Former Musical.ly President Alex Hofmann Spends 9 Hours a Day on His Phone, Still Won’t Return Your Texts

Welcome to Screentime, a new series from The Weekend in which tech leaders divulge their personal phone habits.

Alex Hofmann has an app for everything. His phone is filled with—literally—hundreds of them. Apps to meditate (Insight Timer), check air quality (AirVisual), remember birthdays (Birthdays), pursue romance (30-plus dating options, from Hinge to his own Spark), and even breathe (he direct-messaged this reporter a link to Breathwrk to help with her Covid-19 recovery). The former president of Musical.ly, the app that became TikTok, Hofmann is now CEO and co-founder of 9count, parent company to a number of social media sites. When he’s not doing yoga or chatting with Jimmy Iovine, he’s testing out the competition.

Hofmann breaks down how he spends most of his waking hours on his phone, though he’ll rarely return a text.

What type of phone do you own and how long have you had it?
iPhone 12 Pro. I got it last year.

Average screen time?
My last week was an average of 9 hours, 10 minutes—and that is lower than usual. I see a correlation that the more time I’m not in front of the computer but in front of a phone, the more impactful I am for my own company. If I’m in phone conversations versus sending emails or working on spreadsheets, I usually can have a bigger and better impact. So I spend most of my time on my phone and rarely open my computer.