SAVE50
A gentle companion for long screen days that helps hold off digital eye strain. Every 20 minutes it nudges you to look 20 feet away for 20 seconds - a soft chime, a guided countdown, and the good sense to pause itself during games, video and calls.
Hours locked at one short distance - blinking far less than usual - are what drive digital eye strain, sometimes called computer vision syndrome: dry, tired, aching eyes and focus that won't snap sharp. The 20·20·20 rule gives them a regular, restful reset - and 20-20-20 Vision makes remembering it automatic through every long workday. Treat each break as a small moment of mindfulness: a few seconds to unclench your eyes, breathe, and come back to the screen a little clearer.
A steady reminder you can dial anywhere from 15 to 60 minutes.
Out a window, down a corridor, across the room - let your focus relax into the distance.
A guided countdown keeps the break honest and reminds you to blink. Snooze it whenever you're mid-thought.
Interval, rest length & snooze are all adjustable.
Everything lives in one tidy panel - the countdown, the nudge, the break, your settings, and a setup wizard that has you sorted in under a minute. Prefer it out of the way? Run it minimised to the tray and rely on the audio cue, the popup visual notification, or both - whichever works best for you.
One app, one download. Use it free for as long as you like; unlock the Pro extras in-app with a one-time $15, incl. VAT - no subscription, no account.
| Feature | Free | Pro |
|---|---|---|
| Everyday essentials | ||
| Easy setup wizardChoose from Minimal, Gentle, Strong or Advanced and customise to your needs | ||
| 20·20·20 remindersInterval, rest length & snooze all adjustable | ||
| Guided break countdownA calm 20-second timer with a blink cue | ||
| Auto-start breaksEach rest can begin on its own - no clicking | ||
| Six sounds + your ownStart/end tones & volume slider | ||
| Six colour themesSix looks,including light and dark looks to match your desktop | ||
| Five languagesEnglish, German, Japanese, French, Spanish - or follow Windows | ||
| SchedulingActive hours, days & a quiet period for lunch | ||
| Hush remindersFor 15 / 30 / 60 min, or until you're back | ||
| Popup notificationsPlus an optional pre-break heads-up | ||
| Runs in the tray · starts with WindowsTucked in the system tray and ready the moment you sign in | ||
| Private statisticsRests today, this week & your streak - kept on your device | ||
| Smart pausing & power tools | ||
| Auto-pauseGoes quiet during fullscreen games, video & presentations | – | |
| Pause during video callsGoes quiet while your camera is in use - Teams, Zoom, Meet & more. | – | |
| Pause only when a fullscreen app is focusedStricter auto-pause - holds breaks only while the fullscreen app is in focus | – | |
| Pause for specific apps you chooseHand-pick the programs that should hold your breaks - while open, focused, using the camera, or playing sound or video | – | |
| Idle-aware pausingPause the moment you step away, or only for longer breaks - your choice. | – | |
| Global keyboard shortcutsStart, snooze & hush from anywhere | – | |
| Choose your output speakerRoute the chime to its own output so it stays out of your stream, recording or call | – | |
| Back up & restore your settingsExport your setup to a file and load it back on a new PC | – | |
Pro begins with a free trial - every feature unlocked. When it ends, 20-20-20 Vision keeps working for free; the Pro extras simply switch off until you unlock them with a single $15 purchase. Buy once, use forever.
20-20-20 Vision does a few things a simple timer can't - it reads what else is happening on your PC and stays out of the way at exactly the right moments. Here's how each one works.
You shouldn't get a "rest your eyes" nudge in the middle of a presentation or a boss fight. When Auto-pause is on, 20-20-20 Vision watches the same status that Windows itself uses to decide whether to show its own notifications - so it pauses in exactly the moments Windows would stay quiet.
That covers fullscreen games, fullscreen video, presentation mode, and Windows Focus Assist / Do Not Disturb. For video calls there's a dedicated Pause during video calls switch that watches whether your webcam is in use - so it reliably catches Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Meet and any other call app, on every machine. The moment you're back to normal, the countdown picks up where it left off.
If an app doesn't trigger the system signal above - a meeting tool you keep in a window, a recording app, anything - you can name it directly. Choose apps… lists what's currently running, you tick the ones you care about, and they appear as little chips.
From then on, 20-20-20 Vision checks every few seconds whether any of those apps are open. While one is, reminders pause; when you close it, they resume. It's the manual companion to auto-pause, for the cases only you know about.
Each app can also be narrowed with three triggers: Focused pauses only while it's the front window, Camera only while it's using your webcam, and Media only while it's playing sound or video - a YouTube tab, a film in a window, a game with the sound up. Pick more than one and choose whether all or any of them must match.
When it's time, 20-20-20 Vision raises a notification with Start rest, Skip and Snooze buttons you can act on without switching windows - handy when it's minimised to the tray. Don't want them? A single switch turns them off and keeps just the in-app prompt.
Switch this on and you don't even click Accept - the chime sounds, the prompt appears for a beat, and the 20-second break begins on its own. Catch it mid-thought and Snooze still steps in.
The app lives in your system tray. Closing the window doesn't quit it - it tucks away and the timer keeps counting, so reminders arrive whether or not a window is open. Quit properly any time from the tray menu.
Have 20-20-20 Vision launch quietly to the tray when you sign in, so your eye breaks are looking after themselves from the first minute of the day.
In the desktop app you can send reminders to a specific output device - useful if your everyday audio goes one place and you'd like the gentle chime somewhere else.
Free to install and use standard features. Unlock Pro any time with a one-time $15 from inside the app.
Install it, make it yours in a minute, and pin the eye to your tray so its status is always a glance away.
Tap Download for Windows above to open 20-20-20 Vision in the Microsoft Store.
Click Get, then Open. 20-20-20 Vision installs like any Store app and adds itself to your system tray.
The Setup Wizard will run to easily set your interval, sounds, theme, language and active hours, and pause settings. For further advanced customisation open Settings and tweak for your perfect set up.
Want the eye always visible in the tray? See Show the tray icon for the 20-second fix.
Click the small ^ arrow next to the clock (bottom-right) to reveal tray icons Windows is hiding.
Drag the 20-20-20 Vision eye from that pop-up down onto the taskbar's tray area. It stays there from now on.
Open Settings → Personalisation → Taskbar → Other system tray icons, then switch 20-20-20 Vision on.
Right-click the taskbar → Taskbar settings → Select which icons appear on the taskbar, and turn 20-20-20 Vision On.
I'd get so locked into the latest project that I'd look up four hours later with eyes that felt like they were bleeding.
That dry, gritty, can't-quite-refocus feeling at the end of a screen marathon - I know it intimately. I'm a developer; I'd zone into a problem and forget my eyes existed until they were sore, dry and strained. 20-20-20 Vision began as a fix for exactly that: a calm nudge to look away before the ache sets in, so a day at the keyboard doesn't end with that raw, over-worked feeling.
It's built to head off the everyday digital eye strain that quietly stacks up across a long day - the dry eyes, the screen fatigue, the focus that's slow to snap back to the distance.
Stuck on something, found a bug, or have an idea? We read every message, so get in touch.
Rolling 20-20-20 Vision out across a team, or want Pro for the whole workplace as part of an occupational-health or display-screen-equipment (DSE) programme? See 20-20-20 Vision for Workplaces, or get in touch about volume Pro licences and bespoke arrangements.