For heavy sleepers: an alarm that follows up.

Why heavy sleepers switch alarms off without waking

Being pulled out of deep sleep leaves you groggy for a while, a state often called sleep inertia. In that state you can reach over, stop an alarm and fall back asleep without remembering any of it. More volume doesn't help much, because the problem isn't hearing the alarm. It's that stopping it takes no thought at all.

The fix is to make stopping it require something you can't do half-asleep in bed. Skyshot asks you to get up, find the sky and hold your phone up for a moment.

The backup chain

iPhone always shows a system Stop button on alarms, and Skyshot doesn't hide it. Instead, when you set an alarm with the backup chain on, Skyshot also schedules backups:

• +2 minutes: a second alarm if the first was stopped without the sky check
• +4 minutes: a third
• +6 minutes: a fourth
• Showing the sky cancels every backup that's left

It rings when your phone is on Silent

Skyshot uses Apple's AlarmKit, the same system that powers built-in alarms. It rings in Silent mode and through Focus, shows on the Lock Screen, and doesn't need the app to be open. It won't ring if you deny the alarm permission or your phone is off, so check that once during setup.

Tips that help heavy sleepers

Skyshot works best combined with a few simple habits:

• Charge your phone across the room, so the first steps happen anyway.
• Leave the curtains slightly open so the window is easy to find.
• Use Strict difficulty (Pro) if Gentle is too easy to pass while drowsy.
• Keep the same wake-up time on weekends where you can. The streak helps.