Is Your YouTube Content Made for Kids?

Your YouTube video is made for kids if it targets children under 13 as its primary audience, or targets them as one of its audiences after weighing the COPPA factors. Family-friendly content is not automatically made for kids, and some children watching does not decide the setting. YouTube requires creators to label their videos accurately, regardless of where they live.

COPPA and YouTube: the basics

COPPA, the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, protects personal information collected online from children under 13. Covered operators generally must give parents notice and obtain verifiable parental consent before collecting, using or disclosing that information, subject to limited exceptions.

The FTC amended the COPPA Rule in 2025, with most updated requirements requiring compliance by April 22, 2026.

COPPA's foundational principle is one that most people can agree on. Parents - not kids, companies, platforms, or content creators - should be in control when it comes to information collected from children online. The FTC, that's the Federal Trade Commission, enforces the law through the COPPA rule.

Under COPPA, personal information also covers what are called "persistent identifiers". Behind the scenes code that recognizes a user over time and across different sites or online services. That could be an IP address or a cookie when it's used to serve targeted ads.

Now on the face of it, that would seem pretty self-evident and relatively easy to implement even on a platform the size of YouTube because YouTube for years has clearly stated in their Terms of Service that in order to use YouTube and sign in to the platform, you must be over the age of 13. However, the information YouTube has been providing to potential brands and advertisers has been somewhat contradictory.

In September 2019, Google and YouTube agreed to pay $170 million to settle allegations that they collected children’s personal information without parental consent. The settlement required a mechanism for creators to identify child-directed content.

So you've got an idea of what COPPA is and the fact that the FTC enforces this and why they have a big beef with YouTube because YouTube has been telling advertisers exactly why their platform is so popular with children. But what does any of this have to do with you?

Your responsibilities as a YouTube creator

YouTube and creators share responsibility for children’s privacy. A channel can fall under COPPA when it is directed to children and personal information is collected by the creator or on the creator’s behalf.

Or to put it another way, to begin with, you are a video content creator. But you need a platform to distribute your content on, and that's where YouTube comes in to play. But once you start using YouTube, you are taking advantage of all of their features and tools and the identifiers they use to collect information on the internet.

In YouTube Studio, go to Settings > Channel > Advanced settings > Audience. You can set a channel default or choose to review every video. For existing videos, go to Content, select the videos, then Edit > Audience. Individual video settings override the channel default.

On made-for-kids videos, YouTube disables personalized ads, comments, cards, end screens and the notification bell, among other features. If the whole channel is made for kids, additional channel features such as Posts are unavailable. See the current instructions and full feature list.

Incorrect audience settings can lead to action by YouTube and, where COPPA is violated, legal consequences. COPPA civil penalties are assessed per violation and depend on the facts of the case; they are not an automatic fixed fine for every uploaded video.

How to decide whether your video is made for kids

Evaluate the whole video and who it is intended to reach; no single color, character, keyword or viewer-age statistic decides the setting.

To be clear, your content isn't considered directed to children just because some children may see it.

And we'll come back to that a little later because there is more information coming out about audience guidance with content. However, if your intended audience is kids under 13, you're covered by COPPA and have to honor the Rule's requirements. The Rules set out additional factors the FTC will consider in determining whether your content is child-directed.

• subject matter and intended audience
• visuals, animation, toys and characters
• child actors or celebrities
• language, music, stories and activities
• advertising and reliable audience evidence

If children are your primary audience, select made for kids. If children are one intended audience and the factors show the video is child-directed, it is mixed-audience content and still made for kids. Content aimed at teens or adults, or appealing broadly without targeting children, is general-audience content and should be set as not made for kids.

These seem a bit broad and not just leveled towards YouTube which still makes it all a bit vague. And with that general vagueness and confusion in mind, the FTC are delighted to share some general rules of thumb that are as follows:

First, unless you're affirmatively targeting kids, there are many subject matter categories where you don't have to worry about COPPA. For example, if your videos are about traditionally adult activities like employment, finances, politics, homeownership, home improvement, or travel, you're probably not covered unless your content is geared towards kids. The same would be true for videos aimed at high school or college students. On the other hand, if your content includes traditional children's pastimes or activities, it may be child-directed.

Second, just because your video has bright colors, or animated characters, doesn't mean you're automatically covered by COPPA. While many animated shows are directed at kids, the FTC recognizes there can be animated programming that appeals to everyone.

Keywords and disclaimers are evidence, not exemptions

A keyword or a 13+ disclaimer does not determine whether a video is made for kids. Your title, description and About page can indicate your intended audience, but YouTube and the FTC consider them alongside the video’s other characteristics. A toy or cartoon name is not a standalone test. Consider whether the video’s presentation is aimed at children, adult collectors or another audience.

Take NerdSync's example of "Why the Ducktales Song sticks in your head". That song is still stuck in my head, 30 years after I watched the original cartoon. NerdSync's video on it, is a deep educational insight into why that is. But it uses Ducktails as a keyword, so this gets very confusing, and very cloudy in its judgment the moment you un-peel a layer of any of these examples.

Use audience evidence alongside the COPPA factors

Audience evidence can help, but it does not replace the child-directed-content factors. Relevant evidence can include how you market the channel, reviews aimed at parents and reliable information about who watches similar content. YouTube Analytics is not designed to determine whether content is child-directed.

For example, has your channel been reviewed on sites that evaluate kid’s content? Is your channel, or channels like yours, mentioned in blogs for parents or young children or in media articles about child-directed content? Have you surveyed your users or is there other empirical evidence about the age of your audience?