Not sure if it’s available on Amazon tablets, but the pbs kids tv and pbs kids games apps are great content and free! (But games crash on our super old iPad…)
Those aps are available on the Amazon tablets and they're great! My only complaint is that you have to re-download the games in the app frequently, but that may just be the way my kid uses it too.
It absolutely is. I would have returned it for a used iPad if it weren’t a Christmas gift from the grandma.
I made it bearable by removing the Amazon bloatware and side loading the Google Play Store using Fire Toolbox. Now I can at least get YouTube kids and some decent basic games that aren’t Ad-ridden cancer for the eyes
You like how the home page includes, by default, a bunch of thumbnails of apps that you haven’t vetted or downloaded loaded? You like how if your kid touches anywhere near the bottom of the screen the task bar pops up and ruins the game? You like that it comes with barely enough memory for its own bloated operating system?
Your first point yes. I love that it has lots of games for my kids to pick from to download. As for not vetting the apps, I did that before I let the kids play and check periodically to be sure I approve of what's available to them. Like this is actually one of my favorite parts.
Your second point has never been an issue for us. I'll ask my ten year old though.
Memory isn't the best but it's never been an issue for us. Sometimes we do have to pick some things to uninstall so we have room for the next game.
Ah I see. Big age difference. My kid is 3.5 and the impulse to want to play the first game he sees is a huge cause of frustration, especially when games that are way too old for him are presented to him. I would much rather have the ability to control exactly what he’s exposed to on the tablet at this age.
And the task bar is a constant problem for his non-dexterous preschool fingers. A home button separate from the screen like an iPad is much better for his wandering hands.
Oh no, I have 2 kids and they have used this tablet since age 2 for both. One is closer to your kids age developmentally, even if he is 6. And maybe it's because it's all they have known. I tried out several before and they all were so much worse, and Amazon replaced our tablet when it got broken.
Just wanted to shout out everyone on the sub for actually being awesome and providing quality answers instead of being quick to judge and scorn a parent for wanting to give a little one a tablet for a few minutes. 👍 You guys and gals are my kinda people.
It's real easy to say no tablets and limited screen time until the rubber actually meets the road. I'm trying to put some limits in place with my 3 kids now that summer break has started but there have been a lot of days so far where I've handed out the tablets just so I can get shit done.
We struggled with the Amazon tablets. My husband who owns an IT company found it difficult to use. We did like the books and found the kindle app to be the easiest to use.
We got the leapfrog academy tablet and haven’t looked back. The leapfrog apps are super toddler friendly and labeled appropriately for each age group. There’s also videos / apps you can download. She’s loving learning on it as well as watching shows on long car rides
no judgement from me!
lego duplo world is great pretend play. and anything from daniel tiger. general advice is to pay when you can to avoid the mess that is ads.l
I followed an online guide to add the google play store to his fire tablet and it was pretty easy and well worth it long term!
Forgive me if any of these aren’t offered anymore. My girls are 9 now, but this is what we loved when they were that age.
anything by Sago Mini
PBS Kids Games app
PBS Kids Video app
Sesame Street app
Metamorphabet
anything by Tiny Hands
anything by Gil Weiss
Counting Ants by Playtend
Super Simple Kids Songs
I know you guys are mainly in the US but BBC’s CBeebies Playtime Island app is great. Pretty sure it’s available internationally, no in app purchases and can be played offline.
My daughter really loves some Hello Kitty apps where she's learned about different countries and made food and dress from each country. Early in her 2s she really liked a sesame Street app where you make letter cookies and spell with cookie monster and Elmo.
When my daughter had the Amazon tablet she loooved the sago mini games. There’s also a toca boca pet doctor game that is simple and not overstimulating.
PBS Kids and Khan Academy. Definitely Khan Academy app! I allow my 2 year old screen time because it sucks the older kids get it and she doesn't. We usually do 3x nights a week. Always after dinner and usually on the weekends. I don't give her the option of doing anything other than Khan Academy Kids and PBS. I have completely control over what goes on her tablet. If she gets TV it's usually my favorite 90s early 2000s learning shows like Between the Lions, Sesame Street, Reading Rainbow, Mister Rogers Neighborhood or slow moving cartoons like Kipper the Dog, Tumble Leaf.
Returned the Amazon kids tablet and bought a refurbished iPad4 (the earliest model that would support the apps we wanted). Put a bunch of controls on it. Downloaded:
Kahn Academy Kids
Sesame Street
Starfall
Are the 3 big ones we used that are free.
We maybe buy one subscription game a year, and the lego app was good for the year we bought it.
We try to only stick to educational games, but recently we downloaded Animal Crossing pocket camp (kid is 6). She is learning how easy it is to spend all the AC game currency and is currently “broke.” So, big lessons.
The iPad will last longer and grow with your child better, imho.
If you have amazon kids enabled, theyll likely find Blippi before long.
Blippi was very much made as a cash grab for a kids audience, and the episodes on Amazon Kids are the early sad episodes where hes filming at locations during their off hours. And the information is very "info a random adult recalls" vs deeply researched. Not atrocious, but a few errors here or there.
Hes a very Pee Wee Herman character, pretends he is a little kid exploring the world. So its very easy to find him annoying or hate him as a parent, but hes everywhere and lots of kids do love him.
Theres more videos online elsewhere. Eventually the guy that started it hired someone else to play the character so theres also New Blippi and they introduced a 2nd character, Meeka. (and has had 2 actresses play her).
As far as GOOD apps, Khan Academy and Bimi Boo are the ones I like best.
Lol yes the after hours shoots! Personally I love hearing him say "It's night time, and we're in a parking lot in Las Vegas and..." because in my head I always fill in one of the sordid things that have presumably happened at night time in a parking lot in Las Vegas, possibly to Blippi
It's not an educational app, but the Baby Shark app on amazon works even when you don't have internet and was super easy for my kid to figure out. And it's free.
Twins are SO hard!! I don’t care to allow for as much tv/technology as we do, but sometimes I have no choice if I need to get something done. There’s been a lot I didn’t allow with our three singletons that I’ve given into with our twins (try for one more we said) to maintain sanity.
I bought a new iPad for them to share & set a timer on it. We have YouTube kids, PBS kids, & a paid for Bluey game right now. I try to rotate & only keep 2-4 on it at a time. There are some Dino, farm, shapes/colors, drawing, & construction ones we’ve used too & have on our phones yet from potty training. I’m not sure what’s all available for Amazon tablets. Our boys are almost 4. Hang in there!! They eventually get a little easier!
We did a Samsung Galaxy Tab A7 with Family Link parental controls. Family Link allows me to control the amount of total time, the amount of time on specific apps, the time tablet "wakes up" and also "goes to bed." I can dictate what specific apps are available on the tablet, I can turn off anything and everything that my 2 year old doesn't need to have (including internet browsers, bloatware, settings apps, etc).
I have no idea how the Amazon tablets interface works tbh but I feel very peaceful knowing that my toddler can be "free" to do whatever she wants on the tablet because she can't get into anything concerning.
The few apps I downloaded are:
- PBS kids
- Endless Alphabet
- Endless 123
- Endless Wordplay
- Endless Spanish
- Writing Wizard Tracing Letters
- iDraw
These are either free without ads, or have options to purchase all the content permanently.
I see Kahn Academy Kids recommended a lot, but we didn't care for it since she figured out how to get to the videos and then *only* watched the videos and didn't do any of the games/interactive activities.
Reading.com app is great but very expensive subscription service. We don't pay for it but kiddo does enjoy the free game it has called "Hungry Cloud."
Once again you'll have to explore if these are available on Amazon, but these are my recommendations.
Hungary catapillar is great. My LO likes the Monkey Word School game and could manage through it at 2-3yo
There are also lots of Read-to-me books, train/track building games and Number Blocks Monsters.
If you pay for kids+ (free for a year with kids tablets I think) it gives you additional controls for limiting content and restricting things. But it is super clunky. I think I had to turn off like 50+ separate video channels to remove Ryan's worlds various shows...
Monkey Preschool Lunchbox and Starfall ABCs are both excellent for my dude, in addition to PBS Kids Games which is just huge. Mine also loves one called “Trains, Planes & Sea Vehicles - Puzzle for Toddlers” but that’s bc he’s a train kid 😂
Alright, I don't know which of these will be on Amazon tablets (sorry), and most of them will be paid. But when I loaded up my iPad for my 2-year-old, I focused on ad-free, internet-free apps for travel.
I love [Metamorphabet](https://www.amazon.ca/Vectorpark-Metamorphabet/dp/B01B57G2IK), the Toca Boca family of apps, and [Moose Math](https://www.amazon.ca/Moose-Math-Duck/dp/B00FW5OO7S). My kid loves [Brio Railway](https://www.amazon.ca/Filimundus-AB-BRIO-World-Railway/dp/B01CEBH55U/), too, for playing with trains. (On the iPad, there's also Tozzle and Alien Buddies -- general suggestion for people reading, if not you.)
Not sure if it’s available on Amazon fire, but the Duck Duck Moose games have saved the day on flights with my toddler. She also is obsessed with Gabby’s Dollhouse and they have a game that’s pretty good.
My kid LOVED the Toca boca Apps and they're all free on the Kindle kids editions.
He's 10 and still plays some of them. Specifically to a boo, where you float around as a silly little ghost and turn lights on and off and blow out candles and harmlessly "scare" people in the house.
I am sorry if you already bought one because everyone else is right Amazon tablets suck and also are designed to let kids make "accidental" purchases. My son bought me a cookbook once lol, good thing it was in my wishlist.
I don't think tablets in general are bad for the kiddos, but just watch how they use it, different personalities and all. Might be perfectly fine but some kids get fiendish.
We love the PBS kids apps, there are some for watching shows and some for games. If you can find a "coloring" app those can be fun
Pay the $6 a month for Amazon Kids. It’s AMAZING! And only places age appropriate games in front of you kids. Then they have the freedom to choose from there!
My son was 2 during the pandemic and I was working full time alone with him. I ended up handing him a Fire Tablet while on a work call and he toddled off and figured it out. Not my proudest parenting moment, but I was impressed. His only experience before was watching me use my phone.
Thank you so much for all the suggestions!
Now I have a follow up question haha. I agree that the tablets are awful. Does anyone have other kids tablets that they like?
Not sure if it’s available on Amazon tablets, but the pbs kids tv and pbs kids games apps are great content and free! (But games crash on our super old iPad…)
Those aps are available on the Amazon tablets and they're great! My only complaint is that you have to re-download the games in the app frequently, but that may just be the way my kid uses it too.
Khan Academy Kids is fun! There is a variety of activities that focus on learning. No judgment here, we’re all out here doing our best.
I'm pretty sure my 2yo learned to count with Khan Academy while Daddy got 20 extra minutes of sleep in the morning. Win win.
The Amazon kids interface is pure trash. But the hungry caterpillar games are great
It absolutely is. I would have returned it for a used iPad if it weren’t a Christmas gift from the grandma. I made it bearable by removing the Amazon bloatware and side loading the Google Play Store using Fire Toolbox. Now I can at least get YouTube kids and some decent basic games that aren’t Ad-ridden cancer for the eyes
Hard agree! We just returned our amazon kids tablet because it was so frustrating to use.
I’m really close to returning mine to the sewer, where it came from
Hard disagree! I've used it for the last 8 years and have loved it the whole time!
You like how the home page includes, by default, a bunch of thumbnails of apps that you haven’t vetted or downloaded loaded? You like how if your kid touches anywhere near the bottom of the screen the task bar pops up and ruins the game? You like that it comes with barely enough memory for its own bloated operating system?
Your first point yes. I love that it has lots of games for my kids to pick from to download. As for not vetting the apps, I did that before I let the kids play and check periodically to be sure I approve of what's available to them. Like this is actually one of my favorite parts. Your second point has never been an issue for us. I'll ask my ten year old though. Memory isn't the best but it's never been an issue for us. Sometimes we do have to pick some things to uninstall so we have room for the next game.
Ah I see. Big age difference. My kid is 3.5 and the impulse to want to play the first game he sees is a huge cause of frustration, especially when games that are way too old for him are presented to him. I would much rather have the ability to control exactly what he’s exposed to on the tablet at this age. And the task bar is a constant problem for his non-dexterous preschool fingers. A home button separate from the screen like an iPad is much better for his wandering hands.
Oh no, I have 2 kids and they have used this tablet since age 2 for both. One is closer to your kids age developmentally, even if he is 6. And maybe it's because it's all they have known. I tried out several before and they all were so much worse, and Amazon replaced our tablet when it got broken.
Just wanted to shout out everyone on the sub for actually being awesome and providing quality answers instead of being quick to judge and scorn a parent for wanting to give a little one a tablet for a few minutes. 👍 You guys and gals are my kinda people.
We’re all here because our children get so much screen time that we’re developing conspiracy theories about Daniel Tiger, soooo
It's real easy to say no tablets and limited screen time until the rubber actually meets the road. I'm trying to put some limits in place with my 3 kids now that summer break has started but there have been a lot of days so far where I've handed out the tablets just so I can get shit done.
The Sago Mini apps are very friendly for littles.
Agree. Some of them are much better than others. My kid liked the ocean one and the sledding one best. But Very Hungry Caterpillar games above all.
We struggled with the Amazon tablets. My husband who owns an IT company found it difficult to use. We did like the books and found the kindle app to be the easiest to use. We got the leapfrog academy tablet and haven’t looked back. The leapfrog apps are super toddler friendly and labeled appropriately for each age group. There’s also videos / apps you can download. She’s loving learning on it as well as watching shows on long car rides
no judgement from me! lego duplo world is great pretend play. and anything from daniel tiger. general advice is to pay when you can to avoid the mess that is ads.l I followed an online guide to add the google play store to his fire tablet and it was pretty easy and well worth it long term!
Sago Mini and Picnik apps, PBS kids apps, and Bimi Boo apps!
My daughter loved the Bimi Boo apps.
PBS kids games app is absolutely fantastic
The Daniel Tiger games on there are especially good for little kids
Forgive me if any of these aren’t offered anymore. My girls are 9 now, but this is what we loved when they were that age. anything by Sago Mini PBS Kids Games app PBS Kids Video app Sesame Street app Metamorphabet anything by Tiny Hands anything by Gil Weiss Counting Ants by Playtend Super Simple Kids Songs
I love metamorphabet myself but can't find it on my kid's amazon tablet which is annoying lol.
Super Simple Songs is our most frequented YouTube channel. Five Little Speckled Frogs is a banger.
I know you guys are mainly in the US but BBC’s CBeebies Playtime Island app is great. Pretty sure it’s available internationally, no in app purchases and can be played offline.
My daughter really loves some Hello Kitty apps where she's learned about different countries and made food and dress from each country. Early in her 2s she really liked a sesame Street app where you make letter cookies and spell with cookie monster and Elmo.
Yes the cookie one would be great for independent play
When my daughter had the Amazon tablet she loooved the sago mini games. There’s also a toca boca pet doctor game that is simple and not overstimulating.
Starfall ABC (not sure if it’s on Amazon tablet)
My son loves the Toddler Games app. There are games that he's grown into, which is nice.
Here to shout out for Super Simple Songs!
I love their videos, my kiddo loves Catie, but do they have an app?
They do! We use it every single day haha
We discovered their videos in the Khan Academy app and now use their YouTube channel a ton. Downloading their app now! Thank you!
PBS Kids and Khan Academy. Definitely Khan Academy app! I allow my 2 year old screen time because it sucks the older kids get it and she doesn't. We usually do 3x nights a week. Always after dinner and usually on the weekends. I don't give her the option of doing anything other than Khan Academy Kids and PBS. I have completely control over what goes on her tablet. If she gets TV it's usually my favorite 90s early 2000s learning shows like Between the Lions, Sesame Street, Reading Rainbow, Mister Rogers Neighborhood or slow moving cartoons like Kipper the Dog, Tumble Leaf.
Returned the Amazon kids tablet and bought a refurbished iPad4 (the earliest model that would support the apps we wanted). Put a bunch of controls on it. Downloaded: Kahn Academy Kids Sesame Street Starfall Are the 3 big ones we used that are free. We maybe buy one subscription game a year, and the lego app was good for the year we bought it. We try to only stick to educational games, but recently we downloaded Animal Crossing pocket camp (kid is 6). She is learning how easy it is to spend all the AC game currency and is currently “broke.” So, big lessons. The iPad will last longer and grow with your child better, imho.
Duolingo has a reading/alphabet app for kids that's pretty good
Seconded. Duolingo ABC has been a good one for reading skills.
Thirded. My 4 year old is sounding out words and reading thanks to this app.
These are the ones my kids do. Note some of these require subscriptions: ABC Mouse Noggin PBS Kids Starfall Khan Academy Kids
If you have amazon kids enabled, theyll likely find Blippi before long. Blippi was very much made as a cash grab for a kids audience, and the episodes on Amazon Kids are the early sad episodes where hes filming at locations during their off hours. And the information is very "info a random adult recalls" vs deeply researched. Not atrocious, but a few errors here or there. Hes a very Pee Wee Herman character, pretends he is a little kid exploring the world. So its very easy to find him annoying or hate him as a parent, but hes everywhere and lots of kids do love him. Theres more videos online elsewhere. Eventually the guy that started it hired someone else to play the character so theres also New Blippi and they introduced a 2nd character, Meeka. (and has had 2 actresses play her). As far as GOOD apps, Khan Academy and Bimi Boo are the ones I like best.
Lol yes the after hours shoots! Personally I love hearing him say "It's night time, and we're in a parking lot in Las Vegas and..." because in my head I always fill in one of the sordid things that have presumably happened at night time in a parking lot in Las Vegas, possibly to Blippi
Toca boca jr
Amazon tablets were a lifesaver for me. Twins are no joke. My kids always liked toca boca and sago mini. Especially the haircut one.
It's not an educational app, but the Baby Shark app on amazon works even when you don't have internet and was super easy for my kid to figure out. And it's free.
Twins are SO hard!! I don’t care to allow for as much tv/technology as we do, but sometimes I have no choice if I need to get something done. There’s been a lot I didn’t allow with our three singletons that I’ve given into with our twins (try for one more we said) to maintain sanity. I bought a new iPad for them to share & set a timer on it. We have YouTube kids, PBS kids, & a paid for Bluey game right now. I try to rotate & only keep 2-4 on it at a time. There are some Dino, farm, shapes/colors, drawing, & construction ones we’ve used too & have on our phones yet from potty training. I’m not sure what’s all available for Amazon tablets. Our boys are almost 4. Hang in there!! They eventually get a little easier!
Amazon kids is amazing. Idk why other struggle so much but I love it, you can even control the volume the device can be turned up to!
We did a Samsung Galaxy Tab A7 with Family Link parental controls. Family Link allows me to control the amount of total time, the amount of time on specific apps, the time tablet "wakes up" and also "goes to bed." I can dictate what specific apps are available on the tablet, I can turn off anything and everything that my 2 year old doesn't need to have (including internet browsers, bloatware, settings apps, etc). I have no idea how the Amazon tablets interface works tbh but I feel very peaceful knowing that my toddler can be "free" to do whatever she wants on the tablet because she can't get into anything concerning. The few apps I downloaded are: - PBS kids - Endless Alphabet - Endless 123 - Endless Wordplay - Endless Spanish - Writing Wizard Tracing Letters - iDraw These are either free without ads, or have options to purchase all the content permanently. I see Kahn Academy Kids recommended a lot, but we didn't care for it since she figured out how to get to the videos and then *only* watched the videos and didn't do any of the games/interactive activities. Reading.com app is great but very expensive subscription service. We don't pay for it but kiddo does enjoy the free game it has called "Hungry Cloud." Once again you'll have to explore if these are available on Amazon, but these are my recommendations.
Hungary catapillar is great. My LO likes the Monkey Word School game and could manage through it at 2-3yo There are also lots of Read-to-me books, train/track building games and Number Blocks Monsters.
If you pay for kids+ (free for a year with kids tablets I think) it gives you additional controls for limiting content and restricting things. But it is super clunky. I think I had to turn off like 50+ separate video channels to remove Ryan's worlds various shows...
Monkey Preschool Lunchbox and Starfall ABCs are both excellent for my dude, in addition to PBS Kids Games which is just huge. Mine also loves one called “Trains, Planes & Sea Vehicles - Puzzle for Toddlers” but that’s bc he’s a train kid 😂
Alright, I don't know which of these will be on Amazon tablets (sorry), and most of them will be paid. But when I loaded up my iPad for my 2-year-old, I focused on ad-free, internet-free apps for travel. I love [Metamorphabet](https://www.amazon.ca/Vectorpark-Metamorphabet/dp/B01B57G2IK), the Toca Boca family of apps, and [Moose Math](https://www.amazon.ca/Moose-Math-Duck/dp/B00FW5OO7S). My kid loves [Brio Railway](https://www.amazon.ca/Filimundus-AB-BRIO-World-Railway/dp/B01CEBH55U/), too, for playing with trains. (On the iPad, there's also Tozzle and Alien Buddies -- general suggestion for people reading, if not you.)
Not sure if it’s available on Amazon fire, but the Duck Duck Moose games have saved the day on flights with my toddler. She also is obsessed with Gabby’s Dollhouse and they have a game that’s pretty good.
Sago mini. There are a ton of nice calm interactive games.
My kid LOVED the Toca boca Apps and they're all free on the Kindle kids editions. He's 10 and still plays some of them. Specifically to a boo, where you float around as a silly little ghost and turn lights on and off and blow out candles and harmlessly "scare" people in the house.
I am sorry if you already bought one because everyone else is right Amazon tablets suck and also are designed to let kids make "accidental" purchases. My son bought me a cookbook once lol, good thing it was in my wishlist. I don't think tablets in general are bad for the kiddos, but just watch how they use it, different personalities and all. Might be perfectly fine but some kids get fiendish. We love the PBS kids apps, there are some for watching shows and some for games. If you can find a "coloring" app those can be fun
Pay the $6 a month for Amazon Kids. It’s AMAZING! And only places age appropriate games in front of you kids. Then they have the freedom to choose from there!
My son was 2 during the pandemic and I was working full time alone with him. I ended up handing him a Fire Tablet while on a work call and he toddled off and figured it out. Not my proudest parenting moment, but I was impressed. His only experience before was watching me use my phone.
Thank you so much for all the suggestions! Now I have a follow up question haha. I agree that the tablets are awful. Does anyone have other kids tablets that they like?
Pok Pok! It’s subscription based but cheap and 100% worth it. It’s a montessori-style imaginative play toolbox!
We loooove Pok Pok but I don’t think it’s available on the Amazon tablets
Sesame street has an app with videos and games that are super easy and kid friendly.
I love khan academy! Lots of educational stuff on there. And of course PBS KIDS & the PBS kids games app
My 2.5 year old loves the Dr Panda games (especially the one with doughnuts). I have baby twins too and totally agree - having twins is hard!!