Apple Screen Time is the parental controls system already built into every iPhone and iPad, and it is free. To use it properly on a child's device you need two things in place: a Child Account for your child inside your Family Sharing group, and a Screen Time passcode that only you know. Everything else (time limits, app limits, content filtering, contact controls) hangs off those two. Get them the right way round and the whole thing takes about twenty minutes.
Apple says a Child Account is required for children under 13 and available for children up to 18, and that setting one up switches on age-based safeguards automatically, such as limiting adult websites and age-based App Store restrictions. That is the bit worth knowing before you start: the account type does a lot of the work, and Screen Time then sits on top of it.
How do I set up Apple Screen Time on my child's iPhone?
Do it in this order. The order matters, because Screen Time controls only reach your child's device once their account is genuinely in your family group.
- Create the Child Account first. On your own iPhone, open Settings, tap your name, tap Family, then Add Member, then Create Child Account, and follow the prompts. If your child already has an Apple Account, add them to the family group instead.
- On your own phone, go to Settings, then Screen Time. Under Family, tap your child's name.
- Set a Screen Time passcode. Use four digits your child cannot guess, and not your door code, your bank PIN or their birthday.
- Turn on Content and Privacy Restrictions, enter the passcode when asked, then work down the options.
- Set Downtime for the hours when the phone should be away, and App Limits for daily caps on categories such as games or social media.
- Set Communication Limits so you decide who your child can contact, and check Communication Safety is on.
You can do all of this on the child's device instead if it is easier, but managing it from your own phone is better. It means you can change a limit without asking for their handset, and they cannot watch you type the passcode.
The passcode is the whole thing
If there is one part to take seriously, it is the Screen Time passcode. Without it, everything you set can be undone in about ten seconds by the person you set it for. With it, the limits hold. So do not reuse a code your child has already watched you type into that phone, write it down somewhere you will still find it in eighteen months, and if your partner also needs to change limits, agree one code between you.
What Screen Time is genuinely good at
Some of it is excellent, and it is worth knowing which parts to lean on:
- Age-based content filtering. Because the account knows your child's age, adult websites, films and books above your chosen rating, and App Store downloads above an age band, are filtered without much configuring.
- Purchase control. Ask to Buy sends any App Store purchase to you for approval, which quietly ends most in-app spending arguments.
- Contact control. Communication Limits let you decide who can reach your child by phone, Messages and FaceTime, which matters far more than screen hours for younger children.
- Communication Safety. Apple's on-device check blurs detected nudity in Messages and FaceTime and offers the child a way out, without sending images to Apple.
- Honest usage data. The weekly report tells you where the time actually goes, which is usually not where you assumed.
In iOS 26 and later there is a genuinely useful addition: your child can request an exception to a limit you have set, and you approve or decline it from your own phone. That turns "the phone cut me off mid-conversation" from a row into a request, which is a better dynamic than it sounds.
Where Apple Screen Time falls short
Being straight about this saves you from a false sense of security.
- It is not a monitoring app. It will not show you what your child said in a chat, and I would not want it to. If you want to know what is going on, the conversation does that job better than software.
- Limits are per Apple device, not per child. A locked-down iPhone next to an unmanaged iPad or a laptop is a gate with no fence.
- Category limits are blunt. "Social Networking" bundles apps you might feel very differently about.
- Web filtering works best in Safari. Other browsers and in-app browsers can behave differently.
- Determined teenagers find workarounds, and they share them. Treat Screen Time as a helpful default, not a sealed box.
The last point is the reason we push a written family agreement alongside the settings. The settings hold the line on the small stuff; the agreement is what you both point at when something bigger comes up. Our family agreement builder takes about five minutes and prints on one page.
What changes this autumn
Apple previewed a set of child safety features in June 2026 that arrive with the autumn releases, so it is worth knowing what is coming before you spend a Saturday configuring things:
- Time Allowances, which set limits by app category (Entertainment, Games, Social Media) with age-based guidance rather than one blanket daily figure.
- Schedules, for managing access at particular times of day.
- Ask to Browse, which makes a child request approval before opening a new website in Safari.
- Ask to Buy extended to free apps, not just paid ones.
- Communication Safety extended so it also intervenes on detected gore and violence, alongside nudity.
- A redesigned Screen Time view, so a parent can adjust access in fewer taps.
None of that is live yet, and nothing you set up today is wasted: these are additions to the same system.
If this is a brand new phone
Do the setup before you hand the phone over, not after. It is far easier to agree limits on a device your child has not yet made their own, and it avoids the "but you let me have it like this" conversation entirely. Our first phone guide covers the whole handover, and the printable setup checklist gives you a tick-list for the kitchen table. For the settings screen by screen, our iPhone and iPad guide goes further than this post and stays updated as Apple moves things around.
Apple Screen Time is the best free option you have on an iPhone, it takes twenty minutes, and the passcode decides whether any of it works. Set it up, expect to adjust it as your child gets older, and do not mistake it for supervision. It manages a device. You are still the parent.