Plain English first; the technical detail is tucked inside each section if you want it. ChildSafe runs on the child’s Android phone (8.0 or newer) and is managed entirely from yours.
Install the ChildSafe parent app on your phone, add your child, and pick an age mode — Young Child, Pre-teen or Teen. A short wizard sets the first screen-time rules, then shows you a QR code. Factory-reset the child’s phone, scan the code, and the phone sets itself up as a managed device. From that point, every rule lives in your pocket.
ChildSafe uses Android’s built-in enterprise management (the same framework businesses use to secure staff phones). During QR provisioning, Google’s Android Device Policy takes ownership of the device and force-installs ChildSafe — which is why a child cannot uninstall it. Works on any Android 8.0+ phone; the QR code can be regenerated from the parent app at any time.
ChildSafe works on approval, not blocklists: everything is off until you allow it. For younger children the Play Store is closed entirely. Teens can browse it — but installing means asking first.
Young Child and Pre-teen modes run the Play Store in whitelist mode (only approved apps are even visible); Teen mode runs it in blacklist mode with the request flow. Blocked apps are uninstalled where possible; system apps that can’t be removed are disabled instead. A background service also watches for new installs in real time, and ChildSafe automatically detects which phone, messages and camera apps your child’s particular phone uses (Samsung, Pixel and others differ) so the essentials keep working.
Set a daily allowance and the hours it applies — different on school days and weekends. When time is up, the phone locks and your child cannot work around it. Calls and text messages always keep working, so they can reach you and you can reach them.
Enforcement is local to the phone — lockouts land in milliseconds, not on the next server sync, and they keep working with no internet connection. You can set multiple time windows per day (7–9am and 4–6pm, say). During lockdown the phone and messaging apps stay available; everything else is locked at system level. Take a Break budgets are enforced on the device and reset on the clock hour.
Filtering happens at the network level of the phone itself, so it covers every app and every browser — not just Chrome. It’s on from the phone’s very first boot, and it can’t be switched off from the child’s side.
ChildSafe enforces encrypted, filtered DNS (via AdGuard DNS, one policy per child) at operating-system level, applied from first boot. The usual ways round a filter are closed: private browsing is disabled in the managed browser, sideloading and unknown sources are blocked (so a VPN app can’t just be installed), Android’s “Circle to Search” screen-search is blocked on newer phones, and Bluetooth file sharing is disabled so content can’t arrive by side door.
Every monitoring feature is off by default and separately switchable. Some families want all of it, some none; most start small and adjust. Whatever you enable, your child can see ChildSafe on the phone — this is protection, not spying.
Monitored texts and notifications are deleted from ChildSafe’s systems automatically after seven days — this is a smoke alarm, not an archive. Keyword scanning happens on the device against a curated database maintained by an automated research pipeline and reviewed continuously; alert levels are configurable per category, and evaluation takes your child’s age mode into account. Image scanning runs a nudity-detection model entirely on the phone, with a sensitivity level you control. Browsing logs come from the DNS filter (domains only — never full pages or content) and are retained by AdGuard for up to 90 days.
A quiet look at the map when you want reassurance — no ping on their phone, no fuss. And when a phone goes missing down the back of a sofa or on a bus, you have real options.
Location updates with every device check-in. Only the most recent position is kept on ChildSafe’s servers — each update overwrites the last, so there is no movement history to leak. Arrive/leave alerts are worked out server-side from the places you save, and lost-phone commands are pushed with maximum priority so they land in seconds.
Sooner or later most children try a YouTube tutorial on beating parental controls. ChildSafe is built into Android’s own management layer, not bolted on top — so the usual tricks don’t work, and the unusual ones tell you they were tried.
Developer options are disabled at policy level, which on managed Android removes safe mode entirely. Google Play Integrity verification runs on every check-in to detect rooting or tampering. Wi-Fi networks can be parent-managed, and if your child signs into Chrome or adds a Google account, you can control and see that too. The safety audit log is immutable — it survives deletions.
Homework over-runs. There’s a video call with grandparents. Real life doesn’t fit neatly inside Bedtime mode — and rigid controls create arguments. ChildSafe builds the exceptions in.
Parenting is rarely a one-person job. Invite a partner, co-parent or trusted family member by email and share the picture — everyone sees the same dashboard and gets the same alerts.
Two optional helpers, both off until you decide otherwise. One is for your child; one is for you.
Learning Buddy messages pass two independent moderation checks on the way in and the way out, and flagged exchanges appear in your app with context. The Assistant can only reach a fixed set of safe actions — there is no way for it to delete data or remove protection, and every change is confirmed by you before it’s applied.
A five-year-old with a phone needs a different thing to a fifteen-year-old with a phone. ChildSafe has three modes — Young Child, Pre-teen and Teen — and you move through them at your child’s pace. The blocks ease, the conversations get harder, and by the time ChildSafe comes off, your child has had years of practice with the phone — not all of it landing at sixteen.
ChildSafe is in testing with UK families now — numbers kept small, feedback taken seriously, changes shipped weekly. If this page sounds like the plan you’ve been missing, come and help us finish it.
Join the testing programme Free during testing · Android 8.0+ · Set up in about ten minutes