I've tried almost every site blocker that exists. StayFocusd, Cold Turkey, Freedom, BlockSite — I've installed and uninstalled all of them at some point over the years, usually within a week of a New Year's resolution to "focus more." They all work the same way: you give them a list of sites, and they block those sites. Simple, effective, and completely wrong for how I actually use the internet.
Here's the problem nobody talks about: the sites I need to block aren't sites I never need. Facebook has a Marketplace listing I'm mid-conversation on. Instagram has a client's DM I'm waiting on. X has a thread I actually need to reference for work. Blocking the whole domain doesn't just remove the distraction — it removes the one legitimate reason I had the tab open in the first place.
So I'd disable the blocker "just for five minutes," and you already know how that story ends.
The distraction isn't the site. It's the feed.
At some point I realized the thing pulling me back in was never the platform — it was always the feed. The infinite, algorithmically-tuned scroll that exists specifically to keep me there past the point I intended. The Marketplace listing, the DM, the work thread — none of that is what hijacks twenty minutes of my afternoon. The feed is.
That reframing changed what I was actually trying to build. Not a better block list. A tool that understands the difference between a site and the specific part of that site engineered to be addictive.
What I ended up building
FocusRamp is a Chrome extension that hides distracting feeds — Facebook's, Instagram's, X's — instead of blocking the whole site. Open Facebook and the news feed simply isn't there, but Marketplace, Groups, and Messenger still work exactly as they always have. You keep what you need. You lose what you don't.
On top of that, it does the things I actually wanted from a blocker in the first place:
Site blocking for the genuinely useless stuff — the sites where there's no "but I need this part" exception, so a full block makes sense.
A real Pomodoro timer, because focus mode without a session structure is just a passive setting I forget is even on.
Scheduled focus mode, so it turns itself on during work hours instead of relying on me to remember every morning.
Why I made it free
I didn't want to build something I wouldn't trust installing myself, and a tool that asks for payment before you've even tried it is a tool I usually never install at all. So the core of FocusRamp — site blocking, feed hiding, the Pomodoro timer, scheduling — is free forever, no account required. There's a Pro version with some extra features, but it's a one-time purchase, not a subscription. I have enough subscriptions I've forgotten I'm paying for; I didn't want to add to anyone else's pile.
If you've been through the same cycle — install a blocker, disable it a week later, feel vaguely guilty, repeat — I built this for exactly that problem.
FocusRamp is free on the Chrome Web Store: chromewebstore.google.com/detail/focusramp-site-blocker
Or read more about it here: websitegeek.net/focusramp
I'd genuinely like to hear what's missing if you try it — this is still early, and the roadmap is shaped by what people actually hit friction on, not a feature list I decided on alone.
