Customize Consent Preferences

We use cookies to help you navigate efficiently and perform certain functions. You will find detailed information about all cookies under each consent category below.

The cookies that are categorized as "Necessary" are stored on your browser as they are essential for enabling the basic functionalities of the site. ... 

Always Active

Necessary cookies are required to enable the basic features of this site, such as providing secure log-in or adjusting your consent preferences. These cookies do not store any personally identifiable data.

No cookies to display.

Functional cookies help perform certain functionalities like sharing the content of the website on social media platforms, collecting feedback, and other third-party features.

No cookies to display.

Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. These cookies help provide information on metrics such as the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc.

No cookies to display.

Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better user experience for the visitors.

Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with customized advertisements based on the pages you visited previously and to analyze the effectiveness of the ad campaigns.

No cookies to display.

A Fake Phone Designed to Help You Use Your Real Phone Less

By Zeynab

|

30 June 2025

A Fake Phone Designed to Help You Use Your Real Phone Less

© WION

Save Post

The “Methaphone” is a clear block shaped like a smartphone. It doesn’t work—but that’s the point.

In a world glued to screens, one man is offering a surprising solution: a phone that’s not a phone at all.

Eric Antonow, a former Google and Facebook executive, has created the Methaphone (fake phone) a clear acrylic slab shaped like a smartphone. It has no screen, no apps, and no function. And it just might help people break their phone addiction.

Methaphone fake phone for phone addiction
© WION

Antonow got the idea while sitting at a coffee shop. He joked with his family that phone users, like drug addicts, might one day need a “methadone” for their phones. That’s how the Methaphone was born.

He asked ChatGPT to generate a mockup. Then, within days, he ordered a small batch of real acrylic prototypes and launched an Indiegogo campaign. The goal: help people “leave your phone without the cravings or withdrawal.”

The first 100 units, priced at $25 each, sold out quickly.

A Culture Hooked on Screens

Methaphone device fake phone
© WION

Smartphones are designed to keep us scrolling. Tech companies have introduced screen time controls, but many users ignore them. During the pandemic, phone use skyrocketed. Even now, the desire to unplug often loses to the temptation of endless content.

Antonow’s Methaphone doesn’t try to compete with tech, it removes it entirely. It’s a symbolic object, a physical cue to disconnect.

Other products in the same space include apps like Freedom, gadgets like Unpluq, and lockable pouches from Yondr. But the Methaphone stands out for doing almost nothing at all.

Viral Fame

How to stop phone addiction by meyaphone fake phone
© WION

When influencer Catherine Goetze posted a TikTok video using the Methaphone, it exploded online. The clip showed her mimicking phone use in a café—but with the clear block instead of a real device. It gained over 53 million views in five days.

Soon after, the Methaphone was completely sold out.

Antonow says future plans include offering Methaphones in public places—like restaurants—so people can eat without phone distractions.

More Than a Gag

Stanford addiction expert Anna Lembke says the Methaphone might help users reset their habits. “It’s like a zero-nicotine vape,” she said. “The motion is the same, but the reward is gone.”

Antonow has added sticker packs to the product. Labels like “Read,” “Daydream,” and “See Friends” turn the blank screen into a gentle reminder to be present.

Antonow sent a Methaphone to a reporter with simple instructions: use it like rosary beads. Touch it when you feel the urge to scroll.

The experience was oddly calming. At a coffee shop, the reporter tapped the acrylic phone instead of a real one. No one noticed. Everyone else was still locked into their screens.

The Methaphone may be just a clear block—but for some, it’s a small, quiet step back into the real world.

You might also want to read: Research Debunks the Dopamine Detox Hype

Zeynab

Share