Asking because my 11yo is the ONLY kid in his class without a phone. I'm not exaggerating. I overheard the kids talking and apparently they're all on Discord/Snapchat/whatever. I feel like I'm being unreasonable but also I'm not ready for that headache yet. My wife thinks I'm being too strict. What's the actual age that makes sense? 12? 13? 14? Help me settle this.
The Discord thing is the real issue. That's genuinely where kids organize everything socially now. But you don't need a phone for Discord - could he use a computer with parental controls instead? Gives him access to the social part without the phone addiction piece.
It's not true that EVERYONE has a phone. There are always a few kids without them. That said, 11yo is getting close to when it becomes actually useful (group chats, coordination, emergency contact). But Discord/Snapchat at 11? Yeah that's early.
Talk to his school counselor about whether he's actually the ONLY one. I'd bet money he's not. Kids tend to exaggerate this stuff.
You're not being unreasonable. 11 is genuinely early for a phone. But I'd check - does he actually NEED it for social coordination or is FOMO the real driver? If he's genuinely being excluded from group planning, that changes the calculus.
The "only kid without a phone" thing is rarely true though. I'd ask HIM specifically who has what - kids overstate what their peers have. Might be only 4-5 kids with actual phones and the rest have parent tablets or whatever.
The 'everyone has one' argument is usually not actually true but it FEELS true to them. And the social anxiety about not having a phone is real even if it's not rational. That's the actual problem to solve, not necessarily by giving him a phone.
The ONLY kid is rough but also 11 is actually reasonable to hold the line. Probably doesn't matter what we say though - he's already feeling the peer pressure about this.
Can you do a middle ground? Like a basic phone for calls/texts only, no data? Buy him a year or two before Instagram/Snapchat gets normalized?
Yeah but he knows it going in. It's not secret monitoring. We've talked about why and he's okay with it. I'm not trying to spy, I'm trying to know if he's in group chats with weird stuff going on. He respects the boundary.
My take: Discord and Snapchat are legitimately terrible apps for 11yos. The Discord communities can get weird, Snapchat is literally designed for hiding things. I'd push back on those specifically even if you give him something.
I tried that with my 11yo and he felt like it was babyish compared to what the other kids had. The social thing escalated. Eventually we gave him a real phone with hard parental controls - see my kids' screen time, what apps they use, read their texts (they know this). It's not perfect but it's a compromise.
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My compromise: basic phone (no smart features) for calls/texts until 12-13, then smartphone if grades stay up. That way he's not the only kid without one but also not on TikTok at midnight.