No matter how much they’re begging for one, your kid probably doesn’t need a smartphone. The official advice of the American Academy of Pediatrics is that young children need hands-on social interaction and exploration with peers and caregivers to learn.
That doesn’t mean you don’t need a digital device to locate them, entertain them, or distract them while you’re doing something else. If you need someone to absolve you, let me be the second, fourth, or 10th person to tell you: That’s perfectly OK. Here are a few devices that have worked for me and my children, who are now 5 and 7. Most of these gifts don’t require parental supervision, and the ones that do have good parental controls to limit your kids’ use. Check out our Best Subscription Boxes for Kids guide and Best Tablets for Kids guide for more.
Updated November 2022: We’ve added new items, like the new Kindle Paperwhite for Kids.
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Photograph: Belkin
Best Headphones
Belkin Soundform Mini
If your kid watches movies while you’re traveling, do your fellow airplane passengers a favor and buy your kid some headphones. Adult headphones may work for older kids, but mine are still small enough to prefer child sizes, and I look for sets that are volume-limiting—that is, they can’t output sound louder than 85 decibels so as not to bust tiny eardrums.
These affordable Belkin cans can be used with a cord or with Bluetooth. They have about 30 hours of battery life and a shockingly good build quality for the price. Plus, they come in a variety of colors! For sheer reliability, my daughter has come to prefer these headphones over some of our more expensive picks. For more options, check out our Best Kids Headphones guide.
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Photograph: Amazon
A Tablet for Young Kids
Fire HD 8 Kids Edition (2022)
For many, many years, both my son and daughter liked the Amazon Fire Kids tablets, which are affordable, durable, and relatively easy to manage—in a very specific way. If you’re used to Windows or MacOS and want to install your own content, then yes, it can be a little difficult to work around Amazon Kids+. But Amazon’s proprietary kid content system incorporates a zillion books, movies, apps, music, and games, and lets you monitor them all on a parent dashboard. Economically, it just makes sense to use an Amazon kid tablet rather than buying all this content individually. Kids+ also works across Amazon’s Kids Edition smart speakers and Kindles.
The Kids Edition tablets come in two models. Because these are best for smaller kids, we recommend the Fire Kids HD 8 over the Fire Kids HD 10 Pro ($120), which is a little big for tiny hands. Both, however, come with a year’s subscription to Amazon Kids+ and include a sturdy, durable case and a two-year, worry-free replacement guarantee.
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Photograph: PlayShifu
Best Toy
PlayShifu Tacto Chess
If you have a tablet, there are many systems that help turn the slate into a tactile toy. Osmo is one of our favorites for younger kids, but we also like the PlayShifu Tacto system. There are Tacto sets for kids who like dinosaurs, classic board games, coding, lasers, and electronics, but this one teaches young kids how to play chess. It turns the surface of the iPad into a game board and uses physical pieces to teach your kids moves and strategy. It’s a bit fiddly with the iPad Mini, so we suggest sticking to the full-size iPads.
