COVID-19 lockdown: Here's how to control children's screen time on Apple iOS and Android phones

Due to the global pandemic COVID-19, most of the countries, in a bid to control the further spread of the coronavirus, have announced lockdown. Except for the essential goods transport and sale, all corporate companies, and educational institutions have been told to shut down for a few weeks.

While adults are forced to work from home, children and young college-going adults are also asked to attend online classes on PCs, tablets and mobile phones to complete the syllabus for the academic year.

However, once they finish their daily homework, they can't go out to play or socialise with friends and family. They are again going back to phones, tablets to watch movies, TV shows, browse through social media channels and call people, just to kill the boredom.

For working parents, it's a daunting task to keep an eye on what the children are doing all the time, as they have to focus on their work and also look after the house chores. Thankfully, there is a handy parental control Screen Time feature on both Apple iOS (& iPadOS) and Google Android mobile platforms, that will help them do just that without any fuss.

Screen Time feature on the iPhone and the iPad (Credit: Apple)

Screen Time feature on Apple devices
Go to Settings >> Screen Time

Manage your children’s contacts with full control over the list that only you can edit:
— During Allowed Screen Time, choose to allow “everyone” or “contacts only” to contact your children, giving you the option to prevent unknown contacts from reaching them.
— During Downtime or after app limits have expired, choose to further limit who your children can communicate with using the “specified contacts” option.
— For information on how to set up, you can find step-by-step guidelines here.

Get the most out of parental controls on your child's iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch
— Set Content & Privacy Restrictions to block or limit specific apps and features on your child's device.
— Automatically filter and set restrictions for content your child can access on his/her device.
— For information on how to set up, you can find step-by-step guidelines here.

Other notable Screen Time features include:
— Tap into reports from up to 30 days of usage data, and compare week over week results.
— App Limits allow you to combine specific apps or categories and make apps more discoverable.
— In Downtime, children can click One More Minute once to give them an additional minute of screen time.

Note:

To control the child's iPhone, the parent has to link the former's mobile to his/her account via the Family Sharing feature. More details (here)

Screen Time feature on Google's Android mobiles

Family Link app features (Credit: Google)

To control your children's screen time on an Android phone, parents have to install the Family Link app (here). They can create a Google Account for their child under 13 (or the applicable age in your country), and manage it using Family Link.

With Google Accounts, children get access to Google products like Search, Chrome, and Gmail, and parents can set up basic digital ground rules to supervise them.

Set daily limits
Step 1: Open the Family Link app Family Link.
Step 2: Select your child.
Step 3: On the "Daily limit" card, tap Set up or Edit limits.
Step 4: Follow the instructions on the screen to set daily limits.

Note: Daily limits apply to each Android device or Chromebook your child uses. For instance, if the parent set a daily limit of 2 hours, the child would get 2 hours of time on each device.

Set time limits on apps the children can use
Step 1: Open the Family Link app Family Link.
Step 2: Select your child.
Step 3: On the "Today's activity" card, tap Set limits.
Step 4: Next to your desired app, tap Empty hourglass and then Set limit.
Step 5: Set a daily time limit for the app.
Step 6: Tap Set.

Note:
*Time limits will apply to apps installed on all of the child's devices.
*System apps aren't supported by the app limit functionality. Limits can only be set for Android Noughat and newer devices

If the parent has a change of mind and wants to reset the screen time on apps for children's use, here's what they have to do.

To update a time limit on a specific application:
Step 1: Open the Family Link app Family Link and select your child.
Step 2: On the "Today's activity" card, tap More.
Step 3: Next to your desired app, tap Blue hourglass and then Edit limit Set limit.
Step 4: Change the time limit to your desired amount.
Step 5: To remove a limit, tap Delete limit.
Step 6: Tap Edit. The new limits will get updated whenever the child device is online next.

Here's how to lock children phones
Step 1: Open the Family Link app Family Link.
Step 2: Select your child.
Step 3: On the card for one of your child's Android devices, tap Lock now or Unlock.

Note: You can also use a parent access code to unlock your child's Android device or Chromebook if it isn't connected to the Internet.

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