You sit down to study or work, and twenty minutes later you’re on your phone, or the room has gone dim, or you haven’t stood up in two hours. Sitby: Study & Work Companion gives you someone to sit with you through it. You pick a companion, press Start, and they keep an eye on the chair and the light so you don’t have to.
Step away from your desk for longer than you’ve set and your companion calls you back. Stay away and they ask again, at the same interval. Three companions are on offer: Boyfriend, Girlfriend and Asian Mom. They say different things in different voices, so the same nudge from each one feels different. You choose who sits with you on the first screen, and you can switch from the start screen whenever you like.
You also choose how hard they push. Gentle never gets angry, Normal does when you keep ignoring them, and Hardcore doesn’t hold back.
While a session runs, the front camera looks briefly about once a minute and answers two questions: is someone in the seat, and is the room bright enough to read in. That’s all. It doesn’t judge your posture, and it doesn’t try to recognize you. You can turn either check off, and set how sensitive it is.
If you’d rather not allow the camera, a session still runs. You just won’t get the away and dim-light reminders; the timer and the work and stand-up reminders still work.
Besides away and dim light, Sitby can tell you when you’ve worked a set number of minutes, and ask you to stand up after sitting for too long. Both lengths are yours to change, and the sit reminder can be turned off. There’s an optional bedtime reminder for sessions that run late, and an optional nudge if you haven’t opened the app for a day.
Reminders cover the screen, so you notice them without having to watch the phone. Prop it up beside you and carry on; the screen stays on while a session is running. If the sound gets to be too much, you can turn it off in Settings.
When you finish, Sitby shows what the session came to: how long you were actually at your desk, your longest stretch without getting up, and how many times you were reminded, were away, or had the lights low. It also shows today’s total against a daily goal you can switch on or off, a streak of consecutive days, and a bar chart of the last seven days.
Sitby has no account and keeps no server of its own. Camera frames are analyzed on your device as they come in and are never saved or uploaded. What Sitby stores is your settings and, for each session, a few numbers: how long it ran, how long you were at your desk, and how many reminders came up. These stay on your phone. There are no ads and no analytics, and Sitby is free with no in-app purchases.
Sitby asks for camera access when you first press Start, and for notification permission after that. Both are optional.
See the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use for the full text.