Today, mobile devices have been essential; everyone needs their devices in almost every work they perform. People spend an average of 5.4 hours a day on their phones. You cannot just blame your kids’ spending too much time on their devices when you spend half of your time on your phone.
Children and teenagers spend more time on their devices than their parents. More than using their devices for their academic purpose, kids are using them for entertainment purposes.
Nowadays, many parents are concern about their kids’ screentime and device activities. Because of this increasing concern, parents use parental control apps that keep track of their kids’ device activity.
Screen Time is one of the popular parental control apps that has the mission of helping parents to limit their kids’ screen time. It has been the winner of the National Parenting Product Award in 2019. Till now, the app is being downloaded by more than two million people.
Many teenagers and parents have arguments in their screentime. With the app, you can minimize arguments with your kids while balancing their screen time.
Screen Time is a cross-platform app that is compatible with Android, IOS, and Kindle Fire. You can create one account to manage and track the devices of your kids.
Kids always try to bypass the parental control app; they try to uninstall the app from their device. And the best part about Screen Time is kids cannot uninstall the app without knowing the password.
Screen time provides many features that sometimes might be overwhelming for you. Here are some of the features of the parental control app:
Features of Screen Time
Time Limit
As I already mentioned, the increase in screen time has been one of the increasing concerns among parents. With the time limit feature of the Screen Time, you can set the total time limit for your kids’ device usages. You need to set a time limit for your kid’s screen time based on their age.
By setting a time limit for device usages, you can prevent your kids from using the device for too long. You can manage your kids’ productivity by setting your kids’ screen time limit.
This feature is best for maintaining the screentime of kids and engaging them in productive activity.
App Usage
On average, kids can use at least 10 apps daily. And among them, only 2 or 3 apps might be productive, and the rest are games and social media apps.
The app usage feature of Screen Time allows you to view the total time kids spend on specific apps. You can view which app your kids use the most and if the app is productive or not.
This feature is a great way to minimize unproductive app usage and know what kids actually use on their devices.
Approve App
As you know, all the apps have some age limit, and kids must use an app within their age limit. As a parent, you should know what kind of app your kids use and if they are using apps that are within their age limit or not.
New apps are released daily, and getting to know all the apps is beyond impossible. Hence, by using Screen Time, you can know the apps that your kids are downloading.
With Screen Time, you can approve or reject apps that your kids download on their devices. If the app they have downloaded is not appropriate for their age, then you can easily block such apps.
Web History
We all are dependent on the web browser; we open our web browser at least once a day to search for solutions to our problems. Web browsers have been like a go-to solution for all age people.
Kids come across many content through web browsers and their ads. And sometimes, they might end up going on inappropriate sites. Hence, to know what your kids are viewing on the web browser, you can use the web history feature.
The web history feature of Screen Time shows you your kids’ web history, websites they frequently visit, etc. You will know your kids’ browsing habits through this feature, and if they are going on some wrong track, you can improve it.
Web Filtering
Another important feature that Screen Time offers is the Web filtering feature; this feature is somewhat related to the Web History feature.
As I already mentioned above, kids can come across any content on the web. And they may not be able to identify which one is good for them. Also, you may not be around them all the time to know what they are viewing on their device.
Thus, the web filtering feature comes in handy as this feature will filter all the inappropriate contents from your kids’ device. You can block specific websites and URLs through this feature. However, this feature is available on Android only.
Schedules
The next interesting feature that ScreenTime provides is the Schedules feature. As you know that cell phones can be very distracting. Whenever you are doing some work, your phone notification can take your attention.
Adults can somehow control themselves from using their devices, but kids might not control themselves. If your kids are too much into their devices, you must try the Screen Time schedule feature.
This feature will helps your kids to focus on their work whenever they have work to do. For instance, you can set a specific time as study time or sleep time, and the app will stop all the notifications and let your kids focus on what they need to do.
Location Tracking
You might always worry about your kids’ whereabouts. Sometimes, kids can have a spontaneous plan to go out with their friends and worry until they return.
With the location tracking feature, you can view your kids’ location in real-time. You can view your kids’ current as well as last seen location history with the app.
This feature will, however, require a connection to view your kids’ location. If your kids are not connected to wifi or do not have any internet connection, you might not be able to see their location.
Geo-Trips and Geo-Fencing
Next, we have the geo-trip and geofencing feature, which is also related to location tracking.
The geofencing feature allows you to create a virtual fence, and when your kids try to cross the fence, you will get notified. This feature is important to know when your kids reach or leave a specific place.
The geo-trip feature is extremely helpful to know the route your kids are taking to reach their destination. You can know their whereabouts through this feature and know where they were throughout the day. You will know when your kids stop over any places through the geo-trip feature.
Instant Pause
The most interesting feature among all the features in the Screen Time app is the instant pause feature. Kids use their device almost all the time, which make their parents fed up.
This feature has been a good solution for parents who want to control their kids’ mobile usage habits. Whenever your kids disobey you and continue using their device, this feature will come in handy even when you ask them to stop it.
Whenever you select the instant pause feature, the app will automatically pause your kids’ device. Just like you pause DVR, you can pause your kids’ device with a single click.
Homework and Task
Every kid love reward; this feature comes up with the idea of providing extra reward time whenever your kids complete their work on time. The homework and task feature encourages your kids to build positive habits.
Whenever your kids complete the task listed on the app, your kids will be rewarded with additional screentime as a reward.
Pros of Screen Time
- It has a free plan.
- You can track up to five devices through one subscription.
- Provides you with a refund policy.
- Offers 14 days of the free trial period.
- It is quite difficult for kids to uninstall the app.
- Provides your daily report of your kids’ device usages.
Cons of Screen Time
- Lacks calls and messages monitoring feature.
- Lacks Windows and Mac monitoring features.
- Some of the features are available only on Android.
Pricing of Screen Time
Screen Time offers two price plans, which are:
| Plan | Price |
| Basic | It is free of cost. |
| Premium | It costs $6.99 per month. |
How to Install Screen Time
To install the Screen Time app on your kids’ Android device, you need to follow the following steps:
- First of all, download and install the Screen Time app from the play store.
- Now, go to settings and enable unknown sources.
- Open the app and customize the app according to your preference.
Conclusion
Summing up, Screen Time is an affordable parental control app that provides several features. It is one of the easy-to-use parental control apps and offers 24/7 customer support. You can manage your kids’ healthy screen habits with this app.
However, one drawback of the app is that many features are available only on Android devices. The app can be better if all the features are available on both IOS and android. This app does not monitor your kids’ calls, text messages, or social media activities.
Besides these drawbacks, the app works perfectly and has been satisfying over 2 million of its customers.
