Overlap / Multiple sessions running at the same time [Now Works with App Limits and Sessions]

[Vanessarseneau]

I would prefer to have the ability to have more than one session. As they don’t work the same.

I.e. I’d like to have some apps “always on” and only take breaks for them when needed, rather than having them blocked for cooldown.

[Vanessarseneau]

I’d love to be able to have more than one session at a time. i.e. There’s some apps that I would like to have “always on”, and then be able to have other sessions with more apps other times throughout the day.

[Rach_K]

Also would like to request running multiple sessions at once.

Or - to be able to add apps to a Deep Focus session while in progress.

Thanks!

[kenneth]

@Mordri_G-O

•Second topic: I think sessions should be allowed to overlap because what if there are certain apps you want to block only on certain days but allow them to run on other days, but keep your main apps you don’t want to use blocked all at the same time. It’s annoying you can’t customize it more in that way

Adding this here from another post

[joel888]

Being able to have multiple, overlapping sessions is key to the use case of opal. I block certain apps at certain times but then want to go into a deep work session and shut down additional apps (overlapping time) for focus.

Cold Turkey is the gold standard for mac and what opal should replicate for ios.

[Elliot_Tower]

I would like to be able to have one session which blocks work emails and messages outside of work hours, as well as a continuously running social media blocking session, which I did using the coworker live session. But it currently seems to end the social media one automatically when toggling on the work blocking session.

[kenneth]

Thank you for reporting this. @Elliot_Tower I actually split up the second part into a different feature request: Challenge: total session timer - How long you can you last?

[yoav_kirshenboim]

Everytime i block an app on a single session it updates the rest of the sessions, for example i wanna block social and mail in the morning and in the afternoon session only social, it doesn’t let me do that

[Ahmad]

This is an important and a very useful feature.

[Adrien]

@kenneth is overlapping sessions being developed?
I’ve read the entire thread here and I can see you’ve directed people towards using App Limits at the same time as a session, but it’s not the same as having overlapping sessions.

For ex I’d like to have most distracting apps blocked throughout the day but not WhatsApp.
But for 2 hours each morning I’d like to also block WhatsApp, to do some deep work.

Thanks!

Adrien

[kenneth]

Hey Adrien! overlapping sessions is not planned at the moment, what I suggest as backup is for you to create two distinct sessions:

1. Morning for 2 hours: Your distracting apps + Whatsapp
2. Rest of the day (all hours expect the 2 morning hours you picked): Your distracting apps without Whatsapp

[Adrien]

Thanks, I’ll do that!

[rafaelmoreira]

Hey @kenneth Why is the overlapping sessions function not planned yet?

I understand that there are other ways to organize the time blocks that each user needs, but it would be much easier to release the function of overlapping sessions.

And there are possibilities that can’t be done. Example: I would like to completely block social media throughout the day, but partially block WhatsApp at night. It can’t be done, because the sessions will overlap.

And I don’t want to use an app limit, because it’s not the same thing.

[neverfresh]

This is also what I want.

My original plan was to have 2 app groups: strict and lenient, but both set to the same time window (8am-7pm, then 8pm-7am). This way social media could not be unlocked, but browsers (yes I block browsers) could be unlocked in a pinch.

Now to make this work, I just have everything as a lenient unlock.

[KungFoocus]

Please add overlapping sessions! So many users have requested it, app limits are not solving the problem. I want to be able to whitelist apps only during certain times (IE use email only during work hours) and allow deeper focus sessions on top of that. It’s been years since this was first proposed, please give us the feature!

[Felix_Neumann]

Hi my suggestion for the future would be a button that time overlapping blocks are working (at least I don’t find a way to to it). When overlapping is happening one of the blocks is snoozed.

This should be able to set by the user. Just in my opinion. When I have a normal block in the morning but want that the harder block is going on until the evening.

[rchase]

I typically block social media 24 hours at a time

But then when I go to the gym I also want to block work apps

Currently there is no way to do this

It would be great to be able to, for example, block social media for 24 hours and then while that is going block work apps for 2 hours while at the gym

[Sarah_K]

Hey @Peds,

Thanks for the suggestion! To clarify, you can now run overlapping Sessions if you run both a Session and an app limit and/or app lock at the same time:

Opal FAQ | How to use Sessions

Opal FAQ | How to use App Lock
Opal FAQ | How to use App Limit

That said, we’d like to be able to run overlapping Sessions in the future, so I’ve also escalated this feature request to our engineers to consider for our roadmap. Stay tuned!

I hope that helps,
Team Opal

[Sam_B]

Any updates on this? It’s fast becoming a deal breaker for me to get value out of Opal.

[Rory]

This blew my mind that this wasn’t a thing coming to Opal. ScreenZen has this (what I was moving away from)

I can’t believe this isn’t being added and I stupidly bought the pro membership without realising this wasn’t a standard feature!

Can Opal actually communicate a timeline of when they’re doing it? As above said, this is a deal breaker for me.