Is My Child Ready for Snapchat? An Important Message For All Parents and Caregivers to Read!
- The White Hatter
- 3 hours ago
- 4 min read
The two most common questions we get from parents and caregivers are: “What’s the right age to give my child a cellphone?” and “Is Snapchat safe for my child to use?”
Snapchat often comes up because it’s the most popular way many youth and teens communicate with each other today. However, it’s not just a messaging app, it’s become their go-to platform for staying connected.
Many parents think of Snapchat as just another messaging app, a place for sending disappearing texts and photos. But the truth is, Snapchat is much more than that, and its appeal to teens goes far beyond private chats. (1)(2)
Snapchat includes features like Spotlight and Discover, which operate more like TikTok or Instagram Reels. These sections offer a never-ending scroll of short videos curated by an algorithm. They’re designed to grab attention, keep users engaged, and feed them content based on what they interact with, even if they’re not actively searching for it, by default.
What often goes unnoticed by parents is just how quickly these feeds can turn highly, and we mean highly sexualized. From provocative challenges and revealing outfits to clickbait-style thumbnails and influencer-style commentary, a young user can be exposed to mature content within minutes of opening the app. This shift isn’t gradual, it can happen almost immediately after an account has been created
To demonstrate this to our followers, we created a test account as a 13-year-old boy. We didn’t add any friends, follow anyone, or engage with any content. All we did was open the Spotlight feed, Snapchat’s version of TikTok’s “For You” feed.
What we saw was eye-opening and extremely concerning. Roughly 90% of the videos shown to this account featured hypersexualized content, primarily of young females. It wasn’t hidden and it wasn’t something we had to search for, it was pushed straight to the front page by default. The longer we stayed on the feed looking at some of these video’s, the more the Snapchat algorithm sent similar and more hyper sexualized content. For a 13-year-old boy, this kind of content is not just tempting, it’s overwhelming by design. Here are some screen shots from videos that we saw in this 13yr old test account
We also saw a video of a user using a knife to push a challenge that could cause significant injury sent to this account.
All these above noted pictures were pushed automatically to an account that was registered to a 13yr old boy.
This is one of the major reasons we do not recommend Snapchat for anyone under the age of 16, unless you’re comfortable with your child being regularly exposed to this kind of material. If you do allow Snapchat, you need to go in with both eyes wide open, and take steps to use the available safety features to help minimize, but unfortunately not eliminate, such content.
So what can and can’t parents and caregivers control on snapchat?
Snapchat offers some parental tools through its Family Center, (3)(4) including a feature called “Restrict Sensitive Content”. When turned on, this setting attempts to reduce the amount of sexualized or mature content that shows up in the Stories and Spotlight feeds. However, after testing this function it’s far from foolproof.
Here’s what parents and caregivers should know:
You cannot disable Spotlight or the For You feed entirely. These features are built into the app and cannot be removed.
Once your child interacts with content, the app will adjust its suggestions based on that activity, even accidental clicks.
Restricted content may still get through. If your child searches for certain keywords or receives links from friends, sensitive content can still appear.
There is no way to completely block the feed. Even with controls enabled, the app still serves up short videos by default.
Snapchat is not just a texting app, it’s a content platform. And much of that content, especially for younger users, skews mature. While there are settings that attempt to reduce what your child sees, they do not offer the level of control many parents expect.
If you’re considering Snapchat for your child, don’t stop at reading this article. Create your own account. Explore the Spotlight and Discover sections for a few days. See what comes up. It’s the best way to understand what your child may be exposed to, and whether they’re ready for it.
You don’t have to fear every app your child wants to try, but you do need to make informed decisions. Snapchat may look like a harmless messaging platform on the surface, but it comes with layers that parents need to know about so that they can make an informed decision about allowing their younger child to have access.
NOTE - We were able to influence the algorithm to some extent so that much, though not all, of the inappropriate mature content was filtered out of the Spotlight feed. How did we do it? We intentionally searched for cat, dog, and baby goat videos. The algorithm responded by prioritizing similar content in the feed, however, this took a couple of hours. That said, it’s deeply concerning that a brand-new Snapchat account registered as a 13-year-old boy was initially served a stream of hypersexualized videos without any prompt or interaction.
PS - don’t forget, youth and teens don’t need the Snapchat App to access , they can also connect via a laptop or desk top at web.snapchat.com where they can log in to message friends, start audio/video calls, send Snaps, and more. It works on Chrome, Edge, Safari, and the Windows.
Digital Food For Thought
The White Hatter
Facts Not Fear, Facts Not Emotions, Enlighten Not Frighten, Know Tech Not No Tech
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