Your kids are online more than ever, and the platforms they love most are also the ones that need the most careful management. Whether your child is scrolling TikTok at bedtime, grinding Roblox after school, or watching YouTube on the family TV, each platform has its own set of safety tools and knowing how to use them makes a real difference.
This guide covers the best parental controls available right now across every major platform, from built-in device settings to dedicated apps that go further than the defaults.
iPhone: Apple Screen Time
Apple’s Screen Time is one of the most capable built-in parental control systems available on any device. Accessed through Settings > Screen Time, it gives parents a dashboard covering app usage, web activity, screen time totals, and content restrictions, all protected behind a parent-set passcode.
How to set it up:
- Open Settings on your child’s iPhone
- Tap Screen Time > Turn On Screen Time
- Select This is My Child’s iPhone
- Set a Screen Time Passcode that your child doesn’t know
- Enable Family Sharing to manage the device remotely from your own iPhone
- Go to Content & Privacy Restrictions and turn it on
- Set App Limits by category (e.g., Social Networking, Games)
- Configure Downtime to block most apps during bedtime or school hours
- Under Content Restrictions, set age-appropriate ratings for apps, films, and TV shows
- Enable Ask to Buy so purchases require your approval
What Screen Time does well: Downtime scheduling is reliable and hard to bypass without the passcode. Communication limits let you control who your child can call or message, even during Downtime. Ask to Buy integrates cleanly with the App Store.
Where it falls short: Screen Time has limited visibility into what actually happens inside social media apps. It can tell you that your child spent 90 minutes on Instagram, but not what they saw or who they talked to. For deeper monitoring, third-party apps like Qustodio or Bark fill that gap.
Android: Google Family Link
For Android families, Google Family Link is the native solution. It is built into Android and lets parents create and supervise a child’s Google Account, set screen time limits, approve app downloads, and track device location in real time.
How to set it up:
- Download the Family Link app on your own Android or iPhone
- Open the app and follow the prompts to create a Google Account for your child
- Enter your child’s real date of birth — this determines which protections apply automatically
- On your child’s Android device, sign in to their new Google Account
- The device will prompt them to connect to your Family Link supervision
- From your Family Link app, go to Controls to set app limits, daily screen time caps, and bedtime locks
- Use Content Restrictions to require your approval for any app downloads from the Google Play Store
- Enable Location to track your child’s device in real time
What Family Link does well: The Play Store approval system is effective — your child cannot install anything without you confirming it first. Screen time controls work at the device level, meaning they apply across all apps simultaneously. The redesigned interface, updated in early 2026, now consolidates device usage, time limits, and controls into a single screen for easier management.
Where it falls short: Family Link’s full feature set only works on Android. If your child uses an iPhone, you can still use the parent app to monitor a Google Account, but device-level controls won’t apply. When a child turns 13, they can also choose to remove supervision entirely, so it’s worth having a conversation well before that milestone.
YouTube: YouTube Kids and Supervised Accounts
YouTube presents a particular challenge because its recommendation algorithm is designed to keep viewers watching, and what gets recommended is not always age-appropriate. There are two main paths depending on your child’s age.
YouTube Kids (best for under 12)
The YouTube Kids app is a separate, walled-off version of YouTube with content curated for children. Parents can choose from three content levels (Preschool, Younger, and Older), block specific videos or channels, and set daily watch time limits. All controls are accessible behind a passcode or multiplication-problem lock.
Supervised Accounts on YouTube (best for 9 to 13+)
For older children who want access to a broader range of content, Google offers supervised YouTube accounts linked through Family Link. Parents can choose from three content tiers — Explore (ages 9+), Explore More (pre-teen), and Most of YouTube — and adjust these settings at any time as their child matures.
Newer controls worth knowing: As of March 2026, parents using supervised teen accounts can now set their child’s daily YouTube Shorts feed limit to zero, completely blocking the short-form scroll. The Time Management tab in Family Center also lets you set take-a-break reminders and bedtime cutoffs.
The key limitation: Supervised YouTube accounts cannot monitor watch history in the same granular way a third-party tool can. Restricted Mode, which can be toggled on within any YouTube account, helps filter out potentially mature content but is not foolproof — it works per device and per browser, so you will need to enable it everywhere your child might watch.
Roblox: Built-In Parental Controls
Roblox has its own parental control system, accessible through the parent’s Roblox account. Given that the platform hosts millions of user-created games with wildly varying content quality, configuring these settings carefully is important.
How to set it up:
- Log in to your parent Roblox account (or create one)
- Go to Settings > Security
- Set up a PIN to lock parental settings from being changed
- Navigate to Privacy to control who can message your child, join their games, or follow them
- Set Contact Settings to Friends Only or No One for chat and messages
- Go to Parental Controls to restrict which content categories are accessible based on age
Account restrictions: Turning on Account Restrictions locks a child to a curated list of age-appropriate games and disables all chat. This is the most protective setting and is recommended for children under 10.
What Roblox doesn’t cover: The platform’s own controls manage what happens inside Roblox, but the conversation doesn’t end there. Many children move from Roblox chats to Discord, Instagram, or other platforms to continue talking to people they met in-game. Device-level controls on iPhone or Android are essential for catching this kind of cross-platform activity.
TikTok: Family Pairing
TikTok’s Family Pairing feature links a parent’s TikTok account to a teen’s account, giving parents remote access to safety settings without needing to be on the same device. Both the parent and the child must have their own TikTok accounts for this to work.
How to set it up:
- Open TikTok on your phone and go to Profile > Menu (three lines) > Settings and Privacy
- Tap Family Pairing
- Select Parent and follow the prompts to generate a QR code
- On your child’s device, open TikTok, go to Family Pairing, select Teen, and scan the QR code
Once paired, you can:
- Set a daily screen time limit for your child’s account
- Enable Restricted Mode to filter out mature or sensitive content
- Turn off Direct Messages so strangers cannot contact your child
- Use the Time Away feature to schedule specific windows when TikTok is completely inaccessible, such as during school hours or after 9pm
- Manage Search access so your child cannot look for specific accounts or hashtags
- Turn off the ability for your child’s videos to be suggested to others via Duet or Stitch
Important to know: TikTok automatically mutes push notifications overnight for users under 16, but Family Pairing gives you control over the broader schedule. The Time Away feature is particularly useful — it overrides the app entirely during the hours you set, with no workaround available to the child. On iOS, Bark’s TikTok monitoring is not currently available, so Family Pairing is the most reliable native option for iPhone families.
PlayStation 5: Family Management and the PlayStation Family App
Sony significantly upgraded its parental control tools for the PS5, and in September 2025 launched the PlayStation Family app on iOS and Android, making it easier to manage everything remotely without touching the console.
How to set it up on the PS5:
- On the PS5 home screen, go to Settings > Family and Parental Controls > Family Management
- The console will ask for your family manager account password
- Select Add Family Member > Add a Child
- A QR code will appear — scan it with your phone to complete the account setup in a browser
- Enter your child’s date of birth (this determines Sony’s default age restrictions)
- Create a username that does not include your child’s real name
- Set a monthly spending limit for the PlayStation Store
- Adjust Communication and Privacy settings to restrict chat and friend requests to friends only, or to no one
What you can control:
- Playtime Management: Set daily or weekly limits, and schedule hours when the console locks automatically
- Content Restrictions: Restrict games, Blu-rays, and streaming apps based on age rating (e.g., block anything rated MA15+ or above)
- Communication Controls: Limit voice chat, messages, and friend requests to approved contacts only, found under Parental Controls > Communication and Privacy
- Web Browser: Block browser access entirely directly from parental controls, preventing unfiltered internet access during gaming sessions
- Spending: Require your approval for all PlayStation Store purchases
The PlayStation Family app lets you adjust all of these settings remotely from your phone and review your child’s gaming activity without sitting down at the console yourself.
Third-Party Apps: When Built-In Controls Aren’t Enough
The native tools on each platform are a solid foundation, but they work in silos. An app like Qustodio, Bark, or Net Nanny sits across all of a child’s devices and activity, giving parents a unified view.
Qustodio is consistently rated among the best overall parental control apps for families with multiple devices and multiple children. It supports iOS, Android, Windows, Mac, and Chromebook, and provides detailed activity reports across apps and browsers. Location tracking and geofencing are available on both iOS and Android.
Bark takes a different approach. Rather than logging every message, it uses AI to scan for specific patterns linked to bullying, self-harm, sexual content, and predatory contact across 30+ platforms, then alerts parents only when something concerning is detected. This makes it well-suited for older children where constant surveillance would undermine trust. Note that Bark’s iOS app cannot currently monitor TikTok activity.
Net Nanny is notable for its content screening that works within social media apps rather than simply blocking or allowing them entirely, making it a strong option for families who want nuanced content filtering rather than a blunt on/off switch.
Final Thoughts
No single tool covers everything, and that is by design. The most effective approach combines platform-specific controls (like TikTok Family Pairing and PlayStation Family Management) with device-level restrictions (iPhone Screen Time or Android Family Link) and, for families who need more, a third-party monitoring app layered on top.
The conversations you have with your children about why these controls exist matter just as much as the settings themselves. Technology will always evolve faster than any parental control system, and kids who understand the reasons behind the rules are better equipped to navigate the platforms you cannot directly monitor.