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Aging Out of Screen Time Family Sharing

I created an AppleID Family consisting on me, my wife, and our daughter who is now 15 years old.


As a result, Screen Time on my iPhone allows me to to control the the Screen Time settings on our daughter’s iPhone. Moreover, Screen Time settings that I make on her iPhone can’t be changed without entering a 4-digit Screen Time Passcode so she can’t change settings I’ve made.

I think that at some point I won’t be able to change Screen Time settings on her iPhone this way. I think that once she attains some particular age based on the birthday in her AppleID, Apple will consider her an adult for the purposes of Family Sharing and will therefore take away my ability as her parent to remotely control her Screen Time settings.


Does anyone know whether it’s true that Family Sharing based Screen Time is restricted to a particular age range?


I seem to recall that my daughter will age out of Family Sharing child status at 16. But I can’t find anything about aging out of AppleID child status anywhere on the internet.


Does anyone know at what age Family Sharing considers a child to crossover to being an independent person for the purposes of Screen Time?


Please post only technical replies. Please do not respond with comments about whether using using Screen Time this way is appropriate parenting. I’m just soliciting technical facts about an iOS feature.


Thank you for reading

Posted on Jun 13, 2021 9:00 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jun 22, 2021 6:55 AM

As you suggested, I called Apple Support.


I was told that in the United States, a child ages out of parental controls via Screen Time Family Sharing at 18.

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2 replies

Jun 14, 2021 9:22 AM in response to Nello Lucchesi

Hey there Nello Lucchesi,


Thanks for reaching out to Apple Support Communities. We understand you have some questions about a child aging out of Screen Time and Family Sharing. We’ll be happy to help.


While the resource Use parental controls on your child's iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch doesn’t provide a specific age the child ages out of this, a child can remove themselves from Family Sharing at a certain age (this varies by country and region) which could affect Screen Time. You can read more about this here:


Family Sharing and Apple ID for your child


If you have more questions on this, you can reach out to Apple Support directly here:


Contact Apple Support


Take care.

Aging Out of Screen Time Family Sharing

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