment’s respite to get caught up on notifications. In comes the Forest app, an app that doesn’t just promise to put your phone in jail, it also claims to help the environment with your in-game currencies. Let’s take a look.

At A Glance

App	Forest
Platform	Android, iOS
Free?	Freemium, some features locked behind paywall
App Type	Productivity, Screen Time Management, Focus Sessions, Environmentalism
Subscription	One-Time Payment of $3.49 to unlock premium

My Experience with Forest

My experience with Forest has been great. I am strongly incentivised to stay off my phone by the growing trees and am able to set timer goals to improve my focus during focus sessions with my Clarify ADHD app. Let’s dive into the functions I liked the most.

Planting Real Trees with Fake Money

This may be shocking, but as a vegan, I’m also a passionate environmental activist. The idea that I could use fake video game money to buy real trees is extremely interesting to me. However, there are some downsides. First, there isn’t really a strong report on whether the trees planted (which Forest does by sponsoring the charity Trees for the Future) have a notable environmental impact. The page for the Forest App’s sponsorship indicates that they’ve funded the planting of over 2 million trees and counting. Secondly, each app user is limited to planting five real trees per lifetime of use. This isn’t too limiting as the in-game cost of a real tree is 2,500 gold coins and you only get about 20 per virtual tree planted. But it would be nice to see a way to possibly pay gold coins in-game or real money to plant more trees.,

Crucial App Features Are Locked Behind the Paywall

One of the most important app features for people who plan to become career users is the whitelist, which allows you to set apps to be usable during the deep focus mode, which prevents you from using unauthorized apps. There is no way to access this feature for free. So, if you’re a remote worker who uses their phone to do certain tasks for their job, you will need to cough up the tree-fiddy (ha. ha.) for the premium app.

Would I Recommend the Forest App?

I would recommend Forest for people who are easily incentivised by pretty visuals. There isn’t much interactivity beyond the deep focus mode and the option to just “give up” on your focus mode and accept the withered trees in your forest can be tempting when you have an important text or email you want to check.

Is Forest Pro Worth the Cost?

YES! Forest Pro is very low cost, even I was able to afford it while I was broke as a joke. It gives you access to the deep focus whitelist. That way you can whitelist other productivity apps, work emails, things like that.