
Qustodio seems like a popular choice for many parents due to marketing and the endless amounts of affiliate clickbait reviews. Read my “honest” Qustodio review to find why you should NOT be using Qustodio for your parental controls.
If your kids have multiple devices on different OS’s (Apple, Android, Amazon, Windows, Mac, Linux), then parental control can be a real nightmare, as most apps are not available on all platforms.
For desktop security, I was using Microsoft Family Safety for time limits and activity reporting plus BitDefender for cybersecurity + openDNS for an additional level of content filtering at the router level.
For my kids mobile devices, I was using MMGuardian + Kid-Control. If your devices support these 2 apps, then I would recommend using these over Qustodio.
Last year I bought Amazon Fire tablets for my eldest boys, and due to their age I could not use the built-in “fire for kids” mode as it was too childish and restrictive, and they just refused to use the tablets.
Sadly MMGuardian is not available on Amazon marketplace, so I had to look for something else, as It quickly becomes very confusing and a lot of hassle if you are using different products on different devices, so I started looking at the limited options available on the Amazon store.
Due to the ongoing issues with Microsoft family safety. I was also looking for an alternative solution for my kids desktop PC’s as well.
Qustodio
There was little choice on Amazon marketplace, so I decided to give Qustodio another try.
TL/DR summary: Qustodio has very poor security and is easy for kids to bypass or simply uninstall the app. You definitely cannot rely on Qustodio and will need to be diligent and technically aware enough to also manually check and monitor your kids devices every single day to make sure they have not tampered with Qustodio.
I tried out the trial version of Qustodio a few years back when I wrote my article Cyber Security: How to protect your kids online, but it was lacking in several areas so didn’t bother installing it on my kids devices and opted to go for MMGuardian + Kid Control at the time, as MMGuardian had better monitoring, better activity tracking, better security and more control but lousy GPS tracking, which is why I used kid-Control as well.
Overall, the first impression of Qustodio is that it seems to do a fairly decent job at blocking content and controlling screen time. It blocks dangerous sites, it enforces safe search in all browsers and on youtube, it allows you to block or allow specific apps and websites either globally or per device, and it also allows you to set time limits.
The interface is not especially intuitive, and until you get used to the app, it is quite an effort to figure out how some features work and where to find the settings as some options are rather disjointed and the web interface does not match the Android app. My wife still struggles to find where or why something is blocked or disabled.
With the screen time, you can enable/disable time controls, by setting which hours of the day the device can be used and you can also set allowed number of hours each say. So you could, for example, say that they can use their tablet for 4 hours per day between 9am – 7pm.
Since I have started using Qustodio, they do seem to have implemented one of my suggestions, and you can now set time limits on specific apps as well, which means you can limit time on games or social media only for example.
All access levels is very much an all or nothing solution though, so you cannot make a change that applies today only for example, so if you block access on Tuesday, it will be blocked every Tuesday until you undo it.
What I really wanted is a time quota solution like Microsoft Family safety, allowing time to added ad-hoc on a daily basis, so kids have no time by default, they have to come home from school, do their chores etc, and then they could request time, at which point I would grant the request and give them x number of hours screen time.
This was very flexible and very easy to manage and meant that if they were banned for being naughty, I just did not give them any time that day.
Lack of Monitoring
One huge issue is the complete lack of any social media or chat app monitoring. Qustodio claims on their website to have social media monitoring, but this is not true. The only option they have is for Facebook on desktop pc, which requires the child to install the Qustodio facebook app, which can just as easily be removed by your child, so is essentially useless.
There doesn’t seem to be any support for the facebook mobile app or monitoring for the many other social media websites or apps on mobile devices such as Twitter, Instagram, Google+ or any of the myriad of chat apps such as WhatsApp, Skype, Saraha and all the others.
The whole reason for monitoring your kid’s online activities is to make sure they are not being harassed, threatened, bullied or getting involved with bad people. In this respect, Qustodio completely fails and is essentially useless. They could be chatting to paedophiles or being groomed by drug dealers, and you will never know.
Location Tracking is Unreliable
Most times I tried to use the location tracking to find out where my kids were, it gave a completely wrong location or was still reporting an old location from hours or even days ago.
For this reason, I do not rely on a single product, as none of them has been perfect. I primary used kid-control for the location tracking, but this has also become unreliable, so I am again looking for alternatives.
Note: I am now using Life360 for tracking, which has been very reliable.
Changes require a reboot
This one really does defy logic for me. If you make any changes to your child’s settings, such as block/allowing an app, adding/removing time etc, this will often not take effect until the next day unless you reboot the device.
So let’s say your child is being naughty or has not done their chores, and you lock their phone as punishment, you think they now have no access. In fact they are sitting up in their room using their phone as normal.
Tomorrow comes, the block has now kicked in, but your child has now gone out with the friends. You remove the lock, but of course, it has no effect. So unless your child thinks to reboot their phone, they are now stuck unable to use their phone or make calls and think you have done it on purpose.
I contacted Qustodio support about this and they confirmed this is intended behaviour. I did point out the above reasons why changes need to take immediate effect or they are pointless, but they were not interested and did not remotely care about the safety of the kids.

Poor Security, Easy for kids to bypass
Sadly, any good features about Qustodio are rendered completely moot by the fact that the security is terrible and it is very easy for kids to bypass.
The first thing I noticed, is that when the screen time runs out, Qustodio locks the screen whenever you try to do anything, but it takes a few seconds for it to kick in. This means that the kids can still use the device in those few seconds, as they just continually keep opening the apps for a few seconds to read messages etc. It is also possible for them to perform blocked actions if they are quick enough, as they can perform the action before Qustodio blocks it.
For example, even if you have blocked access to the play store, so they cannot arbitrarily install apps, this can be bypassed. Granted it is repetitive and arduous, but kids will go to any lengths to get around restrictions.
All my kids are quite IT literate, and since I wrote this review originally, one of my boys figured out how to completely uninstall Qustodio and told his brother how to do it. Frankly, it wasn’t hard, a quick Google search brings up a youtube video showing you how to do it. It took me a couple of weeks to notice since Qustodio does not alert you that the app has been removed and is no longer being monitored, so that was 2 weeks of unrestricted access for both my boys.
Since then I have discovered an even easier method. You simply uninstall Qustodio in the usual way (hold icon, drag to uninstall link), if you do it quick enough then you will bypass the anti-tampering, as it takes a couple of seconds to kick in.
There is no easy way to stop your kids from doing this either, so my only option was to tell them I was now monitoring for the app being removed and to regularly check their phones. I did contact Qustodio a few months back to report this issue, but they didn’t care.
A few weeks later my kids had then figured out how to bypass Qustodio instead by using the android Guest account, meaning that when I checked their phones, everything seemed fine to me. I only found out about this due to them slipping up and using their phones right in front of me after bedtime when they were supposed to be locked and forced them to show me what they had done. If not for this slip-up, then I would have been oblivious for who knows how long.
I advised Qustodio support about this issue too, and again no real feeling that they care and clealry nothing has been done to address this as it is not exactly a new hack. The best they do is offer a workaround, which is to make yourself the primary user on your kids phones, and then add them as guest accounts. Not ideal.
If all else fails, your kids can simply reboot their Android device in safe mode, which bypasses any parental controls. I have only found 1 app which has a solution to this, which is MMguardian. Thy have a special version of the app which you install during the phone setup, which acts as the phone admin. NOTE: This is not the app you get from the play store.
So if your kids are good with IT and computers, or are even just savvy enough to use Google to search for “how to hack Qustodio”, then they are going to get around Qustodio easily, and it might potentially take you months until you twig.
I would have to recommend MMGuardian over Qustodio 100%, which while not perfect, is way more secure and does have better monitoring. I have switched back to mmguardian myself and had to resort to just DNS filtering for the Amazon tablets and taking them away at bed time.
Iv’e just read your article about Qustodio and how much I feel identified. How can it be that it is the top1 recommended application and children can bypass and override the controls.
My 11 yo managed to remove qustodio even when the telephone was blocked! Which is turning into a nightmare for me to know when the app is being switching off and reporting is not accurate.
He has a xiaomi devise. I understand that you recommend MMGuardian as it is more difficult to disactivate. The problem I see with qustodio is that if the kid is very quick as you saying can disactivate the functions.
I am grateful to have read your article. Your advise is appreciated.
Thank you.
I’ve used Qustodio for years until it stopped working properly and it was very easy to bypass.
Now I’m using Google Family Link (totally free) on my daughter devices, it works perfectly, except I would like just to:
Easily see web and youtube history (not by their devices but remotely);
They can delete the history by Chrome and youtube, even if managing their account is allowed only by parents and they don’t know their Google account password;
If they are over 13yo they have the option to stop supervision, (even if their phone will be blocked for the next 24hours after the request) I don’t want to let them having that option at all. It would be enough to lock Google Play Services (to be shown on the device but still working in background) but I cannot find a way to do that.
I already locked the phone setting access with another app (LockIt) to avoid Family Link bypassing but it cannot lock Google Play services.
I’m just a mom, I’m struggling to find a really working parental control, I’m not so tech savvy… if you can give me tips or write a post with those solutions I will be infinitely grateful to you, as many parents!
Thanks a lot!
The best solution I have found so far, which I think I did mention in the article, is mmguardian.
It is not perfect and the interface is very clunky and outdated, but it does a better job than all of the other products I have tested so far.
They also have a way to install the app so it completely blocks the use of safe mode as well, which is the way any other app can be removed.
If my kid intentionally disables anything I put on their phone, it’s back to the flip phone for them. No crap.
Which is fine if you do not use GPS tracking or are happy to lose that functionality. But this was a primary feature for me. if something happens to my kids, the GPS tracking tells me where they are and where they have been.
Without this, your only option is to contact all their friends to see if anyone knows where they are. And do you know who are their main friends, where they live or their phone numbers?
I have tried to keep a record of their friends/parents phone numbers, but this has also proved impossible, as the numbers don’t seem to stay working for very long. I can only assume they must keep losing their phones and changing their umbers.
Please tell me what is the very best security app to use for my teenagers? They have andriod phones and IPADS.
I have been using Qustodio and it’s not working well.
please see my other articles on parental controls, where I have reviewed several other products. Overall I suggest mmguardian.
There is no solution for Apple devices i’m afraid. Apple have made it impossible to provide any effective parental control and they think your childs privacy is more important than their safety. the only choice you have is the built in screen time, but you must also onown an Apple device to manage this, and it is very easy for the child to circumvent.
I recommend sticking with Android devices for kids.
Sorry… your last post says “I recommend sticking with Apple devices for kids.” but you said most apps don’t work on Apple devices..
it’s a typo, should have said Android.
What do you recommend for a teenager’s PC? I looked at mmguardian. It only seems to apply for Android and iOS. What I need is to restrict games, give ad hoc availability once homework and chores are done, and block at night. Thank you!
Sadly the best solution I have found for Windows is still Microsoft’s own family parental controls.
It is the most flexible with the ability to give screen time and also time on individual apps on demand.
You just have to remember to check it regularly to make sure it is still working, as it has a tendency to break.
Obviously you need to make sure your child is a standard user and not an administrator.
Do you still recommend mmguardian as the best solution for Android? Do you still use it for your kid’s phone? Thank you!
Sadly I have had a lot of issues with mmguardian on some devices since writing this.
I only have to use parental controls on 2 of my kids now thankfully.
With my daughter I have had continuous issues with MMguardian just randomly not working, not locking, not unlocking, not applying time limits or app blocks etc.
Battery optimisation seems to cause a lot of problems, and there is really nothing you can do about this it seems.
they have also discontinued the admin version that blocks using safe mode.
I am using google family link now, plus dns filtering.
I am only doing parental control for my 2 youngest now.
Am seriously thinking of getting a firewalla device.
I will be updating this article soon or doing a new one
It looks like Qustodio is a good choice for PC if you just want to block & monitor content/website usage. I don’t need to have time limit access, or to track Social Media, since I will block access to these sites anyways.
I just want to make sure nothing inappropriate is being viewed & I want to monitor what is seen online.
Can Qustoido be bypassed on a laptop for monitoring this way (not Mac, just basic laptop)?
Thank you!
No idea, never used it on pc. I use the microsoft family safety that is built into windows along with dns filtering.
The Qustodio app is terrible for PCs. I appreciate how effective the content filter is, but there’s one major flaw I found on the app. All it takes is one quick look at task manager, select the Qustodio process, and then select end task to prevent it from working at all. This is a very serious oversight!
doesn’t surprise me.
Although you would be make sure your kids are not running and administrator account as well.
You could probably solve this with a group policy to deny access to the task manager, but I would suggest just using the built in windows family safety instead.