Frequently asked questions

You install FamilyLock on your child's phone, set a PIN, and choose a rule for each app: Allowed, Curfew, Timed, or Blocked. When a locked app opens, FamilyLock's PIN screen appears over it. Everything runs on that phone. There is no account and no server. The setup guide walks through every step, with the screens you will see.

Pick up the phone. The Home screen shows a banner if anything in Setup is missing, and the History screen, behind your PIN, shows when restricted apps were opened or locked, when the PIN was used, when settings changed, and when protection went off or on.

No. FamilyLock has no internet permission. It works the same in airplane mode. The only network activity involved is your purchase through Google Play.

Not yet. FamilyLock is Android only, version 8 and newer.

Yes, on Android tablets with Android 8 or newer. FamilyLock uses its phone layout in a centred column, and the lock screen turns with the tablet.

Yes. Google Play ties your purchase to the Google account that bought it, so any phone signed in to that account can install FamilyLock without paying again. A phone on a different Google account, such as a child's own account, needs its own purchase. Each phone is set up on its own; settings are not shared between phones.

Curfew follows the allowed hours on the Curfew screen, the same for every Curfew app. Timed gives one app its own daily minutes at any time of day, and curfew still applies on top. Use Curfew for bedtime and Timed for something like 30 minutes of games a day.

At the end time you set. "7:00 AM to 9:00 PM" locks at 9:00 PM on the dot. An end of 12:00 AM means midnight. If the start and end are the same time, the app is allowed all day. Overnight hours work: the hours after midnight belong to the day the window started on.

Phone, Contacts, Clock and the home screen always stay open, so your child can always call for help, answer your calls and stop an alarm, and you cannot lock yourself out of the home screen. Messages is not in the group, so you can put texting under curfew like any other app; calls still work. Settings always needs your PIN, because it is where protection could be switched off. These rules are fixed on purpose, so they cannot be changed by accident.

Settings is where Accessibility access can be switched off and where picture-in-picture can be turned back on, so it always needs your PIN. To use it yourself, enter your PIN on its lock screen. When you open Settings from FamilyLock's own Setup or Picture-in-picture screens, it lets you through for that visit only: the pass ends when you come back, tap Lock or go to another app, and after five minutes at most.

Yes. The lock screen says why, and when the app is allowed again, for example "Allowed again tomorrow at 7:00 AM". With notifications allowed, they also get a warning five minutes before a curfew or time limit locks the app they are using.

A switch on the Home screen, behind your PIN. Until midnight, Curfew and Timed apps open freely, whatever the time or minutes left, while Blocked apps stay locked. Timed apps keep counting and uninstall protection stays on. Ending it early takes one tap.

The opposite. Until midnight, every app is locked except Phone, Contacts and Clock, including apps set to Allowed. Parts of the phone without an app icon, like the keyboard and notifications, keep working. Starting it needs no PIN, since it only makes things stricter. Ending it early does. You can still unlock a single app from its lock screen with your PIN.

Enter your PIN on a lock screen, choose 30 minutes or 1 hour (or type any length up to 24 hours), then tap Allow. Granted time runs on the clock: 30 minutes ends 30 minutes later, however much of it was used. It is extra time and is not taken from an app's daily limit. Manage Apps shows it counting down, and you can remove it early there.

Not easily. When Android asks to confirm an uninstall of FamilyLock, your PIN screen appears instead. With your PIN you get a Remove FamilyLock button, so it is always one PIN away for you. The same goes for uninstalling it from the Play Store. Accessibility access can be switched off in Settings, which is why Settings always needs your PIN.

Yes. In Manage Apps, open Protected apps and switch on any app you installed, like a school app or the messenger you use to reach your child. When Android asks to confirm uninstalling one of them, your PIN screen appears instead, and your PIN gives you a Remove button for that app. Apps that came with the phone can't be uninstalled anyway, so they aren't listed.

Force stop is on the App info screen, and Accessibility access is switched off in Settings. Both need your PIN, and so do the other places that could switch FamilyLock off: battery and date settings, phone-manager apps such as Samsung Device Care, and Digital Wellbeing, so on Samsung phones "Pause app" needs your PIN too. On Pixel phones, the home screen's own "Pause app" can still pause FamilyLock until midnight; tapping FamilyLock then offers Unpause app. If protection does go off, for example after a restart or an update, Home shows the Setup needed banner and History records when it went off and came back.

Yes. A locked app's notifications still show, and a reply typed into one is still sent, for example Messages during curfew. Media an app was already playing can keep playing too. If that matters, turn off that app's notifications in Android's settings while you have your PIN in.

No. It has no internet access and no server, and Google Play does not allow apps like this to send texts. Once it is uninstalled or force stopped it is not running to send anything anyway. History on the phone is the record.

No. FamilyLock works per app. It cannot see or filter what happens inside an app you allow. For websites, see "How can I filter websites?" below.

FamilyLock doesn't filter websites; it locks whole apps. To filter websites, give your child one browser that filters, and block the others in Manage Apps > Browser setup.

Chrome with Google Family Link can try to block explicit sites, and block sites you pick. The catch: your child needs a Google account managed in Family Link, and only Chrome is filtered.

Microsoft Edge with Family Safety can filter adult sites and block sites you pick. The catch: you and your child need Microsoft accounts, and only Edge is filtered.

FamilyCove, our own browser for kids, opens only the sites you choose, sends every search to DuckDuckGo with strict SafeSearch, and needs no account. The catch: it is new and in beta, it is Android only, and only FamilyCove is filtered.

Apps with a browser built in, like a link opened from a chat app, aren't covered by any of them. Block that app itself if it matters.

Picture-in-picture lets an app like YouTube keep playing in a small floating window, and Android draws that window above everything, including FamilyLock's lock screen. So a video can keep playing after its app has been locked. Turning it off for restricted apps closes that gap. Manage Apps > Picture-in-picture lists every app that supports it, warns about restricted apps that still have it on, and opens each one's switch for you.

No app of this kind is. Restarting in Safe Mode, a factory reset, or a computer can get around it. FamilyLock stops the everyday attempts: uninstalls (including from the Play Store), Settings, App info and Digital Wellbeing need your PIN, and History shows what happened.

FamilyLock checks which app is open (both halves in split screen), so it can lock restricted apps and keep Settings behind your PIN. It does not read messages, browsing, or typing. The one exception is uninstalling, so it can ask for your PIN first. On Android's uninstall confirmation it looks for its own name and the names of the apps you protect. Google Play's small "Uninstall this app?" dialog doesn't name the app, so whenever a Google Play page is on screen, FamilyLock looks at the app name at the top of that page and at its Uninstall, Open and Update buttons, to know whose page the dialog belongs to. It only looks at Google Play's windows, only for those names and buttons, and saves none of it. Nothing it sees leaves the phone.

No. After one correct PIN, Manage Apps, Curfew, History and Setup open freely, and Home shows an Unlocked bar. FamilyLock locks again when you tap Lock on that bar, leave FamilyLock or turn the screen off, or after 5 minutes without a tap. Changing the PIN always asks for the current one.

Open FamilyLock and tap Forgot PIN? when it asks for your PIN. If you made a recovery code, type it in (dashes and capitals don't matter) and choose a new PIN. Each code works once, so FamilyLock offers you a new one straight away. Write that one down too.

No recovery code? Tap Use my backup question instead, if you set one, and answer it to set a new PIN. If another parent has a second parent PIN, theirs opens FamilyLock too, and Change PIN sets a new first PIN.

If none of those work, you can start FamilyLock over. Restart the phone in Safe Mode, where FamilyLock doesn't run: on a Samsung, open the power menu, press and hold Power off, then tap Safe mode. In Safe Mode, open Settings, then Apps, then FamilyLock, then Storage, and tap Clear data (on some phones: Clear storage). Restart the phone normally, open FamilyLock and set it up again. This clears your PIN, your rules and History. You don't need to reinstall or pay again.

There is no server, so we can't reset a PIN for you. Keep your recovery code where your children won't find it, and pick a backup answer they wouldn't know.

After three wrong tries, PIN entry locks everywhere the PIN is asked for. The first lock lasts 1 minute. If more wrong tries follow soon after, each lock gets longer: 5, 15, 30, then 60 minutes. Entering the right PIN, or 15 minutes without another lock, starts it over. Wrong recovery codes and backup answers count the same way.

No. FamilyLock is one $5 purchase on Google Play. There is no recurring charge and no account to cancel. Refunds follow Google Play's refund policy.

Use the report form on this site. The Report a bug button inside the app brings you to the same place. We reply by email.