What’s the Grey Bars in Screen Time?

None of these answers are correct, unfortunately. Just waiting for Apple tom chime in! My daughters phone shows she used it for a total of 2.5 hours yesterday, however when I add up all of the time that is shown being used in ALL categories including "other" it is off by more than an hour. The screentime app does NOT show any details about what is being used in the gray bar area, but that is where ALL of her time was being used yesterday. I have app limit restrictions set, so I have a feeling she's found a way around them since there's so much gray area.

Yes! Where are you Apple?!! This makes no sense at all! My son has many hours of grey on his phone that don’t add up with game usage at all. You need to explain this properly as it could be a great option for us parents with troublesome teenagers and their device usage but if we are reading it incorrectly, it’s a total waste of time! Why aren’t you talking???? I’m wondering if it’s time listening to music???

The grey bars at least in my case are when the phone is in use for audio based functions: Spotify and podcasts. after reading these posts I took the dog for a walk and listened to a podcast for 40 minutes. My screen time shows 40 minutes of grey for that hour. Test it out yourselves and see if this is right. It fits with in general my usage of audio content.

I have figured out what the gray bars are!!! It is when your screen is idle but does not “go to sleep”/go black.

I have 1hr limit ok all apps on my sons iPhone, and 30 minutes for gaming. The screen time report shows the my son spends more than 5 hours in the phone... how can that be possible? Obviously it’s telling he is spending the time in the grey bars, but what is he actually spending time in? I does not tell. Can someone help?

These replies are rubbish. The grey bar is not ‘others’. In my screen time, there’s already an others category. Try again; this time I want something definite answer from Apple, not some wild guesses from the masses. Otherwise, screen time goes in the great rubbish heap of useless apps. Like the Fitbit app and the Versa, which was a waste of $230. I don’t spend money on expensive hardware that doesn’t produce.

Okay so I think this will better explain what I was saying in the first pic it is with instagram installed and me using it and then the 2nd is instagram uninstalled right after. And the bar appears gray, same amount of time still but with the app gone.

Having the same exact problem with both of my daughters iPads /iPhones. Have

screen time set up along with restrictions and downtime and every day they get the grey bars indicating they’ve been on for a significantly longer time than can be substantiated by the usage (e.g. color bars). Very frustrated and looking for answers.

It’s an other-others category. When viewing screen time, click “show categories”. Here you’ll see the few color coded categories, for example as in the original post: creativity, social networking, reading & reference. The rest of the categories listed under “show categories” are the groups that will show in the bar graph as grey.

Furthermore, if you delete an app after using it for some time- such as Instagram. Say you have it downloaded for the day, and use it 2 hours, but decide to delete it.... instagram will not show as an app in screen time, nor will it show under social networking. Instead, the time spent on Instagram will show as a grey bar, but with no data in “show categories” or in “show apps & websites”. If you re-install Instagram, it will then show as normal in screen time.

The point is that Apple seems not be aware about the situations which can happen, if parents decide to control the use of digital devices. It is a very sensitive topic and it makes no sense at all if parents have to defend against their children a tool which is supposed to work and help to harmonize family life. I say that on purpose, because I guess it is much more than a simple control. We as parents have decided to install it too, just to be transparent and give a good example. I would suggest Apple to investigate use cases and re-think the whole thing. The tool as it is would be useful if it was transparent in their measurements and functions. Like it is now, it causes a lot of family problems, a nightmare, like jmalcolm5 said.

That sounds about right, but it seems like FaceTime without video also falls into that gray category. And because of it, my daughter is able to talk to her friends for hours and it never gets block. It is extremely frustrating. Sure, I can disable FaceTime, but there are times when it is good to use, especially with other family members. Instead I have been using the OurPact app. She hates the app, but it is the only sure way I can limit the amount of time she uses her phone during the day.

Apps that does not belong to predefined categories fall in to "Others" That grey bar is for other apps.

These are the categories in grey.

Have the same problem with my kids. They told me that after a short break screen time for those apps was available again. Did not expect such a crappy product from Apple.

I think the restrictions that are set on the iPhone will carry over to any other device they try to log into using their AppleID. The restrictions are set to their AppleID, not the device. I only know, because Ive tested this ;)