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Guide · First smartphone

The first smartphone: how to tell whether your child is ready

There is no magic age. But there are questions that show whether your child (and you) are ready. Part 1 of our series on the first smartphone.

· 2 min read

By Redaktion familydevice

On this page
  1. How many children have a smartphone
  2. Six questions before deciding
  3. Writing down rules: the media use agreement

“Everyone in my class already has one.” By the time children move on to secondary school at the latest, many parents hear this sentence. There is no age at which a smartphone is right, but there are questions that help with the decision. This first part of our series helps with the when; the next parts with the how.

How many children have a smartphone

So the sentence “everyone already has one” is usually not true at primary school, but increasingly true around the move to secondary school.

Six questions before deciding

Writing down rules: the media use agreement

A tried and tested tool is a written agreement between parents and child. The initiatives klicksafe and Internet-ABC offer a free online generator for this, with which you choose rules together and print them out [3]. klicksafe offers further materials on media education on its pages for parents [2]. Detailed guides for parents to download are also available from klicksafe [4], from the Deutsches Kinderhilfswerk [5] and from the Bundespsychotherapeutenkammer [6].

The next part of the series is about how to set up a first smartphone safely.

Sources

  1. [1]Medienpädagogischer Forschungsverbund Südwest (mpfs) (2025): KIM-Studie 2024: Kindheit, Internet, Medien
  2. [2]klicksafe (EU-Initiative für mehr Sicherheit im Netz) (2026): Medienerziehung: Informationen für Eltern
  3. [3]klicksafe und Internet-ABC (2026): Mediennutzungsvertrag: Regeln gemeinsam festlegen
  4. [4]klicksafe, Internet-ABC und Landesanstalt für Medien NRW (2011): Internetkompetenz für Eltern: Kinder sicher im Netz begleiten (Leitfaden für Eltern)
  5. [5]Deutsches Kinderhilfswerk (2016): Der Internet-Guide für Eltern
  6. [6]Bundespsychotherapeutenkammer (BPtK) (2020): Elternratgeber Internet

Further reading