Your child's first phone

A first phone is one of the few things you hand a child that arrives with no instructions.

I have set a good number of these up, for friends and for their children.

The same worries come up every time.

So this is everything I would tell you the week before you buy one.

None of it assumes you are technical.

Most of the work is a few minutes in the settings, done once.

Why do the rules come before the settings?

Because on day one, nothing has been taken away.

Whatever you agree before you hand it over is simply how this phone works.

A bicycle comes with a helmet, and this phone comes with rules.

Introduce the identical rule later and it lands as a punishment.

Then you spend the evening arguing about fairness instead.

Six rules cover almost everything that comes up.

• It charges outside the bedroom at night.
• Meals and study time are tech-free.
• There is a daily screen-off time you both stick to.
• They ask before downloading any new app.
• You check the phone together, never in secret.
• They can tell you anything, with no blame, ever.

Two of those apply to you as well.

A tech-free dinner table only works if your phone is off it too.

Write the six down and stick them on the fridge.

A rule that lives on paper stops being your opinion.

What actually happens in the settings?

Less than you fear.

On iPhone it all sits under Settings, then Screen Time.

On Android it is Google Family Link.

That is an app you install on your phone and on theirs.

Both give you one place to control what the phone can do.

Inside whichever one you are using, switch on content and age limits.

Turn on approval for every download, which iPhone calls Ask to Buy.

Switch in-app purchases off completely.

Block adult websites, which filters explicit sites in the browser.

In-app purchases deserve the extra second.

A free game can quietly become real charges on your card.

Then set the controls passcode to something they cannot guess.

This is the step most parents get wrong.

If your child knows that code, every setting above comes off in seconds.

Not their birthday, and not yours.

Not the code they watch you type to unlock your phone, either.

Keep it to yourself and the other parent.

Can I find them without everyone else finding them?

Yes, and this part surprises people.

Knowing your child got to school is one thing.

Letting an advertising company know it is quite another.

Share their location with you through Find My or Family Link.

Then turn location sharing to friends off.

Set each app's location access to "While Using", never "Always".

No app needs a child's location around the clock.

Go through the other permissions while you are in there.

That game works perfectly well without the microphone.

The same goes for the camera and for contacts.

Ad tracking takes seconds to close.

On iPhone, turn off "Allow Apps to Request to Track".

On Android, delete the advertising ID.

Nothing breaks.

The apps simply stop building a picture of a child who never agreed to any of it.

Set any social account to private too.

Do that before there is a following to argue about.

How does the nightly argument end?

By making it the phone's decision rather than yours.

A downtime schedule locks the phone overnight and greys the apps out.

Something like 9pm to 7am works well.

Allow calls during downtime, so your child can always reach you.

Daily limits do the same job for the apps that pull hardest.

The cap belongs to the phone, so there is nothing to argue with.

Two filters matter more than most parents realise.

Turn SafeSearch on inside their signed-in Google account, so it travels with them.

Set YouTube to Restricted Mode, or YouTube Kids for younger children.

A great deal of what children see by accident was never sought out.

It arrives through an ordinary search result, or through autoplay.

Neither filter is perfect, and nothing ever is.

But between them, accidental exposure goes from likely to unlikely.

And when something gets through anyway?

One day it will, and that is where the settings run out.

Children are clever, and the online world keeps shifting.

What protects them in that moment is not a switch.

It is whether they feel they can come to you.

Ask about the apps in an ordinary, unbothered way.

Listen more than you lecture.

Mean the no-blame rule the first time it is tested.

Your face in that moment tells them whether to ever come back.

Deal with the problem afterwards, calmly.

Then loosen the setup as they grow.

A nine-year-old's phone and a fourteen-year-old's should not look the same.

Things to Remember

• Agree the rules before you hand the phone over, never after.
• Set up Screen Time or Family Link, and keep that passcode to yourself.
• Switch in-app purchases off, and approve every download yourself.
• Share their location with you only, and switch ad tracking off.
• Give the phone a bedtime, allow calls during it, and lock SafeSearch into their Google account.
• Guard your first reaction, because you are the safety feature no setting replaces.