Support

Support

Paywall is built and answered by one person. Email founder@joinpaywall.com; replies usually come within a day. The answers below cover most of what comes in.

What Paywall does

You pick apps, put up a wall, and the apps stay blocked. To open a blocked app, you start the wait you set (30 minutes to 24 hours); when it is done, the app is open for 15 minutes and the block comes back on its own. One wait runs at a time. Blocking works through Apple's Screen Time, so it needs a real iPhone on iOS 17 or later.

The wall

• I want the wall down. Open Paywall, tap TAKE THE WALL DOWN and keep the app open for 30 seconds. That pause is deliberate; leaving the app cancels it. Nothing about taking the wall down costs money or needs a subscription.
• A blocked app is still open after the 15 minutes. The block returns on its own within about a minute of the unlock ending, even if Paywall is closed. If an app stays open longer, opening Paywall once puts the wall back immediately. Tell us if that ever happens; it is a bug we want to hear about.
• I cannot change the wait. The rules are locked while the wall is up. Take the wall down, change the wait, put it back up.
• The wait finished but the app is still blocked. Open Paywall and tap CLAIM FREE UNLOCK; the 15 minutes start then. With notifications on, Paywall tells you when the wait is done.
• The app asks for Screen Time permission again. Deleting the app, or turning the permission off in Settings → Screen Time, resets it. Grant it again and put the wall back up.
• Websites are blocked too. When you block a category, its websites are blocked in Safari as well, on purpose. Block individual apps if you want the websites left alone.
• The "time you will not get back" figures are empty. They come from Apple's Screen Time data and need the Screen Time permission and a few hours of use to appear.

Pro, the free week and refunds

• The first week is free from the day you install, without a subscription, a card or a trial sign-up. After that, putting the wall up needs Pro: $29.99 a year or $4.99 a month. A wall that is already up never falls because a subscription ended.
• Cancel in iPhone Settings → your name → Subscriptions, like any Apple subscription. Cancelling stops future renewals and keeps the current period.
• Restore purchases. Pro is tied to your Apple Account. On a new phone, sign in with the same account and open Paywall; the subscription is recognised automatically.
• Refunds. Pro is billed by Apple, so refunds are requested from Apple at reportaproblem.apple.com. If a charge was caused by a bug, write to us as well: we will help with the Apple request and fix the cause.

Privacy

The app collects no data and has no account. What stays on the phone and how Apple handles the subscription is on the privacy page.

When you write

Include your iPhone model, the iOS version, and what you tapped before it went wrong. A screenshot of the app's settings screen helps; it shows the app version at the bottom. Never send anything with your card details on it.