How to Limit Who Kids Can Call, Text, and Face Time on iPhone
We'll show you how new and improved features can help you reduce your kids' smartphone habits so they don't call, text, or face-to-face they shouldn't communicate.
What's New in Apple’s Screen Time Update
In iOS 13, Apple added new and improved features to Screen Time, which can help parents reduce their children's dependence on the iPhone.
It is one way for parents to help their child develop healthy device habits instead of being glued to the smartphone. Parents can now see how often their kids are using the phone, where they spend the most time, and the apps they use frequently.
They can also configure various options to limit the time spent on certain applications or block them completely, as well as limit children who can call, send SMS or Face Time. This is made possible through a combination of specific apps and categories of apps, as well as websites.
The new controls allow parents to apply various limitations on messaging and calling during their children's rest hours and the hours of screen time allowed. It is also possible to display your children's screen time in the form of weekly reports with graphs which compare usage from one week to the next.
Note: You can't manage who can contact your kids via messages, calls, or Face Time during certain hours of the day if you upgrade to iOS 13.3 or higher.
Improved screen time system operation on iPhone
The new features deployed in iOS 13 are intended to give parents the power to communicate with their children on an iPhone or iPad.
The controls can be found in the iPhone settings under the Screen Time Communication Limits section. When this setting is enabled, unknown contacts will not be able to reach children during their allowed screen time. Therefore, only those of your contacts can communicate with you or your children.
During downtime, you can choose whether designated contacts or anyone else can reach you or your children on your iPhone. This means that you can choose the specific contacts that your child can call or send, for example, only mom or dad.
By scheduling the downtime (day or night) to run, the controls help parents prevent their kids from texting or calling their friends late at night or a school day. During these periods, only specific applications and calls may be available or make calls.
Parents can also remotely manage their children's iCloud contacts, so they can easily share important numbers with them, while keeping control of the contact list.
The Screen Time system, supplied with iOS 12, also allows iPhone users to set time limits on apps, schedule time from their screen, view activity reports and Use, among others.
How to set limits on who children can call, message or face
If you haven't set up Screen Time for your iPhone or your child's iPhone, here's how to do it before you can set communication limits.
Step 1: Set up family sharing. This is a handy feature that allows up to six people to share Apple Music, iCloud storage, location data, iTunes apps and purchases, among others. Go to Settings> Set up family sharing.
2nd step: Press Start and select a category you want to share, then follow the on-screen prompts until you get to the Invite family members option.
Step 3: If there are members with an Apple ID who do not need parental controls during setup, add them to your list. Tap Family Sharing again and you're all set up.
Step 4: Then set up your child's account as a "child account" by going to Settings> Screen time and tapping on your child's name. Tap Activate screen time and follow the on-screen prompts to configure application limits, downtime and content and privacy, among other settings.
Step 5: Then tap Communication limits. Here you can limit the people they can call, send SMS and FaceTime, as well as manage their contacts.
Step 6: Set rules for During Screen Time Allowed and During Downtime by tapping on each of these sections. Under the option "During allowed screen time", you can set the communication to Contacts only or Everyone. During the unavailability period, there is an option to communicate with specific contacts, which you must add via a contact editor or a browser, which is more restrictive.
If you want granular control over your children's contacts, tap the button next to Manage Contacts (child's name). Approve the request on your child's device by tapping Approve, and you're good to go.
Note: If you have the Screen Time passcode for your iPhone or your child's device, you can control who contacts them or who they contact via iPhone, Messages and FaceTime. Make sure iCloud contact synchronization is turned on; otherwise, this feature will not work.
Keep children away
Children are explorers, so naturally they will want to find out what else is on your iPhone that they don't already know. By using the new and improved screen time parental controls, you can limit who to contact for their safety and peace of mind.
Then: Need to limit what your kids can watch on YouTube? Check out our next article on how to turn on Restricted Mode to filter out potentially mature content that you don't want them to see when using your phone.