Ask Lemmy

Password manager (saves time typing passwords) and adblocker (saves time wasted on ads and of course malicious content).

Water infrastructure.

Be it indoor plumbing or a flushable toilet or a water treatment plant, without water infrastructure modern civilization would be impossible.

Waze. It really is exceptional at avoiding traffic. I know it's dependent on higher user volume, but, in my area it is very popular with a lot of input.

I also love the user warnings. I've dodged many things I'd rather not run over in my car. From dead skunks to a ladder in middle of the highway.

Rice cooker. Easily my favorite appliance.

My urine bottles. Standing up to go to the toilet is too hard for me.

Edit: Also my phone is great because it enables me to call my wife (or my caretaker if he is approved) to give me food or new urine bottles.

I mean, "tech wise" is incredibly generic. Electricity itself is pretty much essential and something I'd have a hard time living without.

As for more recent tech, the internet. I can "live without", but a lot of stuff I do for entertainment and self education needs it. There's also the discovery, finding out about new stuff that interests me, that'd be much harder without the internet.

Even if you removed several sites, if the 'net was something like it was back in 1994, there'd still be enough content and people around to get good amounts of information back and forth, plus file sharing.

As for time saved, just think about trying to discover, not even acquire or read, just know about, some 2 or 3 books in an "obscure" subject, something that your circle of contacts is unlikely to know anything about, that local book stores probably won't have. Same applies for games or media that said circle of contacts are unlikely to know about. Basically, you have to take the dive and explore and, depending on what you were looking for, you'd come empty handed, or have to contend with a "better than nothing" alternative.

Autohotkey

Limitless custom hot keys on my computer. Each one saves me a few seconds, adding up to hours and hours saved, especially having stuff automated so I can save the headspace

My refrigerator/freezer. Lets me buy food at ideal times (sales etc) and keep it fresh until it is conveneient for me, sometimes months later in the case of the freezer.

Smartphone with internet connection.

Air fryer. Honestly, this thing just makes cooking easier. I don't need to stand in front of the oven or grill to make something. Just bung stuff in and come back in 15 mins.

I'm pretty sure my washing machine is the thing that saves me most time. Washing by hand is fucking hard work and very time consuming. I would neither have the time nor the physical endurance to keep all my clothes and household items in a state acceptable to society.