Digital Wellbeing Timer Not Resetting? Here’s the Fix

Quick answer: Digital Wellbeing timers usually get stuck because the app’s cache is holding onto old usage data, or the system clock hasn’t triggered the midnight reset properly. Restart your phone first — that alone fixes it most of the time. If it doesn’t, clear the Digital Wellbeing app’s cache and data, then check that it has Usage Access permission turned on.

Why your app timer isn’t resetting

Digital Wellbeing is supposed to reset every app timer at midnight, based on your phone’s clock. When it doesn’t, it’s usually one of these:

• The app’s cached data is out of sync with your actual usage
• A recent system update changed how Digital Wellbeing talks to the Usage Access permission
• The app was force-closed or killed by battery optimization right at midnight, so the reset never ran

None of these mean anything is broken on your phone forever. It’s almost always fixable in a few minutes.

1. Restart your phone

I know, I know — the classic tech support answer. But this genuinely clears up the timer glitch more often than any other fix on this list. Hold the power button, tap Restart, and open the app you had timed once your phone boots back up. Check if the timer shows the correct remaining time.

2. Clear the Digital Wellbeing app’s cache

This won’t touch your screen time history or your timer settings — it just clears out temporary files that might be causing the glitch.

1. Open Settings
2. Go to Apps (or “Apps & notifications” on some phones)
3. Tap See all apps, then find and tap Digital Wellbeing & parental controls
4. Tap Storage & cache
5. Tap Clear cache

Reopen the app you set a timer on and see if it’s back to normal.

3. Clear the app’s data (last resort before a full reset)

This one’s a bigger hammer — it wipes your Digital Wellbeing settings and timers, so you’ll need to set your app limits again afterward. But it also fully resets whatever’s causing the glitch.

1. Go back to Settings > Apps > See all apps > Digital Wellbeing & parental controls
2. Tap Storage & cache
3. Tap Clear storage (or “Clear data”)
4. Confirm when prompted

Open Digital Wellbeing again and re-add your app timers. Annoying, but it works.

4. Check Usage Access permission

Digital Wellbeing needs permission to see how long you’re using each app. If that permission got revoked — sometimes a system update does this without asking — the timer data stops updating correctly.

1. Open Settings > Apps
2. Tap the three-dot menu in the top right and select Special access (on some phones this is under “Advanced”)
3. Tap Usage access (sometimes labeled “Usage data access”)
4. Find Digital Wellbeing & parental controls in the list and make sure the toggle is on

5. Uninstall updates on Digital Wellbeing

Digital Wellbeing is a system app, but it still gets its own updates through the Play Store. If a buggy update is the culprit, rolling it back can help.

1. Go to Settings > Apps > See all apps > Digital Wellbeing & parental controls
2. Tap the three-dot menu and choose Uninstall updates
3. Restart your phone once it’s done

This reverts the app to the version that shipped with your phone’s Android build, which sidesteps whatever bug crept in with the latest update.

6. Check your phone’s date and time settings

This sounds unrelated, but the midnight reset depends on your device clock being accurate. If “Automatic date & time” got switched off somehow, go to Settings > System > Date & time and turn it back on. A manually-set clock that’s even a few minutes off can throw the reset timing out of sync.

Tips and troubleshooting

• If only one specific app’s timer is stuck, try removing that timer and setting it again instead of clearing all of Digital Wellbeing’s data.
• On Samsung phones, this same feature lives under Settings > Digital Wellbeing and parental controls directly, no need to dig through the Apps list — but the cache/data clearing steps are the same, just via Settings > Apps > Digital Wellbeing and parental controls.
• Battery optimization can sometimes stop Digital Wellbeing from running its midnight reset task. Go to Settings > Apps > Digital Wellbeing & parental controls > Battery and set it to Unrestricted if that option is available.
• If nothing here works, check for a pending system update under Settings > System > System update — Google does push fixes for this bug periodically.

Frequently asked questions

Does clearing Digital Wellbeing’s data delete my screen time history?

Yes, clearing storage/data resets your saved timers and usage history in the app. Clearing just the cache does not — that’s the safer first step.

Why does my app timer show time left from yesterday?

This happens when the midnight reset job doesn’t run, usually because the app was in a frozen or cached state right when the reset was supposed to trigger. Restarting your phone forces a fresh state.

Can I set app timers without using Digital Wellbeing?

Yes. Some launchers and third-party apps like Opal or ActionDash offer their own app-limiting features if you’d rather skip Digital Wellbeing entirely.

Does this bug affect Samsung’s One UI version of Digital Wellbeing too?

It can, though less often in my experience. The fix steps are nearly identical — cache clear, then data clear if needed.

For more background on how the feature is supposed to work, Google’s own Digital Wellbeing support page is worth a look. And if you’re also dealing with notification issues on a Samsung phone, our guide on getting notification lock back on One UI 8 covers a similar permissions-related fix.

Did one of these steps get your timer back on track, or is it still stuck? Let me know in the comments what phone and Android version you’re on — it helps other readers hitting the same bug.