Three sessions a day: the number that matters more than you'd think

The constraint was never about conversion

When we built Intentr, we knew we'd need a free tier. Everyone does. But most apps use free tiers as funnels. Fewer sessions to push you toward paid. We wanted the opposite.

Three sessions a day isn't a sales tactic. It's a design decision rooted in something we believe: if you're setting an intention every single time you open the app, you're already being intentional. That's the whole point. By the third session, you've already declared your purpose three times. You've already thought about why you're there.

The limit isn't there to frustrate you into upgrading. It's there to prove that intention works.

What happens inside a bounded session

When you open Intentr, you don't just start scrolling. You set a session intention first. 'I want to catch up on tech news.' 'I'm looking for video essays on design.' 'I need a break with comedy.' Then the session starts, and the timer runs. Your attention ledger records what you spent time on and how long you were there.

The timer itself is borderless. You set it, or you don't. There's no algorithm pushing content at you. You see channels you've chosen to follow, in the order they appear. Creators get 85% of subscription revenue, so they're not fighting for clicks with dark patterns.

Three sessions means three moments in your day where you've had to pause and ask yourself: why am I doing this right now? That friction is the feature.

The free tier tells you who we actually are

Some founders told us three sessions was too limiting. 'You'll lose churn metrics.' Maybe. But we didn't want users who just wanted more content for free. We wanted users who wanted a different kind of media diet.

Free users get 5 channels followed and 7 days of ledger history. That's enough to understand your own habits. It's not a crippled version of the paid tier. It's a complete experience with clear boundaries. If you upgrade to Plus, you get unlimited sessions, unlimited channels, and full ledger history. You can also connect external sources. RSS feeds. Podcasts. YouTube channels. Pull them all into one place without the algorithm deciding what matters.

The Pro Creator tier is for creators themselves. Analytics. Revenue dashboards. A way to see who's actually paying attention to your work, and what it's worth.

Why the ledger matters as much as the timer

Most apps track your time to sell you ads or sell that data. Intentr's attention ledger is different. You own it. You see it. It's a mirror.

Three sessions a day gives you three chances to build that mirror. By the end of a week, you see patterns. Which channels matter to you. Which sessions were scrolling, which were focus. Which creators you actually came back to. The free tier keeps seven days of history. That's long enough to spot your own rhythms.

We didn't add this feature to be clever. We added it because once you see how you're spending attention, you change. Not because some notification app told you to. Because you chose to.

A limit that actually respects your time

The real reason three sessions works is simple: it forces you to be honest. Not with us. With yourself.

When a free user hits their third session and wants to keep going, they have two choices. They can wait until tomorrow. Or they can upgrade to Plus and remove the limit. Either way, they've had to make a choice about their attention instead of drifting into it.

We've watched free users stay free for months. They don't want more sessions. They don't need them. Three is enough to hear from the creators and channels they care about. The upgrade isn't for everyone. It's for people who genuinely want to consume more, not for people who got addicted and need a dopamine fix.

That's the difference. We're not building a habit. We're building a tool.