DS desperately wants the Vtech fake smartphone thing but the reviews aren't great

[DeathRattleDazzle]

DS will turn 8 just after Christmas and has for a few months mentioned he really really wants the Vtech kids smartphone thing,

https://www.vtech.co.uk/product/detail/19125/KidiCom_Advance_Pink

This kind of idea. He wants it to play games, it has face recognition to unlock it, plays music and takes photos. With some of the versions there is a very basic messaging app for messaging parents etc.

The issue is that the reviews are fairly mixed/pretty bad, and it's quite expensive. Has anyone bought this before? Or anything similar?

He's actually desperate for a proper phone but we've said that's not happening until he's much older. He wants to grow up too quickly 😩

He only 'ends up' with a SIM if you buy one for him. He's not going to take himself down to the Carphone Warehouse.

SIM-free inexpensive Android is absolutely the best practical solution. We did something similar last year when DD wanted a compact camera, as we realised that standalone pocket cameras with a decent spec barely exist any more. The deal is that she only gets a SIM once she starts year 7, so in the meantime it only has connectivity if she is on wifi or if we share a personal hotspot with her when we are out and about. You will need to spend some time learning how to use the parental controls properly, which is unfortunately the part that many parents never bother to do.

You can get very chunky cases which will make it feel a bit more age-appropriate and less grown-up, if that helps.

Two of my children had these, and they were well used. Admittedly I bought them around £40ish each, but they were good value. You don't have to buy games from the store, we ended up putting things like minecraft on them so it is possible to put what you want on them. You can set it up so they can message approved numbers if you want but its not necessity. They only stopped being used as the kids decided to see if they would float in the swimming pool one day. Needless to say they aren't waterproof!

My 8 year old had an iPod touch for his birthday. He wanted a phone but we said not until secondary school. It only works on Wi-Fi, but very similar to a mini iPhone. He can also message family members who have apple phones/iPads through iMessage.

Not all secondary schools are like this. Ours has a total ban on phones and no phones are required for homework or anything; they use physical books. They found a massive reduction in bullying when they introduced the ban some years ago. Neither of my DC have phones.

My DS - the same age - spotted this Vtech phone on a leaflet. I won’t be buying it. He used the Vtech camera a fair bit, however the parental controls were useless - a simple maths sum which he could work out from a very young age. He has the watch and I can count on one hand the number of times he’s used it.

He will not be getting a phone or tablet for a number of years; both he and his older sibling are still very much into toys and reading, and happy without phones because they haven’t been introduced to them.

This is a good solution but if you can’t get hold of an iPod Touch then you can create exactly the same functionality by taking the SIM out of an iPhone. Apple’s parental controls really are rock-solid if you learn to use them properly.

I'd stick to the right and hold of on the phone as long as possible, it does become a slow creep and small phone screens aren't good for their eyes. If he already has a tablet he can't need more. My older ones are finishing high school and their peer group did manage to jailbreak phones, circumnavigate parental controls and if all else fails get second burner phones as teenagers. Flipping nightmare parenting in social media times

Those saying stay away from phones a bit longer, would you seriously suggest the Op spends over £100 on what's essentially a toy phone.
That has very mixed reviews and is likely to be very quickly out grown? The ipod touch would have been a perfect answer however has been taken off the market, not enough sales.
So Op is left with a decision the vtech toy phone, or a real phone without a sim?

You also have to remember phones and the software on them have come a long long way in the last 10 years.

I'd just tell him no.

He wants a phone and you've told him no and why. Now he want this so tell him no and why.

He has something that does all of these things (games/music/photos etc). He doesn't need something that does exactly the same, but to a lesser quality. Just tell him that. But tell him clearly and now, don't let him be disappointed right before or at Christmas.

There’s another option: just saying no, and that he doesn’t need a phone…

We’ve managed it 🤷‍♀️

Just buy a cheap proper phone. People become 'obsessed' by the things they are denied not what they do have, by holding off you'll make it more obsessive.

I got a cellnet at age 8 in 1998, it was for safety so I could contact my parents. Before mobiles I use to carry the houses cordless phone (but theres was obviously range issues).

My oldest got his first phone at 8 and honestly hes about to turn 15 and out of all his friends hes the one that DOESN'T care about phones. It has zero novelty value for him as he has had one forever, he currently just has his dads hand me down and no urge for anything fancier. He mostly uses it as a clock lol.

My DS first phone was the Pixi and cost £5 from car phone warehouse on PAYG... better than an over priced toy and actually practical if needs be.

Also side note but by age 12 only 1 kid in DS class didn't have a phone
(parents moral objection) and I saw how it effected him, some kids can be really
mean.