How to Permanently Block Porn on iPhone

If you've searched for this, you've probably already turned on Apple's Screen Time restrictions at least once — maybe more than once. That's not unusual. Setting the restriction was never the hard part. The hard part is what happens two weeks later, in a weaker moment, when you still remember your own passcode and it takes four taps to turn everything back off.

Why the built-in setting doesn't stay on

Apple's Screen Time restrictions are genuinely effective at blocking adult content on an iPhone — the technology works. The failure point almost never has anything to do with the filter itself. It's that the same person who turned it on is also the person who can turn it off, at any time, with no delay and no one else involved. A restriction only holds as long as your motivation does, and motivation isn't constant — that's the entire reason this is hard in the first place.

The quieter escape hatch: Account Recovery

There's also a way around a forgotten passcode that a lot of people don't realize they've left open. Apple lets you reset a forgotten Screen Time passcode through your Apple Account. So even if you deliberately forget the passcode, or have someone else set it for you, Account Recovery can hand it right back to you in a couple of taps — unless you specifically turn that option off during setup. We cover exactly where this happens in our breakdown of Screen Time Passcode Recovery.

What "permanent" actually requires

A restriction is only as durable as your own ability to reverse it.

Making a restriction genuinely hard to undo takes two separate things, not one.

1. The restriction itself

Content & Privacy Restrictions, with Limit Adult Websites turned on. This part takes about two minutes in Settings → Screen Time and is identical whether or not you ever make it permanent.

2. Losing your own access to reverse it

This is the part almost everyone skips. It means not choosing or knowing the passcode yourself, and turning off Apple's Account Recovery option for it. Do both, and the restriction stops being something you can quietly undo in a moment of temptation — reversing it now takes real, deliberate effort, or waiting out a fixed period you chose in advance while thinking clearly.

Doing it yourself vs. using a tool for it

You can do all of this manually: generate a passcode you won't remember, have a partner or friend set it and keep it somewhere you can't access, and turn off recovery. It works, but it depends on another person staying available and willing to hold onto it indefinitely, which is a real logistical weak point for a lot of people — and an uncomfortable thing to ask of someone.

That's the specific gap ScreenVow fills: it generates the passcode for you, encrypts it, and holds onto it for a period you choose — 30, 180, or 365 days — with no person, including you, able to pull it back up early. See the full step-by-step setup guide or read about the encryption and security model behind it.

Specific situations, covered separately

The steps above cover the standard case. If yours is a little different, these go into the specifics:

• Blocking porn on an iPad
• An older iPhone without Face ID or Touch ID
• Doing it without installing any app
• Starting again after a relapse
• Helping someone else set it up, with their consent
• Making sure it covers every app, not just Safari
• A work or company-issued iPhone
• Confirming it won't affect Wi-Fi or data
• An iPhone running an older iOS version
• Doing it without a second device or person
• Comparing accountability apps, partners, and commitment devices
• Whether Family Sharing can reset your passcode
• Whether erasing the iPhone is a real loophole