Apple Step Up In The Face Of Calls For More Parental Controls

I was recently invited by Apple to check out their latest endeavours to empower parents when it comes to controlling their kids' access to screen time. There's no 'right' or 'wrong' answer to how much screen time is too much. It depends on the family right? The individual kids? The day? Whatever your personal feelings on screen time, chances are as your kids get older you're only going to be able to avoid the need to take control for so long.

I'm lucky. Currently, my kids are far too young to understand the concept of autonomy. In their world myself and my husband are gods. Dictators of their tiny universes, in charge of, well, pretty much everything. They only get the screen when we give it to them and they're currently small enough (and weak enough) for us to physically remove it from them when they are, let's say 'reluctant' to return the digital nanny after the allotted time.

That being said, with a feisty five-year old on my hands, it's only a matter of time before she discovers a word beyond BBC Playtime and Paw Patrol on Netflix. Fortnite is looming, somewhere in the distance but prevalent enough in the lives of my friends' older children to make me shudder with fear. The threat is real and it's time for me to arm myself.

So, Apples new parental controls are pretty slick. They're entirely customisable - you can dictate time limits by category - social media, gaming etc. - and here's the best bit, they're accessible remotely. Once you've set up your kids devices with the agreed limits, they can be on the other side of the world (if only!) and you can still manage their access.

I've done everything I can to create a vlog that talks you through this in a way that doesn't make your eyes bleed with boredom. It's a super quick and easy tour of how to take back control of your kids screens. Trust me. It's worth the watch.

Sponsored Post: Apple provided an iPhone XR to Cat Sims for the purposes of testing.