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Lock a tablet to one toy

A web page can't stop a child from swiping home, opening another app or wandering off to a different website. The tablet itself can: iPads and iPhones have Guided Access, and Android has app pinning. Both keep the screen on one app until a grown-up unlocks it with a code. Here is how to set them up for a toy on this site, and which parts of the toy's screen are worth switching off.

iPad and iPhone: Guided Access

These steps follow Apple's own guide (published July 2026, written for iOS and iPadOS 26.1; older versions work the same way, with the differences noted).

Switch it on once

  1. Open Settings, tap Accessibility, then Guided Access, and turn it on.
  2. Tap Passcode Settings and set a Guided Access passcode. You can also let Face ID or Touch ID end a session, which is quicker than typing the code.
  3. Optionally set Display Auto-Lock, so the screen still goes dark if the tablet is put down during a session.

Start a session in a toy

  1. Open the toy in Safari and let the page load.
  2. Triple-click the top button (iPad), the side button (iPhone) or the Home button (older models). If a menu of accessibility shortcuts appears, tap Guided Access.
  3. On the Guided Access screen, draw a circle around each part a child shouldn't touch. For a toy here, circle the round house button at the top left, the thin strip along the bottom of the toy (it scrolls down to the grown-ups' part, where the links to other toys are), and Safari's address bar and tab bar. Leave the round arrow and the speaker button free if you're happy for them to be used. Guided Access locks the tablet to Safari, not to one page, so anything left uncircled still works.
  4. Tap Options (Session Settings). Here you can turn off Motion so the screen doesn't turn when the tablet is tilted, turn off the volume buttons, and set a Time Limit: when it runs out, a message covers the screen and the toy can't be played until a grown-up triple-clicks and unlocks the session.
  5. Tap Start. If you haven't set a passcode yet, the tablet asks for one now.

End or pause it

Triple-click the same button again (on iOS 18, iPadOS 18 and earlier, a double-click), enter the passcode or use Face ID or Touch ID, then tap End, or Resume to carry on. Apple notes that Crash Detection and Emergency SOS don't work during a session on an iPhone, so end the session before giving the phone back for everyday use.

Android: app pinning

These steps follow Google's Android Help page. Menu names differ a little between makers; if you can't find the setting, the phone's own manual or its Settings search ("pinning") will show where it is.

Switch it on once

  1. Open Settings, then Security (on some phones Security and privacy, then More security settings or Advanced), then App pinning.
  2. Turn on App pinning, and turn on the option to ask for a PIN, pattern or password before unpinning if your phone offers it as a separate switch.

Pin a toy

  1. Open the toy in Chrome.
  2. Open Overview: swipe up from the bottom to the middle of the screen and hold, or tap the square Overview button if your phone uses three buttons.
  3. Tap the app icon at the top of Chrome's card, then tap Pin.

To unpin, swipe up and hold (with gesture navigation), or touch and hold Back together with Overview (three buttons) or Back with Home (two buttons), then enter the PIN, pattern or password. Pinning only stops a child leaving Chrome for another app or the home screen. Everything inside Chrome still works: the house button at the top left of each toy goes back to the toy box, the strip along the bottom scrolls down to the grown-ups' part and its links, and the address bar can open any website. So on Android a child can move from toy to toy, or further; stay close by.

A shortcut on the home screen

To open a favourite toy quickly, add it to the home screen: in Safari, tap the share button, then Add to Home Screen; in Chrome on Android, open the menu and choose Add to home screen. The shortcut opens the toy like an app. It still needs an internet connection to load, and it doesn't lock anything by itself.

What these locks don't do

Sources