My best work-from-home tip is these $5 tap lights that let your housemates know when you don't want

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I love working from home, but it has its own unique challenges. The biggest one for me has been minimizing distractions from my very well-meaning husband. With both of us working from home, it's easy for him to pop his head into my office for a chat, which can agitate me when I'm hyper focused on work or in a meeting. Even a knock on the door and an "are you busy" can set me over the edge when I really need to get something done.

Fortunately, we found a solution in these $10 tap lights from Amazon.

I love them so much that I made a TikTok about it:

@el_savvy Keeping my office door closed didn’t stop the knocks and interruptions. This little light keeps me sane when I work from home. #OutlanderChallenge #fyp #wfhhacks #wfh #workfromhome #workfromhomelife #busylight #lifehack ♬ Cute - Bensound

The tap light system is super simple: if the light on my door is red, it means I don't want any disruptions. Not even a knock on the door.

Lauren Savoie/Insider

I can't take full credit for the idea. I saw a $30 version of a "do not disturb" light Etsy, but I knew I could recreate it for cheaper.

Slicky on Etsy retails for $29.99, but I knew I could find a cheaper solution. Slicky/Etsy

I found this two pack of colored tap lights for $10 on Amazon.

Lauren Savoie/Insider

Each light is operated by three AAA batteries and comes with double sided tape so you can easily mount it.

Lauren Savoie/Insider

One tap turns on a white light, two taps puts it in color change mode, and three taps pauses the light on the color of your choice.

Lauren Savoie/Insider

We primarily use the red setting, but I could also see green and yellow being helpful to indicate "I'm free," and "I'm kind of busy," respectively.

Lauren Savoie/Insider

I thought my husband would think the light was silly, but he actually loves it. It clarifies my availability during the work day.

Lauren Savoie/Insider

I can see it being super helpful if you have a lot of housemates or young kiddos at home. Now if only it worked with nudgy pets...

My cat Chowder doesn't care about the light. Lauren Savoie/Insider Shop at Amazon Shop at The Home Depot Lauren Savoie Deputy Editor, Reviews & Chair of the Editorial Standards Board Lauren Savoie is deputy editor of Insider Reviews and chair of Business Insider's editorial standards board. Lauren leads the home, kitchen, pets, and travel teams, and is deeply involved in all editorial decision making, with a particular focus in strategic content planning, career growth of reporters and editors, and strong journalistic standards for the Reviews team. In 2022, Lauren attended The Poynter Institute's Leadership Academy for Women in Media, a prestigious program that recognizes leaders in the journalism industry.Lauren joined the Insider team in 2020, first as kitchen editor and soon after as senior home & kitchen editor, where she pioneered original testing methodologies for buying guides and built a diverse team of freelancers and reporters with deep expertise in product testing. You can see some of her work in our guides to the best flower delivery services, the best pillows, and the best sous vide machines. Before her time at Insider, Lauren was the senior reviews editor at America's Test Kitchen, where she wrote and edited more than 300 in-depth, unbiased buying guides and reviewed more than 1,000 kitchen products. Her work has appeared in Cook's Illustrated and Cook's Country magazines, in dozens of cookbooks, on two Emmy-nominated TV shows, and on CNN.com, Fodor's, Yahoo, LifeHacker, the Splendid Table, and more.Lauren is currently Kansas-based, but continues to live like a lifelong Bostonian: drinking Dunkin' iced coffee in the winter, spending summers "down" the Cape, and sharing her home with a cat named Chowder. Say hello at lsavoie@businessinsider.com or @el_savvy on Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok. Learn more about how our team of experts tests and reviews products at Insider. Read more Read less

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