The steps
How to make a dopamine menu
To make a dopamine menu, you need a sheet of paper, or the builder further down this page, and about ten minutes.
- Write down things you enjoy. Aim for about fifteen. Small things count: one song, a cup of tea, five minutes outside.
- Sort them into four groups. The table below shows them.
- Make each thing easy to start. Leave your walking shoes by the door and the book on your pillow.
- Put the menu where you will see it. The fridge, your desk, or the lock screen of your phone all work.
- When you are bored or stuck, pick one thing. Do only that thing until it is done. For a short break from a task, set a timer first, so that you go back to the task.
| Group | How long, and what goes in it |
|---|---|
| Startersor appetizers | Ten minutes or lessQuick things for a short break, like one song or a cup of tea. |
| Mainsor entrees | Half an hour or moreLonger things that leave you feeling good afterward, like cooking or a bike ride. |
| Sides | No extra timeThings you add to a boring task to make it nicer, like music while you clean. |
| Desserts | A limit you setThings you turn to when you are bored and that are easy to overdo, like your phone. |
An example
Dopamine menu example
The dopamine menu example below is made up for this page. A man called Leo wrote down 16 things he enjoys and sorted them into the four groups. The minutes are his own guesses.
| What Leo enjoys | Time |
|---|---|
| StartersTen minutes or less | |
| Play one song, loud | 4 min |
| Make a cup of tea | 5 min |
| Water the plants | 5 min |
| Text a friend something funny | 3 min |
| Walk around the block | 10 min |
| MainsHalf an hour or more | |
| Play guitar | 30 min |
| Read a novel on the couch | 30 min |
| Cook a real dinner | 45 min |
| Go for a bike ride | 60 min |
| SidesNo extra time | |
| A playlist while cleaning | |
| A podcast while doing the dishes | |
| A call with a friend while folding laundry | |
| Working at the library, not at home | |
| DessertsA limit you set | |
| A game on the phone | Stop at 10 min |
| Short videos on the phone | Stop at 15 min |
| One episode of a show | Stop at 45 min |
Try it
Build your own dopamine menu
The builder below makes a dopamine menu from the things you type in. Add a thing and say how long it takes, and it goes into the right group. Then choose how long you have, and it shows what fits.
What fits in 15 minutes
- Play one song, loud4m
- Walk around the block10m
- Short videos on the phonestop at 15m
Pick one, and do only that until it is done.
An example menu
Things on it: 5. Remove what is not yours, and add your own.
Starters
Ten minutes or less
Play one song, loud 4m
Walk around the block 10m
Mains
Half an hour or more
Play guitar 30m
Sides
No extra time
A playlist while cleaning
Desserts
A limit you set
Short videos on the phone 15m
Once you change something, your menu is kept in this browser, on this device, and it is never sent anywhere. “Back to the example” removes it. If you clear your browser’s data it is gone too, so copy it out to keep it.
The name
Where does the dopamine menu come from?
The dopamine menu comes from a YouTube video that Jessica McCabe posted in . The video’s own page calls the list a “dopa-menu”. The Daily Dot, a news site, reports that a guest in the video, Eric Tivers, used the name “dopamine menu”, and that the idea spread on TikTok in .
Dopamine is a chemical in the brain. Mayo Clinic says it plays a part in mood, attention, reward and motivation. A dopamine menu does not measure your dopamine. It is a list of things you enjoy, written down before you need it.
What a study found
Does a dopamine menu work?
A dopamine menu has not been tested in a study that we could find, so nobody can say for sure that it works. One set of experiments does suggest that skipping from video to video does not make boredom go away.
Skipping between videos made students more bored.
Researchers asked people to imagine ten minutes of watching videos. Most of them said they would rather be free to skip, and they expected skipping to be less boring. Then students tried both ways. Each student spent ten minutes with one video they could not skip, and ten minutes with a set of short videos they could skip between. The students felt more bored when they could skip (Tam and Inzlicht, 2024). With articles, and with people who were not students, the results were less clear.
That fits the advice to pick one thing from your menu and stay with it. For the phone itself, see how to stop doomscrolling and how to break phone addiction.
The test
How do you know your dopamine menu is working?
The test
You picked something from your menu before you picked up your phone, at least once a day
for two weeks in a row.
A dopamine menu shows what you mean to do when you are bored. It cannot show what you really did.
A good way to check is to count the hours from what you write or say about your day. Most journaling apps only ask how your day felt. They do not show how much of it went to your phone.
One app built for this is Think in Numbers, a smart journaling app with time tracking built in.
You write or say your day in your own words, as it happens or all at once. The app reads what you wrote and counts the hours that went to each part of it: the things on your menu, your phone, work, sleep, and the time you never mentioned (shown as unaccounted). Then it shows those hours over days and weeks. So you can see how many hours the things on your menu got this week, next to the hours your phone got.
1. You write your day
2. It counts the hours
- Guitar0m
- Work0m
- Sleep0m
- Unaccounted24h
3. It shows your week
Guitar this week: 0m
On 6 of 7 days. The gap is the day without it.
An example day and week.
For iPhone and Android. Try it on your own day before you pay.
Sources
What did we read for this page?
The four sources below were read for this page: the study, the news report and the Mayo Clinic release in full, and the video’s page and description. The example menu is our own.
- Jessica McCabe, on YouTube (read ). How to Give Your Brain the Stimulation It Needs (video).
- The Daily Dot (read ). Dopamine Menus, or ‘Dopamenus’, are taking over TikTok.
- Mayo Clinic, a news release carried by Newswise (read ). Dopamine Menus: Give Your Brain Some Space.
- Tam, K. Y. Y. and Inzlicht, M. (2024). Fast-forward to boredom: How switching behavior on digital media makes people more bored. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 153(10), 2409 to 2426.
Keep reading.
- LearnAnswers about sleep, habits, study, people and work, in hours.
- Good habitsA list of daily habits in six groups, each written with a time or an amount so you can check it, and how to pick one and start.
- How to stop doomscrollingSet a stop time before the evening starts, put the phone on a charger in another room, and decide what you will do next.
- How to break phone addictionFind your real daily hours, cut a little each week, and keep the phone out of one room.
- Where did my week go? calculatorEnter a typical day and see your week accounted and unaccounted.
- Time journalingThe method: write or say your day in your own words, then see it as hours.
Questions
Questions people ask.
What is a dopamine menu?
A dopamine menu is a list of things you enjoy, sorted by how long each one takes. You write it ahead of time. When you are bored or stuck, you pick something from the list instead of picking up your phone.
What do you put on a dopamine menu?
You put things you enjoy on a dopamine menu, in four groups. Starters are quick, like one song. Mains are longer, like a bike ride. Sides go along with a boring task, like music while you clean. Desserts are easy to overdo, like your phone.
Is your phone allowed on a dopamine menu?
Yes. Your phone goes under desserts, with a limit you set before you start, like ten minutes of a game. A dopamine menu is not a ban. It gives you other things to pick first.
Does a dopamine menu raise your dopamine?
We could not find a study that measured that, or one that tested a dopamine menu at all. The name is borrowed from a chemical in the brain. The menu itself is a list of things you enjoy.
Is there an app for a dopamine menu?
A sheet of paper on the fridge is enough for a dopamine menu. If you want an app, look for one that shows what you really did with your free time, not only what you planned. One app built for this is Think in Numbers, a smart journaling app with time tracking built in. Think in Numbers counts your hours from what you write or say about your day, so you can see how much time the things on your menu got.
Try it on my day.
Write today down in your own words, and see where the hours went.
For iPhone and Android. Try it on your own day before you pay.