Five ways to help your teen to spend less time on their screens

There’s a lot to be gained from using screens and devices – connection is important for wellbeing, homework is often online and we parents love to get our news and information digitally too – you’re doing it right now…

But with the average 8-14 year old spending almost 3 hours online daily, and 13-14 year olds averaging 4 hours on smartphones, laptops, tablets and computers, not even counting games consoles, many parents want to know how to help their children spend less time on their screens.

These figures are just an average, some children and adults are spending way longer online every day. According to Ofcom’s Digital Nation Report, the average UK adult spends 4.5 hours a day on their screens and that doesn’t count any time spent watching TV.

If parents want to reduce screen time for their children, they need to start being more open and honest about their own screen time, says Dr Martha Deiros Collado, a clinical psychologist with over 20 years of clinical and academic experience. Speaking on the BBC Bitesize Parenting Podcast (listen from March 9th on Bitesize Parenting and BBC Sounds), she says, “First of all, you have to start an open dialogue about what you do on your phone.”

“One of the things we all do with our phones is it buzzes, we pick it up, a bit like it's a novel - it's silent. You read and then you put it down.”

“But no one knows what you just saw, right? Start talking about it.”

“Now I do this at home. Literally, it buzzes. Oh, Daddy's texting me. Oh, he's stuck. Okay, well, that's fine. We'll carry on.”

Once you start talking about why you’re looking at your device, Martha says it not only changes how you interact with those around you, but it also alters the way your brain reacts to the screen.

“Especially with teenagers, talk about it. Say out loud, 'Oh, I'm scrolling. I'm scrolling.' As soon as you say it, it makes you accountable. It makes you aware.”

“It’s no longer passive - you've told your brain I'm doing something and now I'm speaking it out loud. As soon as you say, 'I'm scrolling', you realise - I'm actually procrastinating. I'm really tired and I'm trying to take a restful moment on my phone, but this isn't rest.”

No matter how silly you feel, Martha encourages you to describe what you’re doing with your screen out loud, especially if your teens can hear you. “I'm watching someone trying on tops. Do I need to be looking at shoes? Now I'm reading the news…”Martha says, “It's really transformative. One of the things it's made me notice is how much I pick up my phone. So then it's also made me think sometimes I don't need to do this.”

So is scrolling to relax always a bad thing? “Conscious scrolling is fine,” says Martha. “It’s like consciously watching TV. The scroll will put your brain into a deep, semi-dormant state though, so it’s good to set a timer or an alarm because you lose track of time. Perhaps say I’m going to consciously scroll for 10 minutes because that’s what I want to do to relax. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

I took Martha’s advice and tried this with my older teen over a couple of days. Every time we went to pick up our phones for 48 hours we said out loud, “I’m picking up my phone because it buzzed and I’m expecting a message from Kate,” or “I’m reaching for my phone because I want to do my Minute Cryptic puzzle while the pasta boils.”

We both noticed we spent less time unconsciously reaching for the phone, and more time finishing conversations with people who were in the room - frankly, because it’s embarrassing to say, “I’m checking my phone even though you’re speaking to me, because it might be someone more interesting.”

BBC Bitesize spoke to lots of families who all approach screen time differently and all face similar battles: kids want more screen time and parents feel guilty about allowing screens to keep their children occupied while they get stuff done.

The majority of parents we spoke to were trying to limit screen time at and before bedtime.

They’re right to be concerned. In Ofcom’s survey, across four of the main services used by children, YouTube, Snapchat, TikTok and WhatsApp, 15-24% of the time spent for the whole 8-14 age range happens between 9pm and 5am.

There’s research that exposure to blue light on screens in the evening inhibits the body’s ability to produce melatonin, the hormone that makes us feel sleepy. So if teens are looking at phones in the evening it’s physically more difficult for them to get to sleep.

However, if we limit exposure to screens in the hour before bedtime, it should be easier to fall asleep and stay asleep.

One solution might be asking everyone to charge their phones outside of their bedroom, so there’s no temptation if it buzzes.

Some families limit screen time by turning the Wi-Fi off an hour before bedtime – if the whole family can’t use blue-light screens before sleep it might feel fairer to a teenager.

If you have Apple devices there’s free software in Apple Screen Time and for Android there’s a free app called Google Family Link which you can set up to limit screen time and set downtime limits. These could, for example, block access to devices from bedtime till the morning or turn them off while your teen is doing homework to avoid distractions.

These settings can also be used to block apps or contacts, and to put on filters to protect family members from age-restricted content.

But what if your teenager needs to use their device for a good reason, like homework, but they keep getting distracted by messages and notifications?

You can do this in settings on the individual device or download a number of free apps to temporarily block distracting socials and messaging apps from popping up while you’re trying to work online.

Some of these include gamification – for example, on Flora you can plant a tree when you start working and it will flourish if you complete the task (and wither if you don’t).

On some apps teens can choose to lock in together, and encourage each other to get homework or revision done and have similar breaks.

Or, go old-school and just make your device look more boring, and thus less tempting, by changing the settings to black and white.

On an iPhone:

• Go to Settings > Accessibility > Display & Text Size
• Tap on color filters and turn it on
• Select grayscale

On an Android phone:

• Go to settings > Accessibility
• Look for Vision enhancements, Coluor & motion, or similar
• Choose colour correction, toggle it on, choose grayscale

It’s amazing how much less enticing your apps and chats look when they’re black and white.

This article was published in January 2026