Could This Smartwatch Be The Apple Watch For Kids?
If your kids have been asking for an Apple Watch, but you're not ready to pay that much for a kid's watch, you might like the new NickWatch. Available now from Argos in the UK (and soon from Currys), this is a Nickelodeon-branded smartwatch designed specifically for kids, and in addition to its fun features, you can also use it to make calls, text and tracked where is your son track location.
NickWatch costs £159 and includes a year's subscription to NickWatch Caretaker, a security program whose tracking functions work worldwide; Roaming on the global network is included in the price, so you can use the watch even on vacation.
The app lets you make calls and send messages to and from the watch, and has a good set of parental controls that let you do things like turn off the device during school hours, decide who the child can and can't contact yours and what are the options? the child can use No access to social media apps and the selection of games will be expanded every few months with new stickers, sound filters and other fun things.
The cheapest Apple Watch at the moment is the Apple Watch SE, which is significantly more expensive at £259 and has no global roaming. That's a lot of money for a watch, especially a children's watch, and in my case, I wasn't ready to get one for my kid, despite months of requests. Instead, I bought a special smartwatch from them, the Vodafone Neo. One launched in 2021 but seems to have been discontinued. all videos posted on the official product page now say the account is closed.
I think Neo has/has a lot in common with NickWatch; it was also branded, in Vodafone's case with Disney characters, and also had location tracking, built-in games and a walled garden of apps. And my son lost interest after about two weeks, leaving me with a year's subscription to keep paying; I hated the app and often missed text 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 much better success with the Fitbit Ace, which is the device currently at the top of our best smartwatches for kids guide. Part of this is battery life, which takes a week to charge; Smartwatches like the Neo and NickWatch need to be charged every few days, which you need to be careful about because your kids aren't doing it.
