How to Limit Screen Time on Your Kid's iPhone or iPad

The short version: On iOS 27, open Settings on your iPhone, tap Family, then tap your child's name. Use Time Allowances to set a daily budget for Games, Social Media, and Entertainment, and Screen Time Schedule to choose which kinds of apps work before school, during school, and after school. Put the apps they always need, like Phone and Messages, in Always Allowed, and lock it all with a Screen Time passcode. The same steps work for an iPad. Every device in your Family Sharing group must be on version 27; on iOS 26 and earlier, use App Limits and Downtime under Settings > Screen Time instead.

Picture the iPad on the sofa at 5pm, warm from three hours of use, and a child who swears it has been "like, twenty minutes". Neither of you is lying, exactly. Time on a tablet goes strange.

We know the feeling from the adult side too. Our own weekly Screen Time report has made us put the phone face down on the table more than once. A limit on the device is useful for that reason: it keeps the count when nobody in the house can.

This guide covers the settings. If you are still deciding what the rules should be, start with our guide on how to limit screen time for kids without being the phone police, then come back here to set them up.

Before you start

Your child needs a Child Account in your Family Sharing group. Everything below is set from your own iPhone. If your child's device is signed in with your Apple Account, the limits have nowhere to go.

Every device in the family needs version 27. Apple's redesigned parental controls require all devices in your Family Sharing group to run iOS, iPadOS, macOS, watchOS, or visionOS 27 or later. If one device cannot update, Apple's parental controls guide says you can keep using the previous version of Screen Time or change settings on your child's device. The iOS 26 steps are further down.

The iPhone and iPad steps are the same. Apple uses one set of controls for both, so "limit screen time for kids iPad" and "limit screen time for kids iPhone" have one answer.

Step 1: Set Time Allowances

Time Allowances are daily budgets for kinds of apps. Apple puts apps into three categories, Entertainment, Games, and Social Media, and suggests an age-based starting point for each one and for all three together.

1. On your iPhone, open Settings, tap Family, then tap your child's name.
2. Tap Time Allowances, tap Add, and follow the steps on screen.
3. Drag a category's slider, or use the plus and minus buttons, to change its daily time.
4. Drag the overall slider to change the total across all categories.
5. Under Additional Time Allowances, set limits for apps that do not fit a category.

Your child can use apps in a category until they reach that category's allowance or the shared total, whichever comes first. If an app sits in the wrong category, you can move it. Where a developer has linked an app to its website, the allowance covers time on both as well, so moving from the app to the browser keeps the same clock running.

Apple's starting points are a reasonable first draft. If you want to check them against the guidance, our screen time by age guide has the AAP and WHO ranges for each age.

Step 2: Build a Screen Time Schedule

Time Allowances decide how much. Screen Time Schedules decide when. Apple ships them with three time windows, Before School, School, and After School, and you choose which app categories work in each.

1. Open Settings > Family and tap your child's name.
2. Tap Screen Time Schedule, then turn on Schedule.
3. Tap Add Schedule and pick the days it covers. Most families make one for school days and one for weekends.
4. Tap a time window to change its name, its hours, or the app categories allowed in it.
5. To add a window, tap Add Time Window, then give it a name, a time, and allowed categories. To remove one, tap it, then tap Delete Time Window.

A bedtime window is the one we would add first. Give it a start time an hour before lights out, allow nothing beyond Always Allowed, and the phone gets quiet on its own. Apple's own setup guide points to the American Academy of Pediatrics advice to turn screens off at least an hour before bed and keep devices out of the bedroom overnight.

You can also make a custom schedule for odd days, like a half day at school or a Thursday with football practice.

Make allowances follow the schedule

Back in Time Allowances, turn on Match Screen Time Schedule if you want the budgets to apply within the schedule's windows. Tap a schedule's name there to see or change the allowances for it. This is how you give a child, say, more game time on Saturday than on a Tuesday.

Step 3: Choose what is Always Allowed

Some apps should keep working whatever the clock says. By default, Apple keeps FaceTime, Maps, Phone, and Messages available, as its guide to Always Allowed explains. These stay open when other apps are paused or limited by Time Allowances or a schedule.

Go to Settings > Family > your child > Always Allowed to add apps or contacts. Good candidates: a school app, a reading app, a music app for practice, and the contacts your child should always be able to reach, like grandparents.

Keep the list short. Every app on it is outside the limits.

Step 4: Handle requests for more time

When your child runs out of time, they can send you a request. It arrives in Messages on your iPhone, and Apple's guide to approving requests lists the options: Approve for 15 minutes, Approve for 1 hour, Approve all day, or Not Now to decline.

If you are in the same room, your child can tap Approve on Device on their phone or iPad, and you enter your Screen Time passcode there.

A tip from experience: agree in advance what a good request looks like. "Can I finish this match with Sam" at 4:50 is a different request from the sixth "pleeeease" of the evening. Saying yes to the first kind and Not Now to the second, every time, teaches the difference faster than any speech.

Step 5: Use the quick controls

At the top of your child's Screen Time settings, iOS 27 adds quick actions. Apple shows them as ways to pause device time, allow unlimited time, and change schedule. Pause is the one we reach for: dinner, a car ride, a conversation that needs eye contact. Always Allowed apps keep working while the device is paused.

Step 6: Lock it with a Screen Time passcode

None of this holds if your child can change it. The Screen Time passcode is separate from the code that unlocks their phone, and Apple says the parent sets it on their own device, not the child's. On iOS 27, go to Settings > Family > your child > Manage Screen Time and set it there, and accept Apple's offer to tie recovery to your Apple Account so you can reset it if you forget. Our guide to blocking apps on your kid's iPhone has more on keeping the passcode safe.

How to limit screen time on iOS 26 and earlier

If your family has a device that cannot run version 27, you will see the older Screen Time. The ideas are the same, and the names are different.

App Limits set a daily time for app categories or single apps. On your iPhone, go to Settings > Screen Time, tap your child's name, tap App Limits, then Add Limit. Pick a category or tap it to choose single apps, tap Next, and set the time.

Downtime blocks apps during set hours, like bedtime. Tap Downtime under your child's name, choose the days and hours, and turn on Block at Downtime. Apple's iOS 26 guide to Screen Time schedules notes that by default, limits can be ignored once reached, so the block setting matters.

Always Allowed lives on the same screen and works the same way. Keep Messages and Phone on it so your child can reach you during Downtime.

Requests on iOS 26 also come to you, and Apple notes that iOS 26 and later let a child request an exception to a limit.

What these limits can and cannot do

Apple's tools are free, built in, and for many families they are enough. A few honest limits on the limits:

• They need the family in sync. If your phone stops getting your child's reports, the controls may not be reaching their device either. Our guide to Screen Time "has not been available for 7 days" walks through the fixes.
• They count time and stop there. When the allowance runs out, the app goes dark, and nothing fills the gap. That gap is where the requests come from.
• They rest on one passcode. A code your child has seen over your shoulder undoes all of it.

Unglue is what we built for the second point. On iPhone it uses Apple's Screen Time framework to block the apps you choose, and they open again when your child earns minutes with real-life habits: a walk, a made bed, twenty minutes of reading. The request for more time becomes something your kid can do something about. For teenagers, Selection Lock keeps apps on the restricted list unless someone enters a Buddy Code that you hold. Our comparison of app blockers for kids puts it next to Screen Time honestly, and the parents page shows how families set it up.

If your child mostly uses a tablet that the whole family shares, our guide to blocking apps on a child's iPad covers the shared-device problems, and the pillar guide on reducing screen time without battles covers the conversations that make any of these settings stick.

Not sure where to set the limits?

Answer a few questions about your child and get a plan that fits your family.

Start Free 5-Minute Quiz

Join 50,000 families ungluing right now.

Common questions

How do I limit screen time for my child on iPhone?

On iOS 27, open Settings > Family, tap your child's name, and set Time Allowances for daily budgets and a Screen Time Schedule for when apps are available. On iOS 26 and earlier, use App Limits and Downtime under Settings > Screen Time. Either way, set a Screen Time passcode your child does not know.

How do I limit screen time for kids on an iPad?

The same way as an iPhone. Apple uses one set of controls for both, managed from your iPhone under Settings > Family. Every device in your Family Sharing group needs to be on version 27 for the new controls.

Can I set a time limit on just one app?

Yes. On iOS 27, use Additional Time Allowances inside Time Allowances. On iOS 26, use App Limits > Add Limit and tap a category to pick the single app.

What happens when my child's screen time runs out?

The limited apps stop. Always Allowed apps like Phone and Messages keep working. Your child can send you a request for more time, which you can approve for 15 minutes, an hour, or all day, or decline with Not Now.

Why are my child's screen time limits not working?

The usual causes are a family device that is not on version 27, a child signed in with the wrong Apple Account, a Screen Time passcode they know, or, on iOS 26, Block at Downtime switched off. If your phone has stopped showing their reports, start with our 7-day fix.

Can I set different limits on weekends?

Yes. Make a separate Screen Time Schedule for Saturday and Sunday, and turn on Match Screen Time Schedule in Time Allowances so the weekend budgets apply.