I have gone into the my daughters screentime and set app limits, down time, and all catagories to 1 min. and "block at end of limit" . Tiktok and Episode game are still up and running on my daughters phone. PLease advise why these apps STILL run and how to limit.
I have had this incredibly frustrating problem twice now -- I've actually had two problems: 1) not all apps are blocked at downtime, and 2) apps aren't blocked after the time limit is reached. Finally, after HOURS of time trying to fix the problem, I finally figured out something that worked! In the hopes that this might help others, I wanted to post my solution.
Step 1: from the parent's phone, turn off screen time for the child's account. Settings->Screen Time->Child's name->Turn Off Screen Time (scroll to the very bottom to find this)
Step 2: from the child's phone, go into settings and sign out of the phone. Settings->Child's name (at the very top)->Sign Out (at the very bottom). This didn't change any of the contents of the phone (at least it didn't for me), it just removes your child's apple ID from the phone.
Step 3: (this one might not be needed, but I did this part too, so just in case) power down the child's phone and keep it off for one or two minutes.
Step 4: power the child's phone back up, and sign back in using the child's apple ID. Settings->Sign in to your iPhone (at the top).
This completely cleared all the Screen Time settings from the phone and reset it back to what it looked like when everything was new. From there, I just went through the normal steps for setting up Screen Time for the first time. When it was set back up, the problem with screen time not blocking apps was gone ... at least for now.
My child only has one Apple device (the phone), so I don't know if it would be more complicated with more devices. Maybe you have to do it for all of them simultaneously?
At any rate, good luck -- I hope this helps!
Does anyone have a solution for screen time not blocking Instagram, Snap chat or Tim Tok?
I tried this and couldn’t find where. Maybe my kid had an old Tim Tok installed. I looked everywhere.
Thanks, I will give it another go.
I am also experiencing this issue on all my kids devices. Being that these are their two main apps, it’s a big issue!
Same issue. Cannot rtestrict tiktok . Do we have a an answer from apple support ?
An absolute joke & apple are just paying lip service to the issue!
IngridGS wrote:
Nothing in particular. I think they are making changes slowly so they may fix some but not all as they go along :-/
If it "just started working" that suggests Apple changed nothing, but the app itself made changes to it's code to be included in Apple's Screen time processes.
It needs to be understood that Apple does not just send "fixes" in the background without your knowledge and agreement. All changes to iOS & native apps are sent via iOS updates which you agree to.
Same problem. Yes I know how to use it. Screen time will not block TIK-TOK. If I can't control my kids usage on an iphone, I will get another brand smart phone with working parental controls. Apple must do better.
i noticed something interesting after I turned off screen time for my child's account and turned it back on from my “parent” phone. The name of the TikTok application was updated to a new name “TikTok-Trends Start Here”. This may explain why I had it working at one point and then all of a sudden screen time stopped limiting TikTok. If TikTok is changing the name of their app on a random basis and Apple’s Screen Time doesn’t recognize that name change without a reset, it’s going to keep “breaking” for everyone.
I’m going to see if this works and let everyone know.
For what it's worth, I posted a solution that worked for me: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/251313296?answerId=253407478022#253407478022
I'd be interested to see if it works for others as well (I think clicking on the "helpful" link will cause it to appear more prominently when you search for the issue ... assuming it is actually helpful).
TikTok has a way to link your account with your child’s account and set controls. I have my Kids account set up to block the app after 60 minutes a day. They can still create videos and such but after that hour they are locked out of the app.
Nothing worked for me to block TikTok and YouTube but I found a work-around.
Set Content & Privacy Restrictions / Content Restrictions / Apps / age level to 12+ (or Don't Allow Apps) and the apps will disappear.
You’re welcome! You can also set controls within TikTok itself by linking to a parent account. The kids are allowed 1 hour on TikTok but they get 3 hours of screen time overall. If they use an hour on TikTok it shuts the app down.
I have this same problem and it is quite frustrating.
as it does not work properly, here is what I am doing now, I tell my kid that if I notice he goes over the time limit, I will change the age limit on his phone of all apps to 3+, it will cause the disaperance of almost all apps.
As the kid does not like it, he now make sure he stays within the limits I gave.
I also deactivated the possibility to uninstall an app so he cannot reset the time limits.
Its a shame apple is not doing anything to fix properly the screen time that has never worked propertly since I got to use it!
Small win for the parents who are frustrated with iPhone screen time not working for Tik Tok...
In the Tik Tok app, go to settings then digital wellbeing. The app has a built in 60 min screen time management feature and content restriction mode that needs a passcode to be turned off. Hopefully that helps
Parent Control- Screen time not working for tiktok and Episode APP
