TikTok, a leading destination for short-form mobile video, today announces new features for teens, families, and its broader community. In efforts to create digital experiences that bring joy and play a positive role in how people express themselves, discover ideas, and connect, TikTok will be improving its screen time tool with more custom options, introducing new default settings for teen accounts, and expanding Family Pairing with more parental controls.
Changes to help teens manage their time on TikTok
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. While there's no collectively-endorsed position on the 'right' amount of screen time or even the impact of screen time more broadly, we consulted current academic research and experts from the Digital Wellness Lab at Boston Children's Hospital in choosing this limit. 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.
Research also shows that being more aware of how we spend our time can help us be more intentional about the decisions we make. So we're also prompting teens to set a daily screen time limit if they opt out of the 60-minute default and spend more than 100 minutes on TikTok in a day. This builds on a prompt we rolled out last year to encourage teens to enable screen time management; our tests found this approach helped increase the use of our screen time tools by 234%. In addition, we'll send every teen account a weekly inbox notification with a recap of their screen time.
These features add to TikTok's robust existing safety settings for teen accounts. For instance, those aged 13-15 have their accounts set to private by default, enabling teens to make informed choices about what they choose to share, when, and with whom. Direct messaging is only available to those age 16 and older and to host a LIVE, community members must be at least 18.
In the coming weeks, accounts of users below age 18 will automatically be set to a 60-minute daily screen time limit. 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.
To encourage teens to be more conscious about their daily screen time, TikTok will also prompt teens to set a daily screen time limit if they opt out of the 60-minute default and spend more than 100 minutes on TikTok in a day. In addition, TikTok will also be sending every teen account a weekly inbox notification with a recap of their screen time.
Helping families have conversations about digital well-being
When teens need support, parents or caregivers are often the first people they can turn to, making them one of TikTok's most important partners. As TikTok continues to innovate on the way it empowers families, three new features to Family Pairing will be added. This includes:
• Custom daily screen time limits: Caregivers will be able to use Family Pairing to customize the daily screen time limit for their teens – including choosing different time limits depending on the day of the week – giving families more choices to match screen time to school schedules, holiday breaks, or family travel.
• Screen time dashboard: TikTok is bringing its screen time dashboard to Family Pairing, which provides summaries of time on the app, the number of times TikTok was opened, and a breakdown of total time spent during the day and night. From its recent research, TikTok found that screen time is one of the topics parents most frequently discuss with their teens. Hence, TikTok is looking to support caregivers with relevant information to help them guide their teens.
• Mute notifications: Notifications help users to stay connected, but there are times when it's important to be uninterrupted. TikTok is introducing a new setting that enables parents to set a schedule to mute notifications for their teens. Accounts aged 13-15 already do not receive push notifications from 9pm and accounts aged 16-17 have push notifications disabled from 10pm.
Every teen is different, and so is every family. That's why TikTok remains focused on reaching parents with the information they need about the platform. This is done through partnerships with creators, industry experts, and advertising campaigns focused on safety features. TikTok also continues to surface Family Pairing information to some of its users in-app to help them understand the options that may be useful to them or someone they know. TikTok hopes these features will continue to help families establish an ongoing dialogue about safety and well-being in our digital world.
New screen time controls for everyone
TikTok's desire is for its community to feel in control of their in-platform experience. In addition to bringing these new features to Family Pairing, everyone will soon be able to set their own customized screen time limits for each day of the week and set a schedule to mute notifications.
In addition, TikTok will be rolling out a sleep reminder to help people more easily plan when they want to be offline at night. People can set a time, and when it's reached, a pop-up will remind them it's time to log off.
TikTok will continue to invest in improving its current features as well as introducing new tools to help people stay in control as they express their creativity, make meaningful connections, and enjoy culture-defining entertainment.
