Half a year on, the world is watching closely. Are the restrictions working?
The truth is far more encouraging. There are several promising trends that other countries are now building upon, reflecting the importance of Australia’s pioneering policies.
The world is, and should, follow Oz’s lead.
When Australia’s law went into effect last December, 10 social media platforms—Facebook, Kick, Reddit, Threads, TikTok, Twitch, Instagram, Snapchat, X, and YouTube—removed 4.7 million under-16 accounts belonging to an estimated 2.5 million Aussies between the ages of eight and 15.
Still, some have said that this decline is too modest, suggested that kids could also be finding workarounds, and concluded that therefore, the law is failing. So let’s look more closely at the numbers.
The law does not eliminate children’s access to social media content. That is because it was never designed to. Account-based access—and the data the user agrees to share with the platform upon sign-up—is the vehicle for many of the worst social media harms that children experience, such as late-night notifications, interactions with anonymous strangers, posting one’s images online, “like” counts, and algorithmic recommendations designed to maximally “engage” or addict that particular child.
We can see why this distinction matters when looking at YouTube, for example. YouTube is often accessed without an account because most of its content is viewable that way. This means that while many YouTube accounts have been revoked since the age minimum took effect, YouTube usage by under-16s is less likely to be affected by the new law compared to platforms like Snapchat, which require an account to view content. The difference shows up in data from the parental control company Qustodio: after the age minimum went into effect, Snapchat monthly usage dropped roughly 40% among 13- to 15-year-olds while YouTube usage dropped just 3%.
Another way to measure the law’s efficacy is to ask parents themselves. In a YouGov survey conducted one month after the law took effect, three in five Australians said the ban had been effective. A majority (61%) of parents of children 16-and-under reported at least two (out of four) positive behavioral changes in their kids, including more in-person social interaction (43%), children who are noticeably more present and engaged (38%), and improvements in their relationship with their child (38%).
So social media use among Australian kids has declined somewhat. And while disappointment about the rate and speed of decline is understandable, it ultimately misunderstands how the law was crafted. The reality is that Australia’s protections are designed to improve over time in three ways.
Second, norms will shift over the next few years as a “no account before 16” childhood becomes ordinary rather than exceptional. Fewer children will feel the need to use platforms to avoid being left out. In the long run, the law’s effectiveness will not be judged primarily by how it influenced today’s 15-year-olds. It will be judged by how it changes the nature of childhood for kids who are now 10 and under.
The Sydney Harbour Bridge is illuminated to mark the national under 16 social media ban coming into effect on December 10, 2025 in Sydney, Australia. —Brendon Thorne—Getty Images
Privacy protection is improving
Then there’s the issue of privacy. Won’t verifying everyone’s age force all users to hand over sensitive identity documents? It’s a legitimate concern, one that every government will need to address as it designs social media age limit policies.
The first is biometric age estimation. For example, Instagram lets you verify your age by taking a short video selfie, which is analyzed by Yoti, a specialized third-party provider. Yoti estimates whether the user meets Instagram’s age minimum, and shares only that result with Instagram, after which both companies delete the facial data.
Neither method requires you to share your name, birthday, or any form of ID. Developing these tools and prioritizing privacy protection will be key as Australia and the rest of the world take on social media regulation.
Some reformers worry that age limits are a distraction from another important goal: changing the manipulative design of social media products, including the algorithmic feeds, autoplay, infinite scroll, and round-the-clock notifications that exploit developmental vulnerabilities in young people. The worry is this: will age minimums let companies off the hook?
In fact, Australia’s age limits have already pressured companies to reform their products’ designs. Earlier this month, for instance, Snap announced that all 13 to 15-year-old Snapchat users worldwide will be moved to a “friends-only” experience where “they’ll be able to create, save, and showcase Stories and Spotlight videos on a dedicated profile that is visible only to their mutually accepted friends.” (Content from this age group was previously distributed to non-Friend audiences through Snapchat’s Spotlight feature.) This global change is in part due to the global spread of age minimum laws.
In other words, age limits change the economic calculus for exploitative features. These laws incentivize companies to design their products with kids’ safety in mind and force them to prove their platforms are safe to avoid being age-limited, rather than allowing them to experiment on kids for decades until social scientists can prove that the platform’s design features are harming young users.
Age limits do not let companies off the hook for design reform. On the contrary, we now see companies making regular announcements about their efforts to improve the safety of their products for teens. Design-reform laws set the goal; age limits create the business incentive to actually meet it. Countries should pursue both.
Better online spaces can now emerge
Let’s look at access first. As explained earlier, Australia’s age limit does not stop kids from accessing social media content. Plus, the wider internet remains available.
Laws like Utah’s Digital Choice Act, which goes into effect later this year, could further accelerate this shift by enabling users to move their data to better-designed social media spaces as they please.
Importantly, as the world enters the next stage of social media regulation, we must consider the status quo. What is the cost of inaction?
Our current system, which is optimized for engagement, is not a neutral public square that helps people express their authentic selves. It is often more like the ancient Roman Coliseum—a space designed to provoke aggressive combat to please the crowd. Unlike the more open and playful internet of the 1990s, many people find today’s social media platforms intimidating. If age limits can open up a market for online spaces where kids can express themselves safely and find supportive communities, the net result will be a gain, not a loss.
Give it time
Already, hundreds of thousands of kids use these platforms less or not at all. Some have taken up offline outdoor activities as an alternative. Parents finally have a line they can hold together, and many are already reporting improved relationships with their children. Privacy-safe verification technology is improving more rapidly because Australia created a much larger market for it. Companies are reforming under pressure, and better-designed online spaces are being built.
While we won’t know the full effects of the Aussie social media law for years, the signs of success are there, and one thing is certain: Australia did the world a huge favor by going first.
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