Popular short-video platform TikTok has announced a range of new features for teens, families, and its broader community. The platform is updating its screen time tool with more custom options, introducing new default settings for teen accounts, and is also expanding Family Pairing with more parental controls.
Starting in the coming weeks, every account belonging to a user below age 18 will automatically be set to a 60-minute daily screen time limit. This limit was chosen after consultation with experts from the Digital Wellness Lab at Boston Children’s Hospital and considering current academic research. If the 60-minute limit is reached, teens will be prompted to enter a passcode in order to continue watching, requiring them to make an active decision to extend that time.
As part of empowering families and assuring user safety, TikTok has rolled out three new features in the Family Pairing:
- Custom daily screen time limits: Parents and caregivers can customize the daily screen time limit for teenagers. For each day, a different time limit can be set. Families can set the timings by following the school schedules, family travel, and holidays.
- Screen time dashboard: The dashboard will show summaries of time spent on TikTok and how many times the app was opened. Parents will also find a breakdown of the total time spent during the day and night.
- Mute notifications: With the help of this option, parents can decide to mute notifications for their teen by setting up a schedule. Under the new update, users aged 13-15 will not be sent notifications from 9:00 pm onwards. Similarly, the push notifications are disabled from 10:00 pm onwards for accounts whose users are aged 16-17.
TikTok is also rolling out a sleep reminder through which users can do better planning on going offline at night time. A pop-up will appear at the set time to remind users to log off from the application. To educate parents and children about the new features, TikTok has partnered with creative content creators and experts from the industry. The in-app support also plays a vital role in teaching users about the Family Pairing option and newly introduced features.
TikTok remains committed to helping families establish an ongoing dialogue about safety and well-being in the digital world. The platform will continue to invest in improving its current features and introducing new tools to help people stay in control as they express their creativity, make meaningful connections, and enjoy culture-defining entertainment.
For more information, please visit TikTok’s Safety Center.
