Sometimes it’s necessary to leave social media and quickly switch between apps: to check contact info, a note, or a location in Maps.

The goal of one sec is not to disrupt any productive workflows, that’s why we decided to offer a secondary Shortcut that can be executed when closing an app. This allows us to measure time between closing and re-opening the app, allowing you to re-open the app within certain time limits.

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On your iPhone, open the Shortcuts app and go to the Automation tab.

Go to the Automation tab and select + to create another Personal Automation.

Scroll down and select App.

Choose the app you’d like to configure the intentional app switching for.

⚠️ Only select one app here. A separate automation is required for each app.

Be sure that only “Is Closed“ is selected.

At the bottom, select Run Immediately.

Then, continue to the next page.

Select New Blank Automation.

⚠️ If you don’t see this option, you’re running an older iOS version. Please refer to the old tutorial.

Tap Add Action.

Search for “one sec” and select 🅱️ Log app closing (for quick app switching).

Tap App (must be selected⚠️) in order to re-select the previously selected app.

The Automation won’t run without this.

Then tap Done and you’re done!

To set up intentional app switching on Android, open one sec → Settings → Intentional App Switching and select the time interval for which it should be active (e.g. 1 minute).

To set up intentional website switching on the desktop browser extension, click on the one sec icon in your toolbar / extension bar → Open Dashboard → Customize → Intentional Website Switching. Select the time interval that it should be active for (e.g. "Allow leaving website for 1 min".

Need help setting up one sec? Get in touch.