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How to block Prime Video on iPhone

Two ways, both on the phone in your hand. Option A is free and already built into iOS. Option B is Paused, if you'd rather it happen automatically and be harder to tap past.

Not trying to block it — just want Prime Video off your Lock Screen or the top of your screen? That's a Live Activity; here's how to remove it →

Free · built into iOS

Option A — Apple Screen Time

No download, no subscription. Apple's own App Limits can block Prime Video specifically, and Downtime can switch it off by time of day.

  1. Turn Screen Time on. Open Settings → Screen Time. First time? Tap Turn On Screen Time, choose "This is My iPhone", and set a Screen Time passcode — pick four digits you won't type on reflex at 11pm.
  2. Add an App Limit. Still in Screen Time, tap App Limits → Add Limit.
  3. Select Prime Video. Apple sorts your apps into broad buckets and Prime Video sits with the Entertainment apps. Tap the arrow beside Entertainment to expand it and tick Prime Video only — or just type "Prime Video" into the search field at the top, which is faster. Tap Next.
  4. Set the allowance. Choose how long Prime Video gets each day. 30 minutes is a soft cap; 1 minute is effectively off. Tap Customize Days if weekends should be different, then tap Add.
  5. Turn on Block at End of Limit. Reopen the limit you just made and switch on Block at End of Limit. Without it, the "Ignore Limit" button hands the whole evening straight back to Prime Video.
  6. Add Downtime for a time-of-day block. A daily budget isn't the same as "off after 10pm". For that, go back to Screen Time → Downtime → Scheduled and set the window (10pm–7am is the classic), then check that Prime Video is not listed under Always Allowed. During Downtime it's blocked outright — there's no allowance left to burn.

The honest catch: it works, but it's four screens deep in Settings, the limit resets its own way, and if you know the passcode you can undo it in about six seconds. That's why so many people set an App Limit once and never think about it again.

Automatic · one tap

Option B — block Prime Video with Paused

Same Apple blocking engine underneath, built for the one job: getting Prime Video out of your evening without you having to decide again every night.

  1. Create a Block Schedule. Open Paused and create a Block Schedule — that's the recurring, automatic kind.
  2. Pick Prime Video. Choose Prime Video from your installed apps. While you're in there, add the rest of your streaming time-sinks too — HBO Max, Peacock, Paramount+ — because Prime Video is almost never the only one.
  3. Choose the window. Set the days and hours: 10pm–7am so the night is yours, 9–5 for work, or 7–9pm so dinner and the evening stay phone-free.
  4. Save it and forget it. That's the whole setup. From then on Prime Video turns itself off when the window starts and comes back on when it ends — no willpower, no remembering.
  5. Use a Focus session when you need Prime Video gone right now. One tap starts a Focus session: pick a length — 25 minutes, two hours, until dinner is over — and Prime Video stays locked until the timer runs out.
  6. Let the streak do the rest. Every day you keep the block stacks your streak. That's the part that keeps this working in week three, once the novelty of a fresh limit has worn off.

What it can see: nothing. Paused blocks through Apple's Screen Time (Family Controls) framework, so it can stop Prime Video from opening without reading your messages, your browsing, or anything you do inside the app. Your usage stays on your device.

How to get Prime Video off your Lock Screen or the top of your iPhone screen

A score, an order tracker or a countdown that stays pinned to your Lock Screen — or sits in the Dynamic Island at the top of the screen on newer iPhones — is a Live Activity. It's controlled by Apple's switches below, for free, and blocking Prime Video is a different job.

  1. Clear the one that's showing. On the Lock Screen, swipe left on the Prime Video Live Activity and tap Clear. It stays gone until Prime Video starts a new one (the next game, order or countdown).
  2. Stop Prime Video starting them. Open Settings → Prime Video (on iOS 18 and later: Settings → Apps → Prime Video) and turn off Live Activities. That also keeps it out of the Dynamic Island, which has no Clear button of its own.
  3. Or keep every Live Activity off the Lock Screen. Settings → Face ID & Passcode → under Allow Access When Locked, turn off Live Activities.
  4. No Live Activities switch? Then Prime Video isn't using one. If it's a notification, go to Settings → Notifications → Prime Video and untick Lock Screen or turn off Allow Notifications. If audio or video is still playing, it's the Now Playing player — stop playback in Prime Video and it disappears.

Why Prime Video is hard to put down

It plays the next thing automatically and mixes in channels you forgot you were paying for.

Which is the point worth sitting with: you're not weak, you're up against a team of people whose job is the next tap. That's also why "I'll just be more disciplined" keeps failing and a dumb, boring wall — Prime Video simply doesn't open between 10pm and 7am — keeps working. Put the decision somewhere your 11pm self can't reach it.

And block the neighbours while you're there. Closing Prime Video and landing on the next streaming app in the same second is the most common way this falls apart — so block the cluster (HBO Max, Peacock, Paramount+), not the single worst offender.

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