When Is The Best Time To Put A TV In Your Child’s Bedroom?

7 Jan 2023

Wondering when is the right time to put a TV in your child’s room? Discover what other parents think and the pros and cons of this big decision.

Adding a TV into a child’s room is often a big family decision.

Balancing your child’s independence and need for their own space with managing screen time and monitoring what they can watch is not an easy task.

To help you decide when it is the right time for you to put a TV in your child’s room we have looked at the pro’s and con’s and what other parents think below.

Table of Contents

Benefits of children having a TV in their bedroom

Benefits kids tv room

Like with every parenting decision, there are always lots of pros and cons on each side of the argument.

Benefits of children having a TV in their room include:

Fewer Arguments Over The TV

If the kids are constantly arguing over what they watch, having their own TVs in their rooms is a good way to stop this.

Although, we know that they will find something else to fight over.

More Time for Your TV Programmes

If you find yourself constantly losing the battle for the remote, the kids having their own TV will mean that you get some screen time back for yourself.

This may be especially useful when you have older children who have later bedtimes, resulting in it being too late for you to binge-watch the latest drama you have been fancying.

Get Your Living Room Back

When the TV is also used for gaming, your living room can soon be overrun with tech.

If the latest Playstation has taken over your TV stand and the floor is full of Nintendo switch games, moving everything up to child’s room is very tempting.

You will be able to free up some space and you will get your living room back to a relaxing space.

Downsides of kids having a TV in their room

Downside kids tv room

Along with the benefits of having a child having a TV in their room, there are also some downsides. These include:

Less Control Over Screen Time

We all know that too much screen time for kids isn’t ideal and that it may be best to try to put a limit on it of sorts.

If your child has a TV in their room the amount of time they spend watching will be much harder to control.

Sleep Disruption

A TV in your child’s room may not only mean that it will be had to control the amount of screen time but also when your kids can pop on their favourite programme.

A healthy sleep pattern is important for growing kids but this could be easily interrupted with easy access to a TV.

It will be much easier for kids to stay up late and it is reasonable to worry they will ignore your rules around turn-off times.

Monitoring what your kids are watching

With most TVs allowing access to the internet it will be harder to keep an eye on what programmes your kids are watching and ensure everything is age appropriate.

Even if you don’t allow internet access via a smart tv, it will be much easier for your child to have access to programmes on after the watershed.

Less Family Time

Although the idea of you getting time with the TV sounds appealing, you may find that the kids start to spend more time in their room than you intended.

This may especially be the case with older children who may start to opt to watch their TV alone rather coming down to watch it with you as a family.

What do other parents about The Best Time To Put A TV In Your Child’s Bedroom

Reliant Infographics All Together New Branding Reliant New Infographic

Reliant recently conducted some research around children and TVs.

They surveyed over 650 parents and asked them questions regarding kids watching TV watching and about putting a TV in their bedroom.

They discovered that 75% of kids would like a TV in their room and usually start asking for a TV when they are in infant school.

It was also found that 45% of children watch TV to fall asleep and that 43% of parents wished that they had waited to allow a TV in their child’s room.

Only 8% of children didn’t watch TV programmes, 50% still watch live television programmes and 54% of children have a tablet or ipad.

So when is The Right Time for Children To Have A TV in their room?

Unfortunately their official guidelines on what age children should have a TV in their room.

It, therefore, comes down to personal choice weighing up the pro’s and con’s and knowing your child.

However, you may want to wait until your child is older to handle the responsibility and more willing to follow your rules.

When you do decide it is the right time to add to a TV to your child’s room, you may want to consider doing the following:

Set Up Parental Controls

Most new TV’s allow you set up limits for screen time and times the TV can be watched.

You should also be able to set up parental controls on the content that they can access.

Have Family Screen Time

So that you completely lose your children to their rooms, set up a regular time for you all to watch TV together.

You could ensure that they are watching quality TV and include it in their overall screen time.

Encourage Time Away From The TV

To help keep the kids away from the TV it is a good idea to encourage the kids to do activities away from the TV.

Organising days out and play dates, setting up independent craft activities and playing family board games will all help to keep the screen time down.