Amazon Fire Kids Edition
If you're looking for a robust tablet that can keep children entertained, a special Amazon Fire model might be the answer
Alongside its regular Fire tablets, Amazon also offers special child-friendly editions of the Fire 7 and Fire HD 8. The tech specs are the same, but the tablet comes in a chunky rubberised casing – in blue, pink or yellow – to protect it against drops and bumps. And if your little one somehow still manages to break it, Amazon’s two-year “worry-free” warranty covers all accidental damage.
The device runs the regular Fire OS, but activating your child’s user profile replaces the homescreen with a simple visual interface, providing easy access to age-appropriate videos from YouTube, plus any apps, books and videos that you’ve chosen to share from your main account. You can also optionally enable a basic web browser, which allows access to a preconfigured whitelist of childfriendly sites.
The main attraction, though, is a huge selection of licensed videos and apps, available directly from the
homescreen. These include Disney Princesses, Thomas the Tank Engine, Postman Pat, Dora the Explorer and – my personal favourite – Peppa Pig.
The Fire for Kids software also comes with integrated parental controls, protected with a PIN, which allow you to limit how much time each day your child spends watching videos and playing games. And Amazon’s web-based Parent Dashboard lets you keep an unobtrusive eye on exactly what your child’s been up to.
If there’s a catch, it’s the price. The Fire 7 and HD 8 Kids Editions both cost £50 more than the standard tablets – a steep hike, proportionally speaking. On top of that, all the licensed content requires an ongoing subscription: for one child, this costs £2 a month for Prime members, or £4 a month for normal mortals. Still, once you’ve coughed up you don't have to worry about ads and no in-app purchases – and as a sweetener, the first year is included in the purchase price. Of course, it’s perfectly possible to set up any regular Android or Fire OS tablet with third-party parental control software, along with your own selection of kid-friendly apps. But if your experience of parenthood is anything like mine, you’ll be happy to pay for something a bit more smash-proof, which works out of the box, and whose warranty includes protection against the odd experimental dunk in the paddling pool.