How to Automatically and Remotely Restrict a Kid's iPhone

Tech Lockdown Team

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Updated June 27, 2025

If you're a parent who wants to ensure that it's possible to remotely disable your child's iPhone, there are a few built-in parental control features you could consider using if your child's iPhone is set up properly.

To disable your child's iPhone remotely, it's possible to use Screen Time's Downtime feature to block access to most apps, and essentially make your child's iPhone impossible to use. Parents can use Downtime to block access to all but a limited number of apps, which is arguably a better idea than completely disabling your child's iPhone remotely.

Prerequisites

First, parents should have set up Managed Screen Time for their child. To do this properly, here's what you'll need:

1. Separate devices for both you and your child
2. Separate Apple accounts for both you and your child
3. You (the parent) should add or invite your child to your Family Group using Apple Family Sharing

For instructions on how to set up you and your child's iPhone to use Manage Screen Time properly, see our dedicated guide for monitoring your child's iPhone activity .

How To Set Up Downtime

After your child is added to your Family Group and has Managed Screen Time enabled, Downtime can be set and used like this:

1. Use Downtime to remotely disable your child's iPhone if needed
2. Schedule Downtime automatically

Here are the steps you'll want to follow on your (the parent's) iPhone:

Note that if you've set up Managed Screen Time, you don't need access to your child's iPhone each time you make a change.

You should see a menu like this:

How To Remotely Disable Your Child's iPhone with Downtime

After setting up Downtime, follow these steps to disable your child's iPhone:

Your child will immediately see a notification like this:

In 5 minutes, your child's iPhone will be almost completely disabled.

Can my Child still access content while their iPhone is disabled?

Your child cannot use the App Store, Safari, or other browsing or apps by default. You can customize this behavior by setting up the Always Allowed section on your child's Screen Time settings page.

The Settings app will always be accessible to your child, but all apps not allowed by your child's Always Allowed will be blocked.

When an app is blocked, this is how it will look from the child's perspective:

Why does it take 5 minutes to lock my Child's iPhone?

This is a restriction set by Apple that can't be worked around directly.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can't the Find My app be used to remotely disable iPhone or iPad devices?

It can, but we don't recommend using Find My if you're a parent. This is because when "Lost Mode" is enabled, your child would still be able to unlock and use their iPhone.

Is it possible to block my child's internet connection on their iPhone immediately?

Downtime takes 5 minutes to take effect on your child's iPhone. While there isn't a way for parents to get around this limitation, there are some clever workarounds you could try instead, depending on what exactly you're trying to do:

1. If you want to prevent Safari from being used, you can set Allowed-Only mode for websites
2. If you want to immediately restrict a specific app, this can be done with app limits fairly reliably

Check out our dedicated guide for monitoring your child's iPhone for more examples.