The Generation That Grew Up Online Is Logging Off
I started using social media in 2013, when I was 12 years old. Every day, I spent countless hours scrolling and posting heavily edited photos on Instagram. I spam tweeted celebrities like Justin Bieber and Tyler Oakley to get their attention. I binged Kian and Jc’s YouTube prank videos and watched Ariana Grande Vine edits. I chatted with friends and strangers on Snapchat late into the night to maintain my streaks and remain connected. This technology was relatively new. Everyone I knew spent massive amounts of time online—and we all figured it was harmless.
As early as Grade 6, I saw photos on Instagram of beautiful women self-harming and writing poems about how great it would feel to die. This content scared me: was it normal to think this way? I fell into a deep hole and even thought about taking my own life. Social media platforms showed me content about thigh-gap challenges, so I did 100 squats every day for a month hoping my legs would shrink. Pinterest told me scrubbing coffee grounds on my thighs would get rid of my cellulite, so I scoured them with instant coffee, clogging the shower drain. I believed that being beautiful meant being stick-thin skinny.
In 2016, my first year of high school, I was diagnosed with severe depression. I couldn’t stop scrolling: I was glued to my phone for nine hours a day, usually up past midnight. Teachers would scold me in class for using my phone. I got FOMO, seeing posts from school friends who were hanging out without inviting me. Then, I started losing friends to suicide—10 in the span of five years, each after struggling with depression and other issues. Our community grieved online, memorializing those we lost on Instagram. After my ninth friend died by suicide during the pandemic, I decided enough was enough. I initiated a suicide-prevention effort in our school district, building mental health support rooms and giving presentations in health class. I wanted other young people to feel loved and supported.
It was around this time, in 2020, that I watched The Social Dilemma, a Netflix documentary about the addictive design of social media platforms. I learned that algorithms deliberately fed us polarizing content, that my data was being sold and that tech giants profited billions of dollars off of my time, attention and misery. The connection was impossible to ignore: social media was fuelling a mental health crisis for my generation. We never signed up for this.
I wanted to arm younger people with the knowledge and tools we never had so social media didn’t consume them too. When I was a college freshman, I created No Social Media November, or NoSo, a grassroots challenge where students learn about the dangers of social media and then take a month-long detox from it. In November of 2020, I recruited some friends and a pilot group of 35 students from a local school. Together, we posted on all our socials that we were taking a break, deleted our social media and gaming apps, and told our friends and family that if they needed us, they’d have to text or call. I was inspired by a 2018 American Economic Review study that tracked more than 2,800 Facebook users as they deactivated their accounts for four weeks. The results found a drop in loneliness and significant improvements in emotional well-being and happiness. I was excited to see if my peers and I would experience the same transformation. I’d never taken a break from social media before, and I knew I’d have a difficult time. I reassured myself: if I mentally prepared enough, I’d be fine.
The first week of the detox hit me hard. My fingers reflexively kept tapping the empty space where the Instagram app used to be on my home screen. I instinctively reached for social media as a go-to fix for boredom, stress or sadness—only to remember it was gone. I was seeking any other form of distraction, scrolling on apps or games I’d never used. It struck me then: my generation had become deeply uncomfortable with silence, trained to numb difficult emotions rather than sit with them. Reluctantly, I turned to other activities. My friend Luke and I created a bucket list of things we wanted to accomplish during our detox month. We did yoga every day, and I fell in love with mindfulness. I started meditating, biking and journalling. Luke and I launched a book club and, for the first time in my life, I became an avid reader. I devoured books on neuroscience, the social media industry and Buddhism (which my dad had recommended). Over time, I naturally turned to our bucket list whenever boredom crept in.
What struck me most during those early days was the sheer amount of free time I suddenly had. I always used to say I was so busy, but without my habit of mindlessly scrolling, I found myself with more than seven free hours every day. This changed my life. My relationships got stronger as I opted for phone calls and FaceTime over Snapchat photos and texts. I got more sleep and felt more in tune with my body, mind and emotions.
As the end of the detox month neared, I felt a profound sense of freedom—I’d reached more goals in one month than I usually would in a whole year. My depression subsided, and I was happier than ever. Teens in the pilot program reached out to me, sharing how transformative the experience had been for them, too. I realized no part of me wanted to touch social media ever again.
Since then, I’ve turned this experience into a nonprofit venture, leading social media detoxes for tens of thousands of teens across the world. In May of 2024, I graduated from the University of Colorado Boulder; I now run the company full-time and was recently named to the 2025 Forbes 30 Under 30 List for my work. I created an educational program that teaches teens about problematic tech use and gives them practical tools to try their own detox—today, this curriculum is used in schools across the U.S. We host the NoSo detox each year, as well as mindfulness-based events that encourage teens to explore offline hobbies. We’ve also recently partnered with McGill University’s Centre for Media, Technology, and Democracy to spread digital literacy and social media detoxing in Canadian schools. This fall, we’ll launch a pilot program in Ottawa school districts and host community events for young people.
The results speak for themselves: 89 per cent of our detoxers reported a noticeable improvement in their mental health after completing the detox. On average, screen time dropped by 39 per cent and daily phone use from eight hours to just five. Some two-thirds of participants even extended their detox for up to two months longer than they’d initially planned. And 83 per cent of participants felt their social lives had improved during the program.
Over the years, students have told us how their struggles with body dysmorphia and anxiety improved after stepping away from social media for just a month. Teens who once started their mornings by doomscrolling on Instagram now wake up to structured routines that leave them calmer, happier and more in control. Many participants have discovered new passions like gardening, yoga and painting—activities they might never have explored otherwise. We hear about young people reconnecting with their loved ones in person and sleeping better. Many of my friends have permanently deleted their social media accounts—even the ones who used to spend 12 hours a day on their phones.
My own relationship with social media is a work in progress, but it’s improved dramatically. I’ve deleted apps like Instagram, X, Snapchat and TikTok, only reinstalling them briefly if I need to post something for NoSo. For the most part, I stay off of these platforms—they don’t serve me. The only apps I use regularly are LinkedIn and Youtube. But I struggle to maintain healthy boundaries on those too, so I’ve been considering going cold turkey.
The most powerful, lasting benefits I’ve reaped from doing the NoSo detox every year are the activities I do instead of wasting hours every day scrolling. Every week, I practice yoga, meditate, go for walks, bike, dance, do breathwork, call friends, read books, write poetry, create art and journal. (I just bought a typewriter!) They’ve become foundational to my mental well-being. I still struggle with depression, but it’s much more manageable now. These past few years have been the happiest of my life. I feel deeply connected to my community and friends, and I know I can step away from social media whenever I need to. More recently, I’ve even begun leaving my phone at home or putting it away for entire weekends.
I regret the years I lost to predatory algorithms and endless scrolling, and I can’t imagine wasting any more. Now, I get to live differently—alongside a growing community of young people who choose to thrive offline too. Stepping away from social media has given me something I never had back then: clarity, agency and a sense of presence in my own life.
Maddie Freeman is the founder of No Social Media November.
