If your kids want an Apple Watch, but you're not willing to pay that much for a kid's watch, you might like the new NickWatch. It's available now at Argos in the UK (and Currys soon). This is a Nickelodeon brand smartwatch specially designed for kids and apart from entertainment features, you can also use it to find, text and track your child.
NickWatch is priced at £159 and includes an annual subscription to NickWatch Caretaker, a safety and security program with world-class tracking capabilities including WAN roaming so you can wear the watch even on holiday.
The app lets you call and send messages to and from the watch, and there's a nice set of parental controls that let you do things like mute the device during school hours, decide who it can and can't talk to, and which are your options. The child can and cannot talk to him. The son can use it without logging into social media apps, and the selection of games will be expanded every few months with new stickers, sound filters and other fun stuff.
The cheapest Apple Watch at the moment is the Apple Watch SE, which is much more expensive at £259 and doesn't have global roaming. That's a lot of money for a watch, especially for kids, and in my case I didn't want to buy one for my youngest son despite months of demand. Instead, I bought them a Vodafone Neo Kids smartwatch. Launched in 2021 but seems to have been discontinued. all product videos on official product page now say account closed.
I think Neo has a lot in common with NickWatch; it's also themed, in Vodafone's case, with Disney characters, as well as location-based, built-in games and a walled garden of apps. And my son lost interest in it after about two weeks, leaving me with an annual subscription to keep paying; I hated the app and would often miss messages and call notifications because the app wouldn't send them to me.
This makes me wary of any smartwatch for kids, although I've had more success with the Fitbit Ace, the device that currently tops our guide to the best smartwatches for kids. This was partly due to the battery life of a week after each charge; Smartwatches like the Neo and NickWatch need to be charged every two days, and that's a cause for concern because your kids don't.
