New ways to support teens and families on YouTube

YouTube serves as a hub for teenagers to explore their interests, whether they are studying, following their favorite creators, listening to popular podcasts, or catching up on sports highlights. We believe in safeguarding children within the digital landscape rather than shielding them from it entirely. For over a decade, we have focused on developing specialized products and integrated protections for our younger users.

When parents and experts share their expectations for teen and child accounts, they typically emphasize three primary areas:

Controls that assist in teaching children how to engage with content responsibly, while providing parents with options to make informed decisions for their households.

Content that is suitable for their age, alongside more rigorous policies and safety measures for younger viewers.

The appropriate experience for every age group, featuring a streamlined account setup with built-in protections that make it easier for parents to ensure their child is using the correct version of YouTube.

Today, we are announcing several updates designed to help parents customize their family’s YouTube experience, with a specific focus on teen viewers:

Parents can now help teens be more intentional about their viewing habits by using a control to limit the time spent scrolling through Shorts. Soon, parents will also have the option to set this timer to zero. This industry-first feature grants parents significant control over the amount of short-form content their children consume. It also offers added flexibility; for instance, parents can disable the Shorts feed when they want their teen to focus on schoolwork, then increase it to 60 minutes during a long car ride for entertainment. Furthermore, parents managing supervised accounts will be able to set custom Bedtime and Take a Break reminders, expanding upon the existing wellbeing protections already enabled for teens.

We are introducing a new set of principles and a creator guide to encourage teens toward content that is engaging, age-appropriate, high-quality, and enriching. Developed in collaboration with our Youth Advisory Committee and the Center for Scholars & Storytellers at UCLA, and supported by global experts from the American Psychological Association, the Digital Wellness Lab at Boston Children’s Hospital, and other international organizations, these principles define what constitutes high-quality and low-quality content for teen audiences.

We will utilize these principles and the guide to educate our global creator community on their role in supporting teens on YouTube. These standards also inform our recommendation system, allowing us to elevate high-quality videos—such as those from Khan Academy, CrashCourse, and TED-Ed—and increase how often they appear for teen viewers. This initiative builds upon our existing quality content principles for viewers under 13 and our current safeguards for teen recommendations.

Families already benefit from the peace of mind that comes with YouTube placing teens into protected under-18 accounts. In the coming weeks, we are launching an updated sign-up process that allows parents to create a new child account and easily toggle between profiles in the mobile app with just a few taps. This makes it simpler to ensure that every family member enjoys the right viewing experience, complete with content settings and recommendations tailored to the age-appropriate material they actually want to see.

We remain dedicated to evolving alongside the families who use YouTube, ensuring that the platform continues to be a safe and inspiring environment for the next generation to explore.