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How does Fold'em block apps?

Updated September 2026

Fold'em asks Apple's Screen Time to shield the apps you picked, so tapping one draws a block screen over it instead of opening it. You pick them in Apple's own picker, which hands Fold'em opaque tokens: the app counts how many you sealed and never learns which they are. The seal is written to a store only Fold'em writes to, it is always on with no schedule and no daily window, and the phone writes it back on every launch. You can add apps while your term runs; taking one out waits for the term to end.

What the app shield is

The app layer is Apple's Screen Time, driven through the Family Controls framework. When you seal your apps, Fold'em writes their tokens into a settings store of its own, named fp_exclusion_<uuid>, and never into the device's shared default store. Every app in that set is shielded by iOS itself, so the block sits in the operating system rather than inside Fold'em, and it holds while Fold'em is closed.

The store is always on. There are no schedule windows, no daily allowance and no monitored intervals, so a sealed app is sealed at 2am the same way it is sealed at noon.

You pick the apps in Apple's own picker. It hands back opaque tokens rather than names, so Fold'em knows how many apps you sealed and never which ones. Since iOS 26.4 the framework can vend app identities to an app that asks for the wider authorization; Fold'em does not ask, which is a choice written down as a requirement rather than a limit of the platform. The picker can seal any app installed on the phone, and Fold'em keeps a catalogue of ten sportsbooks and casinos plus three browsers, which is the list the operator pages are measured against.

One seal holds up to 50 apps, which is the cap the framework documents. If a pick is larger than that, the app tells you which kind was cut instead of quietly dropping it.

What a sealed app does when you open it Two phones side by side. On the left, a home screen of app tiles with a ring around one sealed betting app being tapped. On the right, the same phone with Fold'em's block screen covering the whole display: the Fold'em mark, one line from the pack you chose, the day count since you sealed, and an SOS button. The tiles are still faintly visible underneath, because the app is covered and not deleted. YOU OPEN A SEALED APP A betting app you sealed F You asked to be kept out of this. Day 12 SOS The wall, every time One line from the pack you chose The day count, from the seal The app is still installed, only covered
Open a sealed app and the block screen lands over it: one line from the pack you chose and the day count since you sealed. The app is covered, never deleted.

Sealing your apps, and adding more later

  1. Pick them during setup

    The setup step reads "Now the apps on this phone." with an empty grid and one button, Add apps. Tapping it opens Apple's picker, and what you tick there becomes the seal.

    The setup step titled Now the apps on this phone, with an empty grid and the Add apps button.

    Setup, picking the apps

  2. The Shield tab counts them back

    The APPS tile shows how many apps are sealed. It is a count, never a list of names, for the same reason the picker hands back tokens.

    The Shield tab with the APPS tile reading seven apps blocked beside the WEB tile reading On.

    The Shield tab, apps sealed

  3. Add to the seal while the term runs

    The apps sheet says "Sealed until your term ends. You can add while it runs, never remove." The plus tile opens the same picker with what is already sealed ticked inside it, and saving adds to the seal rather than replacing it.

    The Blocked apps sheet with its plus tile and the line about adding while the term runs.

    Adding to the seal

How the seal survives the phone

On every launch and every time you bring Fold'em to the front, it checks that the store still carries what your term says it should, and silently writes it back if it does not. That repair only ever restores enforcement. The phone cannot decide to take a shield off: unlocking is the server's call, and the device applies what it is told.

Deleting and reinstalling Fold'em is not a way out. Signing in again pulls your term and your lock back from the server, and a reinstall can never come back weaker than it went. Two things do have to be done again on the new install, because Apple's app tokens do not survive it: granting Screen Time, and picking your apps. Until both are done your keyholder's pass reads "Checking in".

Whether Fold'em itself can be deleted is a separate, optional choice. The app deletion lock is off unless you turn it on, and while it is on no app on the phone can be removed until a 72 hour window finishes on the server.

What this does not do

The app shield covers the apps you picked on this phone and nothing else. It does not reach a second phone, a tablet, a computer or a browser on another device. It does not catch a betting app you never picked, unless you also sealed the Games category and the App Store files that app under Games. It cannot stop you revoking Screen Time in iOS Settings, because no app can; what happens then is that the APPS tile reads Down and your keyholder is told. And it blocks apps, not money: Fold'em never sees your bank, your card or a balance.

Still stuck? Email support@foldem.app and we answer within two working days.