New Features Available on the Xbox Family Settings App to Help Manage Children’s Gaming
Gaming has long been a significant source of joy, inspiration, and social connection for players around the world, and social distancing has made this truer now than ever before. With the holiday break on the horizon, many parents and caregivers may be looking for ways to help balance screen time and family time. We know achieving this balance is important to families. That is why earlier this fall, we launched the Xbox Family Settings app for free on iOS and Android. Today, we are taking the next step on our journey to support families by introducing two new app features for child accounts on Xbox Live.
Pause Screen Time
The ability to pause screen time has been our number-one requested feature from parents and caregivers. Today, we are happy to add the Pause Screen Time feature to the app, which empowers parents to temporarily pause screen time for their children’s accounts – even if they have more screen time available for the day.
Whether the feature is used to reinforce asks to set the table for dinner or to make sure homework is completed, this feature will block children from their account until parents decide it’s time to play again, or until the block expires at the end of the day. Children will see the standard “Your screen time is up” notification on their screen when parents press pause, and once parents decide play can resume, the preestablished rules for game time will take effect.
Pause your children’s game time by temporarily blocking their screen time. When paused, your child will see the “your screen time is up” message until you decide they can play again.
Ask to Buy
As we head into the holidays, it makes sense that children might want to purchase new games to play. We saw that our Ask to Buy feature – which is currently available via family settings on Xbox via console and PC – helps parents manage their children’s spending. So, we brought the feature to the Xbox Family Settings App so parents can manage from their phone.
When “Ask to buy” is activated for your children, you can get a notification in the app.
If the setting is on, when children choose a game they would like to purchase, a request will be sent to the parent’s phone. This notification will include a link to where they can learn more about the game before approving or declining the purchase. The app will also list approved purchases so parents can keep track of recent purchases.
We hope that this feature helps take one more thing off the plates of busy parents everywhere.
These two features join the existing app’s
functionality, which helps to tailor each child’s access to Xbox:
- Screen
time limits – set limits for each day of the week; for example, you
can allow for more game time on the weekends or reduce it during the
school week. And a new feature available today allows parents to
proactively grant additional screen time – a great option if they did well
on a test or completed their homework!
- Content
filters – set filters based on the age of each child; for example, an
8-year-old can only access games that are rated E and will be blocked from
accessing titles that are intended for more mature players.
- Play
and communication settings – choose the option to block all access to
play and communication with other players, limit access to “friends only”
or grant permission for older children to play and chat with “everyone.”
- Friends
list – new with the app is the ability to approve or decline friend
requests your child has made to add friends; parents can also view their
friends list.
- Activity
reports – view daily and weekly activity reports for each child to
understand how they are spending their time on Xbox.
Gaming is a great way to keep in touch with
friends and family and have fun throughout the year, but it should also be part
of a balanced lifestyle. We hope the Xbox Family Settings app will empower
parents to have conversations about the right amount of gaming and appropriate
content with their children. We’ll continue to update the Xbox Family Settings
app to ensure that it meets the needs of today’s families and help everyone to
enjoy fun and age-appropriate gaming.
Download the Xbox Family Settings app today
for free for iOS and Android to jump in and easily manage your family’s
gaming on-the-go.
For more information about the Xbox Family
Settings app, visit Xbox.com/family-app.