Focus Firewall vs SFirewall
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side โ with what reviewers say about each.
Focus Firewall
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Focus Firewall puts a shield in front of the apps that eat your day. Choose what to block. Choose when. That is the whole app. WHAT IT DOES โข Block Now โ one stretch of focus, from 15 minutes to four hours. โข Rules โ recurring schedules that run on their own, without you opening anything. "No social media, weekdays 9 to 12." โข A real shield โ open a blocked app and you get a full screen and a short written prompt instead. โข Per-app breaks โ need one app for a minute? Take a break that opens only that app. Everything else stays shielded. โข Insights โ streaks and sessions, counted from what actually happened. PRIVACY IS THE POINT No account. No server. No analytics. No third-party SDKs. There is no networking code in this app at all, so there is nothing to send and nowhere to send it. When you choose apps to block, iOS hands the app opaque tokens โ never names. Focus Firewall never learns which apps you picked. Your iPhone draws the icons and names itself. Your Screen Time data stays inside Apple's own sandbox and never reaches us. WHAT IT WILL NOT CLAIM Focus Firewall is not unbreakable, and will not pretend to be. You can always turn off Screen Time access in iOS Settings, and no app can prevent that. Strict Mode makes a rule harder to change while it is running โ friction, not a lock. It also will not tell you how many hours you saved. That would mean knowing what you would otherwise have done. Everything in Insights comes from sessions the app itself recorded. And when something goes wrong โ permission revoked, a shield that did not fire โ it says so, instead of showing a reassuring checkmark. Settings โบ Protection check runs the whole thing end to end and reports each layer. FREE One recurring rule, three apps, Block Now up to an hour, real breaks, today's history. Not a trial. It works. FOCUS FIREWALL PRO Unlimited rules, website blocking, Strict Mode, daily app budgets, longer and more frequent breaks, weekly insights, the full coach library, your own prompts and shield message, interactive widgets, Face ID lock, and an encrypted backup. On iPhones with Apple Intelligence, Pro can also write your week up in plain words and turn a sentence into a rule โ running entirely on device. Subscriptions renew automatically unless cancelled at least 24 hours before the period ends. Manage or cancel in Settings โบ your name โบ Subscriptions. Privacy Policy: https://yuganshjain.github.io/focus-firewall/privacy.html Terms of Use: https://yuganshjain.github.io/focus-firewall/terms.html
SFirewall
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SFirewall helps you step away from the apps and websites that pull you in, and keeps you there. It uses Apple's Screen Time to block apps and sites on your iPhone, and only your accountability partner can loosen what you set. HOW IT WORKS Pick what pulls you in: social, video, news, games, shopping, work social, gambling and adult sites. Choose the exact apps with Apple's own picker. Then hand your iPhone to someone you trust and they choose a 4 digit partner code. Adding a block is always instant. Turning a block off, removing an app or a site, or loosening a limit takes the partner code. If the code is ever forgotten, a 7 day reset lets you set a new one, blocks stay in place meanwhile, and your partner is told. ALWAYS ON, FOCUS AND POWER Always on: blocked all the time, like gambling and adult sites. Focus: the categories you choose, during the hours you schedule. Power: a stricter set for when you need a hard stop. Set weekly blocks on the Schedule tab, or start Focus or Power right away with Lock now. A running block keeps its end time, even with the code. ALLOWED SITES ONLY Block every website except a short list you allow. When you land on a blocked site, tap Ask to allow this site, and your partner approves it with the code. TIME LIMITS Give an app or a website a daily allowance, like 30 minutes of a social app. When the time is up it stays blocked until midnight. Up to five limits. SAFARI PAGE WATCHING The SFirewall Safari extension checks pages as they load and blocks any page with your page words, then closes the tab. Page text never leaves your iPhone. If the extension is switched off, your partner is told. FILTER EVERY APP A small VPN that runs on your iPhone and only handles DNS checks every site name apps look up against SFirewall's adult list, adult brand names, your keywords and your running blocks, then Cloudflare's family filter. It covers apps and in app browsers that use the phone's DNS. No other traffic goes through it. Another VPN, or an app with its own encrypted DNS, can bypass it; if it is switched off or another VPN takes its place, your partner is told. It also forces SafeSearch, so Google, YouTube, Bing and DuckDuckGo show safe results in every app. A lighter mode uses Cloudflare's family filter alone. APPS AND THE APP STORE Block apps by name, even before they are installed, set an App Store age limit, and keep apps from being deleted while Always on runs. With Partner lock, your partner also sets the Screen Time passcode, so removing SFirewall needs them too. HISTORY AND YOUR PARTNER History lists every change and every use of the partner code, the Safari pages you visited in the last 7 days, and the apps you used, drawn by Screen Time. Invite your partner to the free SFirewall app on their own iPhone. They get an alert when the code is used or blocking is turned off, see whether blocking is on, and see the Safari pages you visit, with their addresses, for 7 days. SFirewall shows you exactly what is shared before you invite, and your partner has to accept. MAC COMPANION, OPTIONAL SFirewall for Mac is a separate free download from the SFirewall website. Link it and one partner code guards both, and your iPhone can see and change your Mac's blocks. The iPhone app works fully on its own. PRIVACY No accounts. No servers. No ads, analytics or tracking. Your settings live on your iPhone and in your own iCloud. The only things that leave your devices are what you choose to share with your partner, through Apple's iCloud sharing, and, with Filter every app on, the site names your iPhone looks up, which Cloudflare's family filter answers. The developer never receives any of it. Requires Screen Time. Partner alerts need iCloud on both iPhones.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: SFirewall at none against Focus Firewall's 2. Focus Firewall's advantage is iOS requirement (18.0 vs 26.4). On price, ads and device support there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price ยท Rating ยท Positive reviews ยท Number of ratings ยท Update frequency ยท Ads ยท In-app purchases ยท Monetization ยท Best chart rank ยท Devices ยท Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Focus Firewall sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $4.99 per month. SFirewall asks for nothing beyond the download.
| Parameter | Focus Firewall | SFirewall |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No โ better |
| Devices | iPhone | iPhone |
| Requires iOS | 18.0 โ better | 26.4 |
| Further details โ not scored | ||
| Size | 6 MB | 41 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 12+ |
| Developer | Yugansh Jain | Mark Schwab |
In-app purchases
Focus Firewall
- Pro Monthly$4.991 Month
- Pro Yearly$29.991 Year
SFirewall
No in-app purchases









