Internet and Technology Addiction Test

What This Internet Addiction Test Measures

This internet addiction test asks 11 yes-or-no questions about your internet and smartphone use. None of them asks how many hours you spend online. They ask about control and cost instead: whether you can stop when you mean to, what you reach for the screen to escape, and what your use has started to take from your sleep, work, school or relationships.

It's a screening, not a diagnosis. A screening helps you decide whether a closer look is worth it. Only a clinician who talks with you can tell you whether a problem meets the bar for treatment.

The Warning Signs Behind the Questions

Each question looks for one of the signs that separate a heavy habit from a compulsive one. Here is what they cover, and why each one matters.

Losing track of time and control

You sit down to check one thing and look up an hour later. Feeling that time disappears online, or that you can't stop once you've started, is the first sign the test asks about.

Thinking about it when you're offline

You plan your next session, replay what you saw, or feel your attention drift back to the screen during dinner or a conversation.

Needing more to feel the same

Two questions ask whether you need more time online to feel satisfied, and whether you've moved on to more stimulating or exciting content to get the same pull.

Trying and failing to cut back

You've set limits and broken them. You've promised yourself a quiet night and been back online by bedtime. The test asks about both: repeated failed attempts, and going back after vowing not to.

Feeling restless without it

You get restless or irritable when you try to cut down or stop.

Going online to escape a bad mood

You reach for the screen when you're bored, frustrated, anxious or low. Everyone does this sometimes. It becomes a warning sign when it's the main way you handle hard feelings.

Hiding how much you use

You play down or hide how much you're online from family, a therapist or anyone else.

Real costs

The last two questions ask about consequences: whether your use has led to illegal acts, and whether it has put a relationship, a job or a chance at school at risk. A yes to either one is worth taking seriously, whatever your total score.

How to Read Your Score

Your score is the number of questions you answered yes. Your result page places it in one of four ranges.

The ranges are a guide, not a cutoff from a published study. Two people with the same score can be in very different places, so read your answers as well as your number.

Is This the Same as the Internet Addiction Test (IAT)?

No. The questionnaire most people mean by "the internet addiction test" is the Internet Addiction Test, or IAT, created by psychologist Kimberly Young. It's the most widely used tool for assessing internet addiction in clinics and research.^[8]

The IAT has 20 statements, each rated from 1 (rarely) to 5 (always), for a score between 20 and 100. It asks how far internet use affects your daily routine, social life, productivity, sleep and feelings.^[7] It grew out of an eight-item questionnaire Young described in 1998, which adapted the criteria for pathological gambling to internet use.^[6]

This test is shorter, uses yes-or-no answers and covers smartphone use as well as the internet. That makes it quicker, but its score can't be compared with IAT scores or with the cutoffs used in IAT studies.

Is Internet Addiction a Real Diagnosis?

Not as a named disorder. The World Health Organization's ICD-11 recognizes gaming disorder and gambling disorder as disorders due to addictive behaviors, and has no entry for general internet use.^[1] In the DSM-5-TR, the manual US clinicians use, gambling disorder is the only behavioral addiction. Internet gaming disorder appears only as a condition that needs more research, and its proposed criteria leave out general internet use, social media and smartphones.^[9]

That doesn't mean the problem isn't real. Researchers still disagree about how to define and measure it, which is part of why the numbers below vary so much.^[5] If your use behaves like a compulsion and costs you something, it's worth working on, whatever it's called.

How Common Is Internet Addiction?

Estimates depend on which questionnaire was used, where the cutoff sits, who was surveyed and when.

• 14.22% was the pooled rate for internet addiction in a 2022 analysis of 504 studies published through October 2021, covering more than 2.1 million people in 64 countries. The same analysis found 26.99% for smartphone addiction, 17.42% for social media, 8.23% for cybersex and 6.04% for gaming.^[2]
• 7.02% was the pooled rate for generalized internet addiction in a 2020 analysis of 113 studies published from 1996 to 2018, covering 693,306 people in 31 nations.^[4]
• 6.0% was the pooled rate in a 2014 analysis of 80 reports with 89,281 people in 31 nations, all using Young's questionnaires. It ranged from 2.6% in Northern and Western Europe to 10.9% in the Middle East.^[3]
• 0.8% to 26.7% was the range across large single studies in a 2014 review, which found 21 different questionnaires in use.^[5]

The 2022 analysis found that prevalence trended upward over two decades and rose sharply during the COVID-19 pandemic.^[2] Most of these figures are screening results rather than clinical diagnoses, and many of the samples skew young.^[3]

Internet Addiction, Phone Addiction or Something More Specific?

"Internet addiction" is a wide net. For many people the pull comes from one thing: a feed, a game, a kind of content. If one of these sounds closer to you, a more focused test will tell you more.

• Your phone, wherever you are: the Phone Addiction Test.
• Feeds and notifications: the Social Media Addiction Test.
• Games: the Video Game Addiction Test.
• Explicit content: the Porn Addiction Test.
• Scattered focus more than lost control: the Focus and Attention Span Test.

What to Do After the Test

Whatever your score, these steps help most people take back some control. They're easier to start now than after a habit has dug in.

1. Turn off nonessential notifications and set downtime hours, so your devices wait for you instead of calling you back.^[10]
2. Plan when you'll go online for fun, such as after dinner, instead of letting it fill every spare minute.^[10]
3. Charge your phone outside the bedroom. It keeps late-night scrolling out of your sleep.
4. Set one limit and let the device enforce it. Pick the app or site that costs you the most and put a daily cap on it.
5. Replace the escape. If you go online to get away from a feeling, line up something else that works: a walk, a call, music, a shower.
6. Tell one person what you're changing. A limit someone else knows about is easier to keep.

If you scored moderate or high, or these steps haven't held after a few weeks, a therapist who treats behavioral addictions can help with what the habit is doing for you. That's usually the part that keeps it in place.

Taking the Test for a Loved One

The test asks whether you're answering for yourself or someone else. If you answered for a partner, a parent or a child, treat the result as a starting point for a conversation, not a verdict to hand them.

• Talk about what you've noticed, like missed sleep, skipped plans or short tempers, rather than hours online.
• Ask them to take the test themselves. Their own answers will mean more to them than yours.
• For a teen, bring the result to their pediatrician or a clinician who works with adolescents. Avoid taking a phone away suddenly from a teen who uses it to cope with how they feel. Set changes together and give notice.

When to Get Help

Talk to a professional if your score is high, if the steps above haven't held after a few weeks, or if your internet use is tangled up with anxiety, depression or loneliness. You can search for therapists who treat technology and behavioral addiction by state in the therapist directory, or see all your options on the get help page.

If you're in crisis or thinking about suicide, call or text 988, any time of day.^[11]

Frequently Asked Questions

Is this internet addiction test accurate?

It's a screening, not a diagnosis. Its 11 questions cover common warning signs, such as losing control, failing to cut back and real costs to relationships or work, but yes-or-no answers give a rough read. Use your result to decide whether to make changes or talk to someone, not to label yourself.

How long does the internet addiction test take?

There are 11 yes-or-no questions, so most people finish in about two minutes. You'll see your result as soon as you finish, and a copy goes to your inbox.

Is this the same as Kimberly Young's Internet Addiction Test?

No. Young's IAT has 20 statements rated from 1 to 5, for a score from 20 to 100.^[7] This test is shorter, uses yes-or-no answers and covers smartphone use as well, so its scores can't be compared with the IAT's.

Is internet addiction a real diagnosis?

Not as a named disorder. The ICD-11 recognizes gaming disorder and gambling disorder, and the DSM-5-TR lists internet gaming disorder only as a condition for further study.^[1][9] Neither includes general internet addiction, but a therapist can still help with use that feels out of control.

How many hours online is too much?

There's no agreed cutoff, which is why this test doesn't ask about hours. Control and cost matter more: whether you can cut back when you want to, and whether your use is hurting your sleep, work or relationships.

What's the difference between internet addiction and phone addiction?

Internet addiction is the broader idea: compulsive use of anything online, on any device. Phone addiction centers on the smartphone itself, including constant checking and feeling uneasy without it. If your phone is the main pull, the Phone Addiction Test will tell you more.

What should I do if I score high?

Start with the practical steps in this guide, such as turning off notifications and charging your phone outside the bedroom, and consider talking to a therapist who treats behavioral addictions. If you're in crisis, call or text 988.^[11]

Related Guides

• Phone Addiction Test
• Social Media Addiction Test
• Focus and Attention Span Test
• Technology addiction statistics
• How to run a digital detox that holds

Sources

1. World Health Organization. (2026). ICD-11 for Mortality and Morbidity Statistics: 6C51 Gaming disorder.
2. Meng, S.-Q., Cheng, J.-L., Li, Y.-Y., Yang, X.-Q., Zheng, J.-W., Chang, X.-W., Shi, Y., Chen, Y., Lu, L., Sun, Y., Bao, Y.-P., & Shi, J. (2022). Global prevalence of digital addiction in general population: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Clinical Psychology Review, 92, 102128.
3. Cheng, C., & Li, A. Y. (2014). Internet addiction prevalence and quality of (real) life: A meta-analysis of 31 nations across seven world regions. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 17(12), 755-760.
4. Pan, Y.-C., Chiu, Y.-C., & Lin, Y.-H. (2020). Systematic review and meta-analysis of epidemiology of internet addiction. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 118, 612-622.
5. Kuss, D. J., Griffiths, M. D., Karila, L., & Billieux, J. (2014). Internet addiction: A systematic review of epidemiological research for the last decade. Current Pharmaceutical Design, 20(25), 4026-4052.
6. Young, K. S. (1998). Internet addiction: The emergence of a new clinical disorder. CyberPsychology & Behavior, 1(3), 237-244.
7. Chin, F., & Leung, C. H. (2018). The concurrent validity of the Internet Addiction Test (IAT) and the Mobile Phone Dependence Questionnaire (MPDQ). PLoS ONE, 13(6), e0197562.
8. Moon, S. J., Hwang, J. S., Kim, J. Y., Shin, A. L., Bae, S. M., & Kim, J. W. (2018). Psychometric properties of the Internet Addiction Test: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 21(8), 473-484.
9. American Psychiatric Association. (2023). Internet gaming.
10. American Academy of Pediatrics. (2026). Understanding the new AAP digital media guidelines for screen time and social media.
11. 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. (n.d.). 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.