How to choose a learning app for your preschooler: a parent's checklist

Search for a learning app for a three-year-old and you'll find thousands, almost all promising to be educational. Some are thoughtful and carefully made. Others are built mainly to show ads, sell upgrades or keep a child tapping as long as possible. From the store page, they can look exactly the same.

This checklist is for telling them apart. It's written for parents of children aged two to six, and it focuses on things you can check yourself in a few minutes.

A note before we start: we make a learning app, Toddler's Galaxy. We've tried to make this list fair and useful for any app, including ours. Use it to judge us too.

1. Are there ads?

Ads in children's apps are more than an annoyance. They can interrupt play, lead to accidental taps that open a web page or another app, and show things you didn't choose for your child.

Check: play for five minutes. Do ads appear between games, as banners, or as "watch a video to unlock" offers? Does the store page or privacy policy say the app contains ads?

Good sign: the app clearly states it has no ads.

2. What happens to your child's data?

Children's apps can collect more than you'd expect: usage data, device identifiers, and sometimes details shared with advertising or analytics companies.

Check:

• Read the privacy policy's summary, or search it for "third parties", "advertising" and "analytics".
• Does your child need their own account, email or profile on a server?
• Where is your child's progress stored?

Good signs: no advertising or analytics trackers; only a parent account, if any; and the child's information kept to a minimum. Plain-language privacy policies are a good sign in themselves.

3. How does pricing work?

Pricing models vary a lot, and some are easy to get caught by:

• Subscriptions that renew automatically, sometimes after a free trial that needs your card.
• In-app purchases for extra content, coins or lives, sometimes placed where a child can reach them.
• One-time payments for a fixed period or for good.
• "Free" apps paid for by ads or data.

None of these is automatically wrong, but you should know which one you're signing up for.

Check: is there a free trial, and does it need a card? What happens when the trial ends? Does anything renew by itself, and how do you stop it? Are purchases behind a parent gate?

Good signs: a trial that doesn't need a card, prices that are easy to find before you start, and purchases a child can't make by accident.

4. Is it made for your child's age?

An app "for ages 2–12" can't be right for a two-year-old and a ten-year-old at the same time. Small children need big buttons, few choices, short games and lots of time.

Check: can your child use it without help after a minute or two? Are there too many buttons and menus? Does it get frustrating, or too easy?

Good signs: a clear, narrow age range, and settings that adjust difficulty or pace to your child's age.

5. Can a child who can't read use it?

Most two- to four-year-olds can't read instructions. If an app relies on written text, your child will either need you every time or will tap randomly.

Check: are instructions read aloud? Is it clear what to do from the pictures alone?

Good sign: spoken instructions and simple, picture-led games.

6. Does it have natural endings?

Some apps are designed to keep children playing: endless levels, autoplay, streaks that punish breaks, and rewards that pop up just as you want to stop. That makes switching off much harder. (We've written more about ending screen time calmly.)

Check: do games come to a clear end? Does the next one start automatically? Is there pressure to keep going, like countdowns or "come back or you'll lose your streak"?

Good signs: short games that finish, no autoplay, and a way to set a time limit.

7. Is the learning real, or just decoration?

Lots of apps add letters or numbers to a game that is really about tapping fast or collecting coins. Look for activities where the learning is the game.

Check: what is your child actually doing? Hearing sounds and choosing, counting objects, matching, tracing, listening to a story? Or tapping as fast as they can for points?

Good signs: activities that ask your child to think, listen, look or count, and calm feedback when they get something wrong.

Be wary of big promises: "boosts IQ", "reading in weeks", "school-ready guaranteed". Good apps can give children useful practice. None can promise outcomes.

8. Can you, the parent, stay in control?

Check: is there a parent area, protected by a gate a young child can't pass? Can you set a daily time limit? Can you see what your child has been doing? Can siblings have separate profiles?

Good signs: a proper grown-ups gate around settings, purchases and sign-in; a time limit; and simple progress you can see at a glance.

9. Does it feel calm?

This is harder to measure, but worth noticing. Some apps are a blur of noise, flashing and rewards. Others feel calm and gentle.

Check: watch your child's face and body after ten minutes. Are they engaged and relaxed, or wound up?

The 10-minute test

Before committing to any app, try this:

1. Two minutes alone. Open it yourself. Count the ads, pop-ups and purchase prompts.
2. Three minutes with your child. Let them use it while you watch. Can they manage without help?
3. Two minutes in the settings. Find the parent area, the time limit and the privacy policy.
4. Two minutes on pricing. Work out exactly what happens when the trial ends.
5. One minute to stop. End the session. How hard was it?

If an app passes, it's probably worth a longer try.

How Toddler's Galaxy answers this checklist

Here's how our own app does on the points above, so you can compare:

You can see what's inside on our learning games page.

The short version

• Check for ads, trackers, how pricing works, and whether purchases are behind a parent gate.
• Pick an app made for your child's age, with spoken instructions for pre-readers.
• Look for natural endings, a time limit and calm, real learning activities.
• Try the 10-minute test before you commit.