The UK government has announced plans for a midnight social media curfew for 16 and 17-year-olds, saying the measure will be switched on by default but can be avoided by changing account settings.

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Under the proposal, popular platforms including Instagram, TikTok and YouTube would be set to be unavailable between midnight and 06:00 for older teenagers. The government said the curfew would be paired with changes to “addictive” design features, including auto-play and infinite scroll, which it wants to disable during the same period.

The government argued that the combination would help improve teenagers’ sleep, attention at school and college, and family time. Technology Secretary Liz Kendall said the steps were designed to ensure young people “enjoy the benefits of technology” while having tools to help them “thrive” online.

Critics, however, said the approach was incomplete. Laura Trott, the Conservative shadow education secretary, described the plan as a “dog’s dinner”, arguing that it amounted to a curfew that can be bypassed. Child safety organisations and experts also raised concerns about whether a time-based restriction would protect vulnerable children.

Linked with wider online restrictions for children

The announcement comes after the government said in June that children under 16 in the UK would be barred entirely from a range of social media platforms.

The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology said it intends to put the new proposals before Parliament by the end of 2026, with a goal of bringing them into effect next spring alongside the planned ban for under-16s.

Alongside the curfew, the government said it wants measures to improve the safety of children using AI chatbot services. It said providers should introduce regular breaks for under-18s.

Government cites curfew trials; critics question impact

The government said it had trialled several approaches, including overnight curfews, in households across the UK. It reported that 300 teenagers took part in tests in which social apps were disabled overnight from 21:00 to 07:00, or capped to one hour, while some participants saw no changes. The government said the tests lasted one month and were designed to compare experiences.

In a report published on Tuesday, officials said the overnight curfews produced the biggest gains in sleep, alongside more engaging family evenings and a lighter burden for parents. It added that the option was also the most manageable to enforce compared with the other interventions tested.

Kendall said the findings supported what parents have long told the government: reducing time on social media brings benefits.

However, Andy Burrows, chief executive of the Molly Rose Foundation, said the plan was “piecemeal” and not the comprehensive child safety framework needed. Prof Sonia Livingstone, an expert in children’s digital rights at the London School of Economics, warned that a curfew could be harmful for vulnerable children if it restricts access to support at night.

“If it’s a curfew on companies using push notifications to wake someone up in the night, absolutely have a curfew,” Prof Livingstone told the BBC. She said a restriction that prevents a child in need of help or comfort from reaching trusted sources during the night could cause harm.

Ofcom powers, VPN concerns and Australia comparison

Dame Rachel de Souza, England’s children’s commissioner, said young people do not want a ban but do want protection from addictive features such as infinite scrolling. She said she wanted to understand how the policies would be delivered and said she would monitor whether they are effective while also urging Ofcom to use its powers to make online services safer for children.

The government’s moves have been framed as following steps taken in Australia, where restrictions on social media for under-16s began in December. In Australia, providers were required to close existing accounts and stop teens from opening new ones, but the measures have been criticised as ineffective, with many young people reporting they can still access sites that were meant to be blocked.

Questions have also been raised about the practicality of age checks for under-16s, and about how any UK regime might handle virtual private networks (VPNs). On Tuesday, the government said research it commissioned found little evidence that many children use VPNs to bypass age checks.

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15 July 2026

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This curfew is about as secure as a "You must be 18 to enter this website" button.

They are of course setting this up to fail..the 'children' will find workarounds

but the ultimate goal of the government is to require 'authentication' for everyone to use the internet A.K.A the digital panopticon.