Parental Controls on Netflix: How to Enable Them!

I am a Netflix Stream Team member and as such, receive complimentary streaming service. As always, all thoughts and opinions are my own. 

One of the things I absolutely love about Netflix is the amount of original content they have to offer. These shows tend to push right past the boundaries the cable networks need to adhere to, and that can make for programming that has a much more “real” vibe. For example, I’m currently watching The Ranch, which volleys back and forth between being a sitcom and a drama. It gives me a lot to chew on with every episode and I’m so glad I get to tune in to it.

My kids, on the other hand, don’t need to be watching The Ranch due to the language content (there are fairly frequent f bombs in the script, among other things). My oldest is 8, and she is going through a phase where she is very interested in what the grown ups are talking about and watching, so she will often ask to watch whatever I’m watching. This has made me realize that I may need to take some extra precautions to ensure that she doesn’t check out some of mom and dad’s shows during her personal Netflix watching time.

Fortunately, Netflix has a built in parental control feature that I just learned about and wanted to share with you all. It’s simple and effective and brings me a lot of peace of mind.

Head over to your account section, and to your settings. Click on the Parental Controls link, and this will pop up:

What you are doing here is setting the unrestricted level. I chose to let anything up to the PG rating be completely unrestricted. If something is TV-14 and up, though, any user on the account will have to put in the 4 digit pin that has been set. So even if I’m logged into my Netflix account as Tiffany, if I want to watch The Ranch (or similar), here’s what happens:

It takes 1 second to enter my pin, so it’s absolutely no big deal to me. And it keeps little ones from accidentally (or purposely) watching content that isn’t appropriate for their age. I really appreciate this simple parental control feature! If you have kiddos who get unsupervised Netflix screen time, I highly recommend setting this up to ensure that they are watching appropriate content.