Flipper Busy Bar Review: An Expensive Focus Tool That Only Works for Some
The $250 Flipper Busy Bar is a focus aid with a Pomodoro timer and an ON AIR mode, but in an open office it often gets ignored.
A Wired journalist tested the Flipper Busy Bar in an open office. Coworkers mostly ignored it – one joked if he was too busy, but they still talked. When he needed to record audio in the studio, he turned on the ON AIR mode and placed it on the glass. Despite a bright screen, the small device is hard to spot in a large open office. (Even a larger ON AIR sign in the studio is often ignored.)
The Busy Bar is better for keeping the user focused. You can adjust timer settings, but the default is the Pomodoro technique: 20-minute work segments separated by 5-minute breaks. As the timer counts down, a Dr. Mario–like pill icon fills up around the BUSY icon, adding visual feedback. It feels rewarding to fill the pill and then slap the timer to start a break.
Flipper promises more features in the future, such as an expanded app library and better modification capabilities for its open-source operating system. This will test how people actually use the Busy Bar – watching which settings and features they add (someone will surely try to run Doom on it).
For now, the Busy Bar is likely seen as an overengineered focus tool that only certain people find useful. It's hard to recommend at $250, especially since it syncs with the free Busy app. But if it's for you, you'll probably love it – the journalist admits it helped him focus enough to write this story on time (almost).
