How many pushups for an hour of screen time?
Vishwen Labs
At BurnToScroll's default rates, an hour of screen time costs 40 pushups, 80 squats or 10 minutes of plank, because a pushup earns 1.5 minutes, a squat 45 seconds and every 30 seconds of plank 3 minutes. Fifteen minutes of TikTok is ten pushups. The setup offers three daily goals, Light, Balanced and Generous, worth 30, 60 and 120 earned minutes, which is roughly 20, 40 or 80 pushups a day, and Premium lets you set each rate yourself down to a tenth of a minute, so the same hour can cost ten pushups or six hundred. The right price is the one you will still pay on a Tuesday in November.
The default exchange rate
What a set buys at the rates the app ships with:
- 10 pushups: 15 minutes. 20 pushups: 30 minutes. 40 pushups: an hour.
- 20 squats: 15 minutes. 40 squats: 30 minutes. 80 squats: an hour.
- A one-minute plank: 6 minutes. Five minutes of plank, in any number of holds: 30 minutes. Ten minutes: an hour.
- Mixed: 10 pushups, 20 squats and a minute of plank come to 36 minutes.
Why those numbers
The rates were raised in the 1.0.1 release from 1 minute a pushup, half a minute a squat and 2 minutes per plank half-minute, and the reason is worth knowing: at the old rates a person who wanted an hour of Instagram every evening faced sixty pushups a day, which most people quit, and quitting the app is the failure mode that matters. At 1.5 a pushup, forty a day in sets of ten is a load a beginner can build to within a few weeks and a trained person can clear in five minutes. Squats are cheaper per rep because they are easier per rep. Plank pays per second held, so a 20-second hold earns two minutes and a 45-second hold earns four and a half, rounded down to whole minutes at the end of the session.
The three goals at setup
The daily goal is measured in earned minutes, not reps, so it tells the app how much of the feed you intend to buy. Light is 30 minutes, about 20 pushups or 40 squats, for people who want a short leash. Balanced is 60, about 40 pushups or 80 squats, and is the default. Generous is 120, about 80 pushups or 160 squats, for a heavy user who wants to keep more and still earn it. The goal changes what the home screen counts as complete and what the streak asks of you; it does not cap the balance, so a big set on a good day can earn past it, and the result screen says so.
Setting your own price
Premium opens the three rates in Settings, each editable in minutes per rep, or per 30 seconds for the plank, with a floor of 0.1. That range covers everyone. A person rebuilding after an injury can set a pushup to 6 minutes and buy an hour with ten. A person who wants the feed to hurt can set it to 0.1 and buy an hour with six hundred. The useful rule is to price by what you can do in one session without dread, then tighten by a quarter every couple of weeks; the app's stats show your biggest set and your best day, which is the evidence to tighten on.
What the maths does to an evening
Two hours of scrolling at the default rates is 80 pushups, which almost nobody does for Instagram, and that is the point: the price makes the second hour disappear on its own, without a limit screen. Most people settle at 20 to 40 reps a day and a feed that costs enough to be worth opening for a reason. On days you would rather rest, the balance resets at midnight either way, and Premium's pause until midnight is there for the day the rule has to bend; the maths is a tool for making the feed cost something, not for punishing you.
Questions people also ask
Do unused minutes carry over to the next day?
No. The balance resets at local midnight, so minutes earned but not used are gone and every day starts locked until the first set. That is deliberate: a bank that carries over lets one good weekend buy a bad week.
Is 40 pushups a day too many for a beginner?
In one set, probably; in four sets of ten across an evening, most healthy adults get there within a few weeks. Start with the Light goal or, with Premium, a higher rate per pushup, and use squats, which are cheaper per rep because they are easier. If you have a condition that makes pushups unsafe, ask a professional before pricing your feed in them.
