YouTube CEO Neal Mohan, who was named TIME's 2025 CEO of the Year, said he limits his children's social media usage — in line with many other tech bosses.
The harms of being online for young children are being vastly researched and becoming more evident by the day.
In an interview with TIME magazine, Mohan, who took the helm of YouTube leadership in 2023, said that his children's use of social media platforms is “controlled and restricted”. “We do limit their time on YouTube and other platforms and other forms of media.”
Mohan has three children: two sons and one daughter.
Stressing the need for moderation, Mohan said that he and his wife are stricter on weekdays, but weekends have fewer restrictions. “On weekdays we tend to be more strict, on weekends we tend to be less so. We’re not perfect by any stretch,” Mohan said in a TikTok video posted by Time Magazine.
A CNBC report, citing mental health experts, highlighted how excessive smartphone and social media use has harmed children and teenagers.
Some experts, such as Jonathan Haidt, a professor at New York University (NYU) and author of “The Anxious Generation,” have even argued that children should not have smartphones until the age of 14. She also advocated for no access to social media before the age of 16.
“Let them have a flip phone,” she told CNBC in an interview, “but remember, a smartphone isn’t really a phone. They could make phone calls on it, but it’s a multi-purpose device by which the world can get to your children.”
YouTube Kids
In another interview with TIME, Neal Mohan said that he feels a “paramount responsibility” to young people and giving parents greater control over how their kids use the platform.
YouTube Kids was launched in 2015 as a child-friendly version of the Google-owned platform.
“The best thing we can do,” he said, “is to make it easy for parents to manage [the platform] on behalf of their children, in a way that’s suitable to their household.”
Australia has formally barred users under the age of 16 from accessing major social media platforms. It is the first country to do so.
Several tech industry leaders, including YouTube's former CEO Susan Wojcicki, billionaire Mark Cuban, and Microsoft's Bill Gates, are opposed to excessive screen time for young people.
