Bark Phone Review: Why This Parent-Approved Smartphone Is the Best Choice for Kids’ Safety

The Bark Phone is a smartphone geared to ages 6 to 15 with built-in parental controls. It’s the only phone with Bark built in and yet it doesn’t look like a kiddie phone, which can embarrass tweens and teens. Rather, it’s a state-of-the-art Samsung that allows you to add and remove parental controls as you see fit. Plans, which are separate from your existing phone plans, start at $29/month and include unlimited talk and text, and the device itself costs $240 (or you could pay $24 for 10 months). 

Bark’s monitoring tool scans your child’s texts, emails, social media and apps for digital dangers and sends you alerts accordingly. And if your kid is a hacker like mine, you can rest easy, knowing there is no way for kids to delete text messages without permission, download workaround VPNs or change the parental controls you set. Bark is so confident you will like their product that they allow you to try it risk-free with a 30-day money back guarantee.

When we “unboxed” the Bark Phone, we saw a sleek black Samsung that came with a USB-C charging cord and a protective black case. (The brand offers two models—the Bark Phone and the Bark Phone Pro, which both come with 128 GB storage and a 50 MP triple lens camera. The Pro has slightly more RAM, a more powerful fast charge and better water resistance. For the purposes of this review, we're focusing on the standard Bark Phone.)

The next step was to download the Bark app onto my iPhone and to activate the kid phone. Admittedly, we had a little trouble with this, so I emailed customer support, and they were so responsive and helpful, we were up and running in no time. I loved that they were really on top of it and provided almost immediate solutions when we needed assistance.

"I liked how the Bark app walked me through a basic checklist to set up permissions, approved contacts and location alerts," Davison said. "All in all, it took about 15 minutes to set up, and that was including a software update."

As for my family, we decided that for now, we would only allow talk and text, as opposed to access to apps and social media. The parent app gives you the ability to approve or block all of the child’s contact requests so you can know exactly who they are communicating with. It also allowed me to go through and set screen limit times and best of all, I was able to see my kid’s location. This, and being able to reach my child, was one of the best benefits.

Here’s what you’ll get with the Bark Phone:

• Contact Management – Parents can approve or deny contact requests and prevent messages from being deleted. 
• Content Monitoring – Bark monitors text messages, social media, web browsing, emails, images and videos for potentially harmful content such as bullying, predators and self-harm indicators. 
• AI-powered Alerts – Bark's technology provides alerts for over 45 categories of potential dangers, offering personalized insights and expert recommendations. 
• Location Tracking – The phone offers 24/7 location tracking with alerts, check-ins and GPS history. 

A Bark Phone differs from other kid-friendly phones, like the Gabb, because it does have the option of internet (but you get to decide on access). Additionally, the Gabb does not allow you to block callers, which felt pretty important to me.

"Being able to approve or reject callers was huge to me, as well as the ability to monitor messages and receive alerts about troubling behavior," Davison adds. "A 2022 U.S. Department of Education study found that 21.6 percent of students reported being bullied online or via text, and as my daughter gets older, I've been worried about how kids today deal with a bully they can't escape, with messages buzzing in their pockets and on social media."

To that end, the Bark Phone also stands out because it gives you the ability to control it, offering peace of mind as a parent. Case in point: The first day my kid had the Bark Phone, the app alerted me to text messages being sent and received that were flagged for bullying, profanity and sexual content. When I reviewed said messages, I saw that it was mostly harmless kidding around that middle schoolers do, but still, not appropriate. Therefore, even though my kid was at school, I was immediately able to put the phone on “pause,” meaning they could only use it to reach emergency contacts (me and my husband).

Later, we had a discussion about appropriate use, took the phone away for two days and hopefully taught an important lesson in responsible communication.

The Biggest Pros of the Bark Phone

I strongly believe that just handing over a smartphone to a tween or young teen is like giving them the keys to the kingdom. Bark allows us parents a level of control that I have not seen on any other device. (Even though my kid is begging me to add Snapchat to the phone, the answer, at least for now, is no.) In today’s world of bullying and predators, I love being able to monitor everything without worrying about my child deleting things (or being pressured to do so), and I love being able to track his whereabouts.

"It really provides peace of mind for parents, from the location sharing—so you know that your kid made it from school to karate, or wherever they're headed—to being able to approve of callers," Davison says. "When unknown numbers, for example, tried calling the Bark phone, they were intercepted and flagged for approval. Even if it was a relatively harmless spam call, it was nice that it wasn't getting through."

The Phone's Cons

According to my kid, the downside is that it’s not an iPhone, but to be frank, I don’t care. I was prepared to get a flip phone, and this phone is way more functional and cooler. And as a parent, the only con, for me, is seeing my 12-year-old walk around with a phone period. (To combat this con, we had him sign a phone contract which includes not being on the phone at the dinner table, religious school or right before bed.) At the end of the day, this phone is gold, but you still have to be the parent.

"I love that you can set routines to limit screen use during bedtimes and school time, but I did find setting those to be a bit glitchy at times, using my app," Davison says. "The website offers plenty of step-by-step tutorials and videos, though, and after restarting my phone, it worked just fine."

The Bark Phone is a great choice for parents who are not yet ready to hand over a smartphone to their child but want to have communication and the social benefits of digital connection. Kids ages 10 to 15 are the prime audience for this phone, but if you’re considering giving your child a phone before age 10, it would be preferable to make it a Bark Phone than an iPhone or Android that you can’t monitor the same way.

If you want to keep tabs on your child and have the ability to be in touch, and you’re concerned about social media, endless text messages that you would otherwise not be privy to and basically everything on the world wide web coming at your youngster 24/7, Davison and I would highly recommend the Bark.

Fast Facts

• Memory: 4 GB RAM
• Storage: 128 GB
• Camera: 50 MP triple lens camera
• Water/Dust Resistance: IP54 rated (dust- and water splash-protected, but not waterproof)
• Dimensions: 6.47" x 3.07" x 0.31"