> My daughter will not get a phone at all until she's at least 16 and probably finally actually needs one.

It’s all fine and dandy, until (i) you find that they’ve actually just saved up their pocket money and gifts for the last year and a half to buy the phone (age 11 in my daughter’s case) and that all the after school and weekend activities are being arranged on phones. Seeing your kids excluded from real-world activities is tough.

In our case, a combination of talking to the kids plus Apple parental controls offered a reasonable approach.

My daughters are younger than that, but A lot of the neighbor girls in who are in that age range got apple watches before phones. Which kind of makes sense, because it allows them to text, but keeps them off of apps and such.

Yep. Even 20 years ago, phones were basically necessary to have a social life in high school. It’s where everything got planned.

I had a cell phone before my parents. Paid cash for a TracFone when I was 16 or 17 and used that to sell weed. Where there's a will, there's a way.

My daughter is 14. Still no phone. You can make this work.

[dead]