7 apps for monitoring your teen’s phone

Teenagers today live in their phones – so much, that their parents don’t even have a clue of what’s going on in their lives. To make things worse, not many kids are forthcoming when it comes to sharing details about their whereabouts, group of friends or the activities they like to engage themselves in.

Luckily, the miracle of technology works both ways. Parents who are worried about their child’s well being can employ the help of several apps in order to monitor the teen’s web history, texts and phone calls and even their exact location – for suspicious activity. To make it easier, we have compiled a list of some of the best apps that will help you keep track of your teenager’s activity both online and offline, so your heart can be ease.

Screen Time

Worried your child is spending too much time on his/her phone and tablet? The Screen Time parental control app allows you to manage the time the child spends on their smart device. The software limits deemed as inappropriate for your child and block games and applications at a given hour (bed time) or during a certain periods of time (school hours).

Screen Time is free to use, but a Screen Time Premium upgrade is also available for a monthly fee. The Premium options allow users to manage and limit the whole family’s device usage.

Checky

Checky is a phone habit tracker app that answers a simple question. How many times a day do we check our phones? By giving you insight into your teen’s phone checking habits, Checky helps you become more aware as a parent. If you notice your child is spending most of his/her free time online, you can take steps to redirect their attentions towards something else like spending time outdoors or learning a new skill.

FlexiSPY

As a parent, do you have reason to be concerned about your teens interactions online? Then you should get FlexiSPY. The app’s key features include call recording and interception, monitoring of email, Facebook/Skype (and other popular social media apps), view notes, locations, calendars, browser and app activity. FlexiSPY is a bit more intrusive than the other apps we’ve showed you above, but if you’re truly worried about your child’s well being, the app is a powerful tool you can employ to make sure everything is ok.

However, we should note that in order to take full advantage of FlexiSPY’s features you’ll need to root the device you want to monitor (running Android 4.03 – 6.01).

FlexiSPY is a paid service which means you’ll be asked to pay up to $68 for a month.

Family Orbit

Family Orbit bakes a few extra useful features, other apps don’t bring to the table. The app allows parents to locate their teen in seconds via GPS tracking and monitor photos and mobile data usage.

The app allows your child to send out quick SOS and panic alerts in case of emergencies (like accidents). With the Family Places option, parents don’t have to worry about their children’s whereabouts while they are at work. Family Orbit can be used to create family safe zones like “Home” or “School” and send out notifications when the child has arrived in that specific location.

Glympse

Glympse is a fast and secure way to share your location based via your mobile device. Teenagers can quickly send parents “glympses” to let them know how far away they are from home (plus estimated time of arrival info) or that they reached their destination. Glympse is super easy to use and requires no sign up of any kind.

ZoeMob Family Locator

This GPS-centric locator app aims to be a bit more social than the other that are available in the Play Store. While it let you track family members as they go about their daily routine, it also encourages you to chat with them via a in-built mess anger and to share lists and calendars.

Apart from that, you get the standard locator app features: view everyone’s location, check-in place, set up specific location notifications and set limits for family members who are driving – all with the ZoeMob Family Locator.

TeenSafe

For last we’ve saved a very controversial app. It’s called TeenSafe and it comes equipped with the tools needed to uncover every single detail about your child’s life. It can monitor texted messages, installed apps, call logs, web history, contacts and even give you access to deleted messages (from Tinder, WhatsApp or Kik).

Parents using this app will basically turn into a version of Big Brother, but if you want to have a relationship with your child based on trust, this app won’t help you achieve this goal. Especially if the teen finds out he/she is being spied on.

The TeenSafe app features some really lousy reviews from disheartened parents who regret installing the app. The app does it job, but in doing so it might jeopardize the relationship with your child. So before downloading and installing the app, take a minute to really consider whether you really need to be spying on your kid.