1. Qustodio
" Best overall parental control software "
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Price:Currently starting from $49.46 per year
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Free Version:Yes
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Notifications:Daily and weekly email reports, push notifications
Things we liked / disliked:
- Excellent content filtering capabilities
- Detailed time restriction options
- Cross-platform support
- Pricey
Things we liked / disliked:
- Excellent content filtering capabilities
- Detailed time restriction options
- Cross-platform support
- Pricey
-
Price:Currently starting from $49.46 per year
-
Free Version:Yes
-
Notifications:Daily and weekly email reports, push notifications
A phenomenal software that provides both paid and free parental control apps for just about every platform you could think of, from Windows to Kindle. Paid plans are not cheap, but the wealth of features offered more than make up for that.
Pricing
If you want to use Qustodio for free, you’ll have to deal with a very feature-limited plan. Alternatively, there are three subscriptions that have identical features but differ in the number of devices supported. At the time of writing this review, they are providing a 10% discount on all of the plans.
While the free basic plan is functional, in order to get the best internet filtering options, you’ll want to choose either the $49.46 Small Plan, $87.26 Medium Plan, or $124.16 Large Plan. While the free version monitors only one device, the paid plans can watch over five, ten, or up to fifteen devices, respectively. You also get access to location tracking and up to 30 days of activity history.
User experience
One of the advantages of Qustodio is that it works on just about any device and operating system you can think of. Installation is also a breeze, and you can modify settings for each installed device from the handy web interface.
The free parental control apps for Android and iOS have options for stealth installations, in case you don’t want your children to find out that you’re monitoring them. The user interface is generally well-designed, and desktop/web interface users will be able to see a color-coded pie-chart listing all of your child’s activities and apps used.
Features
Qustodio offers a variety of amazing tools for content filtration, activity tracking, location monitoring, and more. Starting with web filters, you can have up to 29 different ones, including everything from alcohol and drugs to gambling, pornography, and violence. You can also restrict access to specific websites or turn on safe search restrictions on all major search engines and YouTube.
In addition to some of the best internet filtering software on the market, they also offer great tools for monitoring your children’s activities. Excellent summaries broken down by time and percentage can tell you exactly how much time your child spent on each app, surfing the internet, or interacting on social media.
Time management options are also excellent. You can customize daily and weekly time allowances for each monitored device, set up alerts when the limits have been reached, automatically switch off the internet, or even completely lock the devices if you feel that your children are spending too much time on their smartphones.
Qustodio doesn’t have the best parental monitoring for apps, though: You cannot block specific chat applications or block apps that don’t require the internet to run. In terms of social network monitoring, you are limited to Facebook, and you cannot see private messages, only pictures, timeline photos, and comments.
All account types also get access to YouTube monitoring, but only premium customers can set limits and block the app completely. There are excellent geolocation and geofencing tools available as well.
Final words
Overall, Qustodio is a fantastic software. It may not be the cheapest option around, but the wealth of features and excellent user interface combined with fantastic notification tools make it an easy recommendation for anyone worried about their children’s online safety.