Joie Bold R

[ploddingalong2023]

My LO has been rear facing since birth, he is now 4 and we have moved to FF. (I know they can do it for longer, we’ve decided not to, please don’t police me lol) I was under the impression that a harness would be the safest option so I’ve spent ages looking for a good, tested, ff car seat that will last till he no longer needs one, that had the longest weight/height limit for the harness, rather than belted.

a lot of them seem to stop at 105-110cm or 18kg for example but the Joie Bold R is weight based and can used with the harness till 25kg.

so I thought great, bought it. (Bought 2 in fact, one for GP car!)

now I’ve seen on a fb group that harness is more dangerous after a certain age!?! Is that true or is it more dangerous if the seat isn’t designed that way?

if this seat says ok to 25kg it must be face surely?!

I don’t feel confident him being just belted!!

for context he 4.5 years old 105cm and 17kg

It's fine for him to be in a 5 point harness as long as the seat is properly installed (looks like it from what I can see here) and he's within the weight guidance. Yes the Joie Bold R can have harness all the way up to 25kg.

There is a claim that goes around on a lot of the car seat groups that forward facing with harness is never safe and seatbelt used forward facing is therefore safer - this isn't evidence based, or at least it's not based on very good evidence. If forward facing harness seats were no good, then car seats probably never would have been invented.

However, the reverse is also true - a lot of people assume that a 5 point harness is safer than a seatbelt, but with the age/weight/height your child is, there's no reason to assume that a 5 point harness would be safer. If he was smaller or younger then it is clear that 5 point harness is better. At his age/size, it's really more down to your gut feeling - some children sit better in a high back booster/seatbelt than others.

Since you have the Joie Bold, it makes sense to use the 5 point harness.