The meditation app market has exploded. Headspace, Calm, Ten Percent Happier, Insight Timer—thousands of guided sessions, courses, music, sleep stories. For beginners, these can be helpful entry points. But for experienced practitioners, they often become obstacles.
Here's the case for simpler tools, and why you might be better off with less.
The Problem with Most Apps
Designed for Dependency
The business model: Subscription apps need you to keep coming back. They profit when you need them, not when you become independent.
The implication: The incentive is to create meditators who rely on guidance, not meditators who can practice on their own.
The design: Endless content libraries, daily new sessions, streak mechanics—all designed for engagement, not liberation.
Guidance as Crutch
The pattern: You can only meditate with a voice in your ear telling you what to do. When the voice isn't there, you don't know how to practice.
The dependency: This isn't learning to meditate—it's learning to follow guided meditation. They're different skills.
The test: Can you sit in silence and practice? Or do you need instruction throughout?
Distraction Built In
The irony: Using your phone to reduce distraction. The same device that fragments attention is supposed to train it.
The notifications: Even with focus modes, the phone is associated with stimulation. Picking it up activates patterns of checking, scrolling, engaging.
The before and after: Opening an app means engaging the phone. Closing means the phone is still there, warm in your hands, ready for the next thing.
Feature Creep
The expansion: Apps add music, nature sounds, celebrities, sleep stories, breathing exercises, mood tracking, social features—everything except what meditation actually is.
The complexity: Navigating options, choosing the right session, adjusting settings—you're doing app management, not practice.
The drift: The more features, the further from actual meditation.
What You Actually Need
A Timer
The essential: Something to mark beginning and end. That's it.
Options: - Kitchen timer - Wristwatch - Clock on the wall - Phone timer (if you can ignore the phone) - Dedicated meditation timer app
A Technique
What you already know: You've learned to meditate. From a teacher, a course, a tradition, or self-study. You have a method.
The application: Apply what you know. Breath awareness, noting, open presence—whatever you've learned. You don't need a voice to remind you.
Consistency
The habit: Daily practice, even brief. This matters more than any app feature.
The simplicity: Timer starts. Practice. Timer ends. That's the whole system.
Maybe Nothing
The possibility: Some practitioners sit without any timer at all. They practice until practice feels complete.
The freedom: No technology, no tools, no interface. Just sitting and the movement of attention.
Going Analog
Physical Timers
The kitchen timer: Set and forget. Completely disconnected from digital distraction.
The meditation timer: Dedicated devices exist—gentle bells, no screens, single purpose.
The hourglass: Visual, quiet, beautiful. Some find the falling sand meditative itself.
Watches and Clocks
The wristwatch: Glance, note the time, add your duration, sit. No buzzer needed—just check when you're ready.
Wall clock: Visible from your seat. No device in hands.
No Timer
The method: Sit until you're done. Trust the body's sense of time.
When it works: For experienced practitioners with established internal rhythm.
The development: Start with timed sessions, notice your internal sense of duration, gradually trust it.
The Minimal App Approach
Timer-Only Apps
The philosophy: An app that does one thing: set a timer, ring a bell. No guidance, no content, no subscriptions.
What they offer: - Pleasant bells or chimes - Simple duration setting - Maybe session logging - Nothing else
The benefit: You get the convenience of phone timing without the distraction of content platforms.
What to Look For
Minimal interface: Open app, set time, start. No navigation, no choices to make.
No content library: No courses, guided sessions, or meditation "programs."
No social features: No friends, groups, sharing, or comparison.
No engagement mechanics: No streaks, achievements, or gamification designed to hook you.
Optional tracking: Simple session logging if you want it, ignorable if you don't.
What to Avoid
Subscription requirements: Paying monthly for a timer is absurd. Basic timing should be free.
Endless content: If the app's value is its library, it's training you to need the library.
Complexity: If it takes more than 10 seconds to start a session, it's too complicated.
Developing Independent Practice
The Transition
From guided: If you've been using guided meditation, the transition to unguided may feel strange.
The method: Start with partial guidance—a beginning instruction, then silence. Gradually reduce the guidance.
The discovery: You already know how to meditate. The guidance was training wheels. You can ride without them.
Silence Is the Practice
What changes: Without a voice filling space, you're alone with your mind. This is harder. It's also the actual practice.
What remains: Just you, just attention, just present experience. Nothing between you and practice.
Trust Yourself
The doubt: "Am I doing it right without guidance?"
The answer: If you're sitting, attending, returning from distraction—you're doing it right. Guidance adds nothing to this core process.
The confidence: You've learned the method. You can apply it without constant instruction.
Build Your Own Structure
The customization: Without guided sessions structuring your practice, you create your own structure.
Example: - 2 minutes: settling, feeling the body - 10 minutes: breath awareness - 5 minutes: open presence - End with dedication or intention
The ownership: This is your practice. You design it.
When Guidance Is Appropriate
Learning New Techniques
The legitimate use: Learning a new meditation method—tonglen, metta, body scan—instruction helps initially.
The limit: Once you know the technique, you practice without guidance.
Retreat or Deep Practice
The context: On retreat, teacher instruction guides intensive practice.
The distinction: This is different from daily app dependency. It's learning in context, not requiring constant hand-holding.
Occasional Support
The reasonable use: Once in a while, a guided session can be refreshing or offer new perspective.
The difference: Using occasionally versus needing constantly.
The Objections
"I Need Accountability"
The response: A timer provides accountability. You set it, you sit until it rings. You don't need a voice for this.
The alternative: Track your sessions. A simple log provides accountability without content dependency.
"I Get Distracted Without Guidance"
The reframe: Noticing distraction and returning is the practice. A voice covering over distraction prevents you from developing this core skill.
The training: You're training attention. Being distracted and returning builds the muscle. Guidance prevents the exercise.
"I Don't Know What to Do"
The clarification: Do you genuinely not know a technique? If so, learn one—from a book, course, teacher. That's education.
The distinction: But if you know what to do and just want someone to tell you—that's dependency, not need.
"I Like the Voices"
The examination: Is it preference or need? Can you practice without voices, even if you prefer them?
The honesty: Entertainment is fine, but it's different from meditation. Know which you're doing.
The Benefits of Simplicity
Portability
The freedom: Practice without phone, without internet, without technology. Anywhere, anytime, with nothing.
The resilience: Power outage, no service, travel to remote places—you can still practice.
Reduced Friction
The speed: No opening app, no choosing session, no loading. Just sit and start.
The directness: Nothing between intention and practice.
Deeper Practice
The silence: Without voices filling space, practice has room to deepen.
The independence: You're developing your practice, not following someone else's.
Digital Minimalism
The pattern: If you're trying to reduce phone use, a meditation app is contradictory. Practice that requires the phone undermines the goal.
The coherence: Analog practice aligns with presence. You're not training attention while attached to attention's primary disruptor.
Making the Switch
Week 1: Reduce Guidance
The approach: If you currently use guided sessions, use shorter ones. 20 minutes guided becomes 10 guided plus 10 silent.
Week 2: Minimal Guidance
The progression: Brief opening instruction, then silence for the rest of the session.
Week 3: Timer Only
The transition: Just a timer. No voice at all. You know what to do.
Week 4: Evaluate
The assessment: How does unguided practice feel? What's different? What's working?
Ongoing: Refine
The adjustment: Maybe you need occasional guided sessions. Maybe you go fully analog. Find what works.
The Deeper Point
Practice Is in You
The realization: Meditation isn't in an app. It's not in a guide's voice. It's not in content or features.
Where it is: In your attention, your awareness, your capacity to be present.
Simplicity Supports Practice
The principle: The fewer layers between you and practice, the more direct the training.
The application: Minimal tools, minimal interface, minimal distraction.
Independence Is the Goal
The trajectory: From needing guidance to practicing independently. That's development.
The irony: Apps designed to help you meditate may prevent this development—keeping you dependent to keep you paying.
Technology Is Optional
The truth: People meditated for millennia without apps. They used bells, watched the sun, or simply sat until done.
The possibility: You can too.
The Bottom Line
Most meditation apps are designed to keep you coming back, not to help you develop independent practice. The more features, the more content, the more engagement mechanics—the more they're optimizing for their goals, not yours.
For experienced practitioners who know how to meditate, simpler is usually better. A timer, a technique you've learned, and consistent practice. That's all you need.
The goal isn't to use an app forever. The goal is to practice, develop, and eventually need nothing but yourself and silence.
Return is a minimal meditation timer for people who know how to meditate. No guided content, no subscriptions, no feature creep—just a clean interface to set your session and practice. For meditators who want less, not more. Download Return on the App Store.