Made for ages 5 to 10
Your child gets a screen with the websites you picked, and nothing else. No search box to wander out of. No links that lead somewhere you didn't choose.
Pick one of your approved websites
The whole idea
Most filters try to guess what's bad and block it. Tiny Internet works the other way round — nothing opens unless you put it on the list. A short list you can read in one glance is easier to trust than a promise about everything else.
What it does
Tapping a link that leads off your list stops right there. Pop-ups and redirects stop too, so the usual ways out are closed.
Advertising and tracking scripts are blocked before they load. Pages arrive quieter, with less pulling at your child's attention.
Calm and Reader views strip out autoplay video, animation and clutter when a site is busier than you'd like.
Privacy
This is the part worth reading twice, because it's usually where children's software disappoints.
For honesty's sake
Two things, and we'd rather say so plainly than let you find out later.
The history stays on your computer. Records of what your child visited are kept locally, shown only to you, and deleted after thirty days.
For you, not for them
You set it the first time you open the app. Settings, the site list and unlocking a paused session all need it. No default password, and no way to switch it off.
A straightforward record of sites opened and sites blocked, with the reason. No dashboard to decipher.
When your child wants a site that isn't on the list, it comes to you as a request to approve or decline.
Getting it
Tiny Internet is being tested with a small group of families before it goes out widely. It's free during the beta, and everyone who joins the beta keeps it free for good.
You will see a warning the first time you open it. During the beta the app isn't yet registered with Microsoft and Apple, so both will ask whether you're sure. That registration is coming before the wider release.
On Windows: choose More info → Run anyway.
On a Mac: open it once and let it be refused, then go to System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll down, and click Open Anyway. Older advice to right-click and choose Open no longer works — Apple removed that shortcut in macOS Sequoia.
What it sends. With the settings it ships with, nothing about your child leaves your computer — no account, no analytics, no crash reports. Three things do go out and none of them is about your child; the full list is here, written from the source code.
Updates. On Windows the app updates itself — it downloads new versions quietly in the background and they apply the next time it's closed and reopened. On a Mac you'll need to download it again when we tell you there's a new one; automatic updates there need the Apple registration mentioned above.