Opal Review: Focus Rules, Hard Blocking and the Price Question

What it actually does

Opal blocks apps and sites under what it calls Focus Rules — named, reusable configurations rather than a single global blocklist. You can run an Allow Only mode that inverts the logic, permitting a short list and blocking everything else, which is a meaningfully different tool from a blocklist once your problem is variety rather than one app.

It also offers a Focus Timer where you set a length and lock in until it expires.

The distinguishing feature is the blocking difficulty setting. Opal exposes a harder blocking difficulty and a "No Unblocks" option, which moves it out of the friction category and into genuine enforcement — closer to Cold Turkey than to One Sec, if you turn it up.

How hard it is to escape

Firm, and adjustable. At default settings it is a speed bump; with harder difficulty and No Unblocks enabled it is a real barrier.

That adjustability is a genuine advantage over tools that pick one strictness for you, because the right level changes over time. It is also a trap: the default is the gentle setting, and someone who never opens the settings will conclude Opal does not work when they have simply never switched it on properly.

What it costs

Opal offers a free trial and directs you to a pricing page for tier details, which are not enumerated on the landing page in a form we can quote. This profile therefore states the model — subscription, with a trial — and no figure. Check the app or the pricing page for the current price.

This is the main strike against Opal and the honest reason for the "skip if" above. ScreenZen is free, covers more platforms, and handles the intervention side well. Opal earns its money on polish and on the strict end of its blocking, not on doing something nothing else does.

Where it falls down

Beyond price, the historical limitation was platform: Opal was an iPhone tool. That has changed — it now covers iOS, Mac and Android — but expectations set by older reviews are still out of date.

The subscription model also sits awkwardly with the product's purpose. A tool you are meant to need less over time, billed monthly forever, has an incentive shape worth being aware of, even if the product is good.

Who it suits

Someone who has already established that blockers help them, who wants one that is pleasant enough to keep using, and who will actually turn the difficulty up. If you have not yet established that blockers help you, start with the free option and come back.