The 8 Best Parental Control Apps for Android Devices in 2024

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By using one of the best parental control apps for Android, you can have a better grasp of how your kids use the internet to ensure their safety. Besides helping you manage their screen time, these tools can also help you locate your child physically or even alert you if they aren’t somewhere, like at school, when they should be. Beyond this, you can block objectionable websites, in addition to revealing who they’re chatting with online.

In this article, we’ll look at the best parental control applications available right now, whether you’re a new parent planning for the future or you simply want to learn more about your children’s online behaviors to keep them safe, these are your best options.

Top 8 Best Parental Control Apps for Android

Based on factors like ease of use, affordability, Android functionality, and their overall reputation, we’ve ranked each of the best parental control apps for Android and included a short outline of why they’ve made it on our list:

1. uMobix – $12.49/month — The best Android parental control app as it offers a wide range of features, including remote access to the target device and text management capabilities.
2. Cocospy – $12.49/month — The best no-root Android solution for parents looking for an easy-to-use, quick-to-set-up app to keep an eye on social media and app usage.
3. Spyic.pro – $9.99/month/$16.66 for 3 devices — A good option for families as it lets you cover more than 1 device on one subscription, and you can blacklist for particular terms and apps
4. TheOneSpy – $6.25/month — A strong and reasonably priced app that lets you see deleted communications and gives you remote access to the device’s camera and microphone.
5. ClevGuard – $9.16/month — The best value-for-money option as it doesn’t need rooting and has sophisticated capabilities like screen recording and microphone access.
6. Norton Family – $49.99/year — A budget-friendly solution for filtering inappropriate material and setting screen time limits, plus you can add up to 15 users on one account.
7. Qustodio – $4.58/month — The cheapest parental control app that lets you manage screen time and track social media activity on PCs and mobile devices.
8. Famisafe – $4.99/month — An affordable solution offering location tracking, web filtering (and monitoring), and screen time limits.

Detailed Reviews of the Top Parental Control Apps for Android

Let’s take a closer look at each provider to see what sets them apart from the rest. To do that, we’ll look at key factors like compatibility, pricing, and their top features so that you can make an informed decision on the best one for you.

1. uMobix – Overall, the Best Parental Control App for Android

uMobix is by far one of the best parental control apps on the market. It combines a variety of cutting-edge features, like remote access to a device’s microphone, with affordable pricing, most notably on Android. To begin with, it offers a great keylogging function that functions on standard browsers and, unusually, even in incognito modes.

In terms of convenience, there’s a simple-to-use dashboard that allows you immediate access to certain important features and presents some essential information on call and SMS activity. Additionally, a handy overview of browsing habits, including the most popular websites and search phrases, is available.

In addition to this, you can check the caller’s name, phone number, call time and date, and length, plus the target phone’s call history information, including missed, deleted, and incoming calls.

It’s also important to note that every five minutes, uMobix syncs with the smartphone, updating call logs and providing information to you that’s as near to real-time as possible, including actual location data.

That said, one outstanding feature that’s worth a remark is the Remote Access you can have with uMobix; for example, you’re able to block incoming calls and texts to the user’s mobile if you feel they’re unwelcome or insulting. This enables you to protect your child well, which is especially helpful if they’re victims of cyberbullying.

Overall, although uMobix lacks features like location monitoring on iOS, it’s a fantastic option for Android parental control, especially if they’re rooted. The toolkit on offer gives parents complete peace of mind about who their children are talking to, the content they’re consuming, and their location.

Pricing

In terms of cost, uMobix is pretty level on par with most of the other providers on this list, with cheaper pricing available for those who sign up for longer subscriptions. There’s also a 14-day refund policy in place for those who aren’t satisfied with the app’s performance.

2. Cocospy – The Best No-Root Android Parental Control App

With cutting-edge features and a cost-effective annual plan, Cocospy is a well-known parental control app that offers everything you need for peace of mind. You can keep an eye on a variety of social networking sites, including Facebook and WhatsApp, and it even includes Tinder surveillance, allowing you to protect your children online.

The majority of the monitoring tools required to spy on someone are included in Cocospy, which can track an Android device without rooting being required for full functionality. Additionally, the user won’t be made aware that the program has been loaded as it shows no sign of its presence, so it won’t slow or overheat the device.

In addition, there’s a great real-time location tracker available. It delivers high accuracy and provides a timestamp so you can see when the user was at a specific spot, and it effortlessly interacts with Google Maps and is rather simple to use.

To top it off, you can also keep a watch on any social media activity from any of the major platforms using the specialized social media monitoring tool, which periodically takes screenshots. Alternatively, you can just check the excellent keylogging feature to see what’s being entered in messages, status updates, or search fields across apps.

You can even monitor the files stored and shared to make sure your child isn’t consuming or receiving inappropriate content. In fact, with Cocospy, you can inspect any files kept on the device by browsing them remotely from your own device.

All of this and the fact that no rooting or jailbreaking is needed makes Cocospy one of the market’s best iOS spy apps and a solid Android parental control solution for hassle-free monitoring.

Pricing

You can choose from 3 subscriptions with Cocospy, and each one comes with a 14-day refund policy:

3. Spyic.Pro – A Budget-Friendly Parental Control App for Families

Spyic is a well-known and dependable parental control app that provides a variety of plans to fit all demands, whether they’re for family or commercial use. That stated, one of the things that contribute to its popularity is the fact that, as with Cocospy, installing and configuring it doesn’t require a rooted or jailbroken device.

What you do receive is a user-friendly design along with several useful fundamental capabilities, including the ability to read chat logs from standard text messages and social media monitoring for both Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp.

Additionally, you can designate safe areas on a map for your loved ones and get a notification on your phone if they go outside of areas; the real-time, pinpoint accuracy of this makes Spyic one of the best geofencing apps available right now for location tracking.

All things considered, the device coverage, which enables it to be customized for home or corporate use with a wide variety of plans fit for everyone, is unquestionably its biggest selling feature, but Spyic’s accuracy is among its strongest advantages.

This tool is extremely dependable because it follows everything very precisely, including the target phone’s location, SMS, and social media chats. Another benefit of Spyic is how quickly the data from the target phone is synced to your Spyic account, with all the information needed being available on the device within a few minutes.

Pricing

Unlike most, with Spyic, you can select from a range of different plans depending on what device you want to track and how many devices — including family and business subscriptions, the latter of which lets people cover 25 devices for $83.33/month:

Despite a phenomenal range of pricing options, Spyic also boasts a generous 60-day refund policy for risk-free signup.

4. TheOneSpy – A Powerful Parental Control App with Cutting-Edge Features

TheOneSpy is an excellent parental control app for Android users, as it doesn’t require any rooting, unlike the iOS version, which requires a jailbroken device in order to operate — this is never ideal as rooting or jailbreaking a device comes with several risks, so this is refreshing to see that Android doesn’t have such requirements.

With the help of the software, you can remotely control the target device’s camera and discreetly take pictures and videos for live insight into their surroundings, plus, you can do the same with the target user’s microphone so you can capture background noise.

Better yet, TheOneSpy’s advanced capabilities are, in large part, why it’s renowned for being one of the best spouse spy apps, as it even lets you record phone calls that are made to and from the target device, among other things.

TheOneSpy also keeps track of all the conversations and communications the target individual has on multiple social media networks, including Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. It differs from many other parental control apps in that it even records VoIP calls conducted on these sites.

This makes it easily one of the best Facebook spy apps right now and also works well with parent companies Instagram and WhatsApp. Beyond this, you can even learn someone’s phone pattern or password because TheOneSpy is one of the few spy applications that can track this.

There’s also an excellent location tracker that delivers pinpoint accuracy and allows you to set up a dedicated safe zone for your child or children. Should they stray from these areas, you’ll receive an alert on your device that’ll show you exactly where they are.

All-in-all, TheOneSpy has all of the features you’d expect to find on one of the top parental control apps, and it does have some standout features like VoIP call recording and remote access, plus it’s super easy to navigate, with all of the key metrics accessible from the home screen.

Pricing

There are 2 main plans for TheOneSpy users to pick from, both of which can be paid for either monthly, quarterly, or annually. Below are the cheapest versions of the plans you can get if you pay on a yearly basis:

5. ClevGuard – The Best Value-for-Money Option for Advanced Features

The main offering from ClevGuard — KidsGuard Pro — is a feature-rich parental control app that enables parents to remotely monitor their children’s smartphone usage. Parents can check their children’s call and text history, follow social media app activity, and keep track of their whereabouts using KidsGuard Pro.

Additionally, the app has options for website filtering, geofencing, and app banning, which give parents more control over their kids’ online behavior. Plus, it operates in stealth mode, so the user of the target device won’t know it’s running in the background.

This makes it an effective tool for keeping an eye on your kids’ app usage, call histories, and exact location without invading their privacy. That said, you’ll have a thorough overview of your child’s whereabouts — including current and last known locations, plus you can set geofencing alerts to avoid needing to constantly monitor it.

With KidsGuard Pro’s new remote control tools, you can instantly carry out a variety of stealth-mode tasks on the target device. Call recording, viewing the camera on the target device, and taking screenshots of the device’s display are the three sophisticated features it provides here.

You can even monitor new photos and videos that are taken on the device, as well as being able to browse previous ones in the media files section, all of which can be done from the main dashboard. Furthermore, you’re able to keep track of your child’s social media accounts, like Facebook, which is riddled with explicit content and bullying.

Pricing

We like how clear-cut and uncomplicated ClevGuard’s KidsGuard Pro plans are for Android and iOS:

6. Norton Family – A Budget-Friendly Solution That Let’s You add 15 Users to 1 Account

With practically all of the capabilities a parent could ask for from one of the top parental control apps, including recently added geofencing, Norton Family’s strengths and features are great for Android (and Windows) devices, making it a top choice for families with multiple kids.

For mobile, you get the location tracking, time scheduling, site filtering, and monitoring features of this service, but Norton’s time limits are only applicable to its Windows and Android apps.

That said, the web filters are extremely effective; even on iOS, it monitors Hulu and YouTube and flags anything explicit. It also prevents children from unintentionally (or purposefully) browsing inappropriate websites. Additionally, children can request access to websites that are restricted, which is a good inclusion.

Beyond all this, Norton Family also supports limiting screen time and app use, blocking objectionable websites, verifying your child’s live location, and receiving alerts when they enter or exit the house, the school, or any other important location you set.

Some features also have great depth. For instance, many parental control applications provide you with a list of the videos your child sees, but most of the time, you only get a title. Norton Family provides a small image from the video and the explanation, making it simple to determine whether there’s a problem.

In the Family Dashboard, you can personalize settings and receive reports on your child’s activity. The user interface is simple, with activities broken down into six categories (Web, Time, Mobile Apps, Location, Search, and Videos), each of which has a Settings icon where you can customize how it operates.

And to top it off, Norton Family lets you add 15 child profiles to a single account, all for a low annual sum, which is perfect for the always-connected generation.

Pricing

Parental control apps typically have a wide range of pricing models, but Norton Family’s plan is straightforward. With a Norton Family subscription, you can filter websites, set time limits, and track your whereabouts for just $49.99 annually.

It’s worth noting that you can get Norton Family bundled in for free with a Norton 360 Subscription as well — one of the best antivirus solutions on the market. Plus, you can test the software for free for 30 days before purchasing an annual membership.

7. Qustodio – The Cheapest Parental Control App on the Market

Almost every function a worried parent might possibly need is available in Qustodio, including robust app blocking, web content filtering, and an in-depth activity log. The web dashboard and mobile apps are used for all settings and monitoring, allowing you to establish rules and check on your child’s activity from any location or device.

Beyond being a solid option for Android parental control, Qustodio is an incredibly strong challenger in the parental control app field when it comes to total platform coverage because it supports a variety of operating systems, including Android, iOS, Windows, macOS, Kindle Fire tablets, and, most recently, Chrome OS.

On Android, you can monitor your child’s texts and calls in the Qustodio app, and you’ll be able to view your child’s current position and location history with the location tracking feature. This occurs automatically once activated on both Android and iOS, however, iOS pings about every five minutes less frequently for location checks.

As a bonus, Qustodio also has a rare Panic Button for Android — after being activated, this can be reached by an SOS button at the bottom of the child’s app. To trigger it, your child must press both that SOS button and a circular SOS button on the following screen.

This will alert all the trusted contacts you’ve added to the app, along with the child’s current location, to an emergency. You can send this message via email and text.

Pricing

With a few significant exceptions for iOS users, Qustodio is also among the solutions with the most features. That said, it can be a bit expensive depending on how many devices you need to protect, but the basic 5-device premium plan at $54.95 per year is on par with most of the competitors.

8. Famisafe – An Affordable Solution for Location Tracking and Web Filtering

Using the FamiSafe software, parents can keep an eye on their kids’ actions without violating their privacy. Since it’s simple to install, there’s no need to use any backdoors to monitor a device. However, it is lacking in several areas.

For example, it doesn’t offer call and text tracking, but it does stand out with its compatibility for both mobile and desktop, so it depends on your needs. For example, although it lacks some things, you can still limit the amount of time your children are permitted to use their gadgets.

Limits may be imposed daily, weekly, or monthly. Through visual graphs, you’ll know what apps your child uses most and the overall time spent on them. Plus, you can also prevent your child from accessing particular websites with Famisafe’s Web Filter and receive notifications if they do.

You can exclude entire website categories, including adult content, gambling, shopping, and drug use. Some websites may evade the app’s categorization because it isn’t always accurate, but you can block those in particular. However, what we like most is that you can even monitor any secret incognito searches your child does.

On the FamiSafe app, you can also view your child’s past locations. It retains records of their movements, which you can view at any time. All of this activity is stored for 3 months, so you can have a good overview of everything happening.

Pricing

For both families and schools, FamiSafe offers a variety of apps and plans that can be paid on a monthly, quarterly, or annual basis. You can monitor up to five devices with the family plan, whereas the quarterly and annual plans allow you to manage up to ten devices.

FamiSafe is available to all new customers for a free three-day trial. Every purchase comes with a 7-day money-back guarantee as well, which is substantially shorter than many of FamiSafe’s rivals.

The Best Parental Control Apps for Android Compared

Below is a head-to-head look at the providers listed above, where you can compare their pricing, how many devices they track, and much more, all in one simple-to-view table:

How to Choose the Best Parental Control App for Android

Each parental control app will have a similar set of features, but aspects like price, unique features, and device compatibility are all completely different. So below, we’ve detailed some of the key factors you should look for when deciding on which app you want to use:

• Price: It’s important to find out how much the service costs and how many kids/devices are covered in the price plan. Some providers allow you to monitor just one device, whereas others can cover several on one subscription.
• Compatibility: The chances are that you want to install this across all of your child’s devices, so it’s therefore very important that the parental control app you use has support for all popular platforms.
• Features: Most parental control apps have similar features, but some have unique offerings, for example, panic mode, which sends an alert to a host of trusted devices, or remote access of the target devices’ camera and microphone are specific to a certain few apps.
• Rooting: Some of the top parental control apps require you to root the device, which can be a tricky process if you’re not tech-savvy. Also, it can void the device warranty, making it hard to replace if anything should go wrong.
• User-friendly: Overall, you want the setup and use of the app to be as easy as possible, especially if you’re not up to date with modern technology. A nice clean interface and simple-to-understand dashboard are a must.

Are Free Android Parental Control Apps Good?

As tempting as it might seem, we’d recommend that you avoid free parental control apps, mainly because they don’t offer anywhere near the same level of coverage as a paid option.

For example, you might be able to track a device’s location, but you won’t be able to monitor calls, texts, social media, or use any premium features you might find with the likes of uMobix, like geo-fencing and web filters.

Instead, we’d recommend opting for a premium service that offers a free trial or money-back guarantee. They’re the best way to keep your children safe online, and if you signup for an annual plan, they can cost as little as $4.99/month.

How to Set Up Parental Controls on An Android Phone

Getting set up with a parental control app is much easier than you might think, as most of the providers on this list offer one-click installation. As an example, we’re going to take our top choice uMobix, and run through the steps:

1. Step 1 — Signup for a plan on the uMobix website, complete your purchase, and receive your login details via email.
2. Step 2 — You’ll need an APK link to download the app if your child has an Android phone. When you register for uMobix, you’ll receive this URL.
3. Step 3 — Open the default browser on the target device, then enter the APK link sent by uMobix. The moment you arrive at the page, the app is downloaded.
4. Step 4 — You can click the Install button after opening the file once it’s downloaded.
5. Step 5 — You can access the app after installation and accept the terms and conditions to proceed.
6. Step 6 — Go back and remove the file you got from the APK link if you want to make sure your child doesn’t find out you installed the app.
7. Step 7 — Next, delete all browsing history from the browser. Make sure the target device’s Home Screen Settings are used to hide the app as well. To complete the installation, click “Complete installation.”

That’s it—you can now start monitoring all the device’s activity from your own control hub on your phone or PC.

Why is Google Family Link Missing From the List?

Many of you might be wondering why Google Family Link isn’t included on this list, as it’s made by the tech giant, so surely it must be worth a try. We don’t think so.

You can modify several settings using the web app, including SafeSearch or Restricted mode on YouTube, editing the list of URLs that are banned or whitelisted, and allowing or blocking particular apps. However, you won’t be able to use the web app to do things like:

• Limit your child’s screen time
• See how much time they spent using their device or an app on a specific day
• Or find out where they are

In addition, you’re not allowed to expand your family group with more parents or adults in charge. Essentially, it doesn’t have the features to truly keep your child safe, and it also allows the child to turn the restrictions off when they turn 13, so overall, it doesn’t keep them very safe or block out any negative social media messages, etc.

If you truly want to keep your children safe online, then we’d recommend using a top parental control app like uMobix, which includes geo-fencing features, remote access settings to listen in on conversations, and much more.

Conclusion | What’s the Best Parental Control App to Use for Android?

Overall, if you want to ensure your child’s safety on the internet, the best parental control app you can use for Android is uMobix, although the other providers on this list are also reliable.

With uMobix, you get a ton of premium features like social media monitoring, call and text management, and excellent location tracking — all for $11.66/month.

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