How to Set Up Google Family Link App on Android and Parental Control on Play Store

In the previous post we talked about How to Enable Parental Control Feature on Your Child's or Children's Phone and I showed you step by step how you can actually do this successfully.

It is important to note that your child's or children's wellbeing should be your uppermost priority in training your child. That is if you do not want to fail in such area in their lives.

HOW TO SET UP FAMILY LINK ON ANDROID

It’s pretty simple.

1. First, download the Google Family Link app (for parents) on your phone.

2. Walkthrough the app and set up a Google account for your child when prompted (or sign in to an existing account if available)

3. Now, sign in to the created account on your child's phone

4. Download the Family Link child and teen app on the child’s phone and follow the on-screen guides to complete the link-up.

That’s it. You can now control/monitor your child's Android device with the parental control options mentioned earlier.

NOTE: Family Link may not be that useful if your child is climbing up the age barrier already, and that's why we provide more ways to keep your children safe online below. 

How to set up parental controls on Google Play

Besides what happens online, in your child's browser, apps and games are other angles from which your children can get abused. Thankfully, you can prevent them from downloading unsuitable apps and games by putting up parental controls on the Google Play Store app. With that, you get control over what your child downloads or purchases on their Android devices based on their maturity level.

Here’s how to put parental controls on Android phones through the Play Store:

1. Launch the Play Store app on your child’s device.

2. Tap the Profile icon in the top right.

3. Click Settings, then

4. Tap Family Parental Controls to expand the drop down arrow

5. You would see Parental Controls turned off, click on it.

6. Then turn it on by flipping the toggle (as seen below). When you Click on the toggle it brings up a pop up, showing Create content PIN

5. Create a pin to protect the controls. (It should be what your child doesn’t know or can guess)

6. Choose what you want to filter.

7. Select the means of filtering or restricting the access.

That’s how to put parental controls on Android phones via the Play Store. Meanwhile, kindly note that whatever control/rule you assign for a child's device applies to the particular device only. If you have children, repeat the steps to set up parental controls on each one of them.

Also, if you’ve linked to child’s account to your Family Link app, as described earlier, you can set up Google Play Store parental controls on it. Just open the Family Link app and go to Manage Settings > Google Play to filter the content you want and how to restrict them.