How much screen time is too much? It’s a question many parents and caregivers ask, and for good reason.
For the vast majority of families and children, screens now sit squarely inside the daily rhythms of life. They entertain, distract, soothe, teach and connect – but they can also take up much more space than we realise.
Also see: How to reduce screen time without going offline completely
According to Dr Onyinye Nwaneri, Managing Director of Sesame Workshop International South Africa, the problem with the question of how much is too much is that reducing the conversation to a number oversimplifies the issue.
An hour spent alone, passively watching mindless videos is one thing; but an hour spent video-calling a parent who is away for work is something else entirely. So is an hour spent engaging with age-appropriate content in a familiar language, with an adult nearby to discuss it with and help connect it to real life.
These are very different screen time experiences, even though the stopwatch says the same thing in all three cases.
That’s why simply imposing a time limit on children’s screen time is rarely enough on its own. The more useful question is whether screen use is helping or hurting the overall balance of a child’s day. To answer that, adults need to look beyond minutes and pay closer attention to quality, context, and what screen use may be replacing.
This broader lens is especially important in South Africa, where families are navigating very different realities from many of their Global North counterparts. In many homes here, a shared phone is the only device the family has, and every minute of use is informed by data costs. In others, children may spend longer on screens because caregivers are juggling work and household responsibilities, or because there are fewer safe places to play outside. In these instances, more screen time doesn’t make the parents careless; it just makes careful assessment more important. So, when guidance focuses only on hours, it misses the bigger picture of digital well-being.
A healthier way to approach screen use in South Africa is to start with a few practical questions.
- What is the child doing on the screen?
- Who are they with?
- How do they feel before and after?
- What might screen time be replacing?
- Can they move away from the device without major distress?
- Does the screen use fit with the family’s values and daily realities?
These questions change the focus from “how long?” to “how healthy?” – a vital paradigm shift. Sesame Workshop’s guidance is useful here because it moves the conversation away from rigid limits towards co-engagement.
When adults are present, even some of the time, screens can become tools for connection and learning rather than simply a way to keep children occupied. A song can turn into a game, a story can open up a conversation about feelings, and a counting activity can continue later with cups, pegs or fruit in the kitchen.
Also see: 5 Ways to manage screen time for your kids
The bottom line is that a healthier digital life for SA’s children can’t be encapsulated in a universal number. It requires better questions, closer attention to what a healthy balance involves and more realistic support for families raising children under very different, and often difficult, conditions.
It also requires that we, as adults, accept that screens are part of childhood now, so our job is not to fight them, but to make sure they do not crowd out the other parts of a healthy childhood.
Also see: Is screen time harming your child’s eyes?
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