The new parental controls let parents or guardians link their Twitch account with a teen’s account if the user is between 13 and 17 years old. Once connected, parents can stop their child from going live, disable Twitch’s private messaging and set daily screen time limits. They can also keep content labeled with mature themes out of the teen’s searches and recommendations.
Parents will receive weekly activity summaries showing which channels their teen watched and how much time they spent on the platform. Twitch says the controls are optional and expire automatically once the user turns 18.
Questions remain about children appearing in adult streams
While the new controls apply to under-18 users with their own Twitch accounts, they do not touch adult creators who include their children in livestreams.
Family creators and streamers can still feature minors in their broadcasts, as long as they follow Twitch’s community guidelines. That has led some child safety advocates to argue the platform’s protections focus mainly on young account holders rather than children who appear in content made by adults.
Children’s privacy, consent and compensation when they regularly appear in online content have become a growing issue across many platforms. Several U.S. states have recently introduced or passed laws requiring child influencers to receive a share of the revenue earned from content featuring them.
Safety efforts for its community
The parental controls join Twitch’s existing safety features for younger users, including age restrictions, content classification labels and moderation tools.
According to Twitch, the company plans to keep expanding Family Center over time, with more parental features under consideration. The latest update aims to give families more flexibility in deciding how teens use the platform while holding on to the protections already in place for minors.