When to Allow Screens: What the Experts Say (and What We Actually Did)

If you've ever handed your toddler your phone in a waiting room and then felt that little stab of guilt — hello, you're my people.

The question of when to allow screens is one of the first big parenting decisions of the digital age, and the internet answers it in two unhelpful ways: either "screens are melting your child's brain" or "relax, it's all fine". Neither is what the actual evidence says. So let's do what my husband makes me do every time I panic about something online: go to the primary sources.

What the official guidance actually says, age by age

Under 12 months: basically none. The World Health Organization's guidelines for under-5s are blunt on this one — for babies under 1, screen time is simply "not recommended", and the same goes for 1-year-olds. What babies need at that age is floor play, faces, and a frankly outrageous amount of sleep (the WHO says 14–17 hours a day for newborns, which raised a hollow laugh from me too).

The video-chat exception. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) says screens are best avoided before 18 months — except video chatting. A FaceTime with Grandma is not "screen time" in the worrying sense, because it's a real human interacting with your baby. Use it freely and without guilt.

Ages 2 to 5: no more than an hour, and less is better. The WHO's line for 2, 3 and 4-year-olds is that sedentary screen time "should be no more than 1 hour; less is better." The AAP lands in the same place, suggesting parents "cap your child's electronic entertainment time at 1 hour a day from age 18 months to age five." The word doing the heavy lifting there is entertainment — and the AAP adds that kids this age learn much more from a screen when a parent watches with them.

School age and up: there's no magic number — truly. This surprises a lot of parents. Our own eSafety Commissioner says it straight: "There is no magic figure. The right amount of screen time can depend on a range of factors like your child's age and maturity, the kind of content they are consuming, their learning needs and your family routine." And the AAP has actually moved away from blanket hour-limits for older kids — its current guidance is a framework called the 5 Cs (the Child, the Content, Calm, Crowding out, and Communication) plus a written Family Media Plan, rather than a single number for every child.

In other words: past about age five, the experts stopped counting minutes years ago. The real questions are what your child is watching or playing, what it's replacing (sleep? outside play? actual conversations?), and whether you're in the loop.

Quality beats the clock

An hour of your 8-year-old building something ridiculous in Minecraft with his cousin is not the same hour as sixty minutes of autoplay YouTube slop. eSafety makes exactly this point — "the quality and nature of what they are doing online, and your involvement, are just as important" as the clock.

So when you're deciding whether to say yes to screens, I'd honestly worry less about the timer and more about three things:

1. Is the content decent? Made for kids, calm pacing, no rabbit holes. (Our app and game reviews can help here.)
2. Is it crowding anything out? Sleep and outdoor play are the two the research keeps coming back to.
3. Are you nearby? Co-viewing with littlies, and staying genuinely curious (not surveillance-y) with bigger kids.

The honest bit about guilt

Every mum I know has broken every rule above at least once — sick days, long-haul flights, that one hellish week of school holidays. The WHO guideline is a target for normal days, not a purity test. If screens got you through a rough patch, that's called parenting, not failure. What matters is the pattern across weeks, not the worst Tuesday you ever had.

If you're just starting to set things up, our getting started guide walks you through it step by step, and the family checklist is a good ten-minute audit. And whatever age your kids are, the single most protective thing costs nothing: keep talking with them about what they watch.