X (Twitter) Safety Guide
A parent's guide to X (formerly Twitter), covering content risks, privacy settings, and how to help your child use the platform more safely.
X (Twitter) is a fast-moving social media platform, formerly Twitter, where users post short public messages, images and videos and follow live news.
Official age
13+
We recommend
16+
Developer
X Corp
Risks
2
Features to know about
Overview
X (formerly Twitter) is a public social media platform where users post short messages, images, and videos. Content ranges from news and education to graphic violence, hate speech, and adult material. Following changes to content moderation policies, the platform now hosts a wider range of unfiltered content than many alternatives.
How children use it
Teenagers use X to follow interests, celebrities, and news. They engage in public conversations, share opinions, and may encounter viral content including harmful material. Some use alternative accounts to express views they would not share publicly. Users can add a general location, or in some places a named landmark or business, to their posts. Users can buy X Premium subscriptions and paid post promotion inside the app. Users can go live on X to broadcast video from their account, and viewers can watch, comment and send hearts during the stream.
Main risks
Recommended privacy settings
Protect your posts
Location: Settings > Privacy and Safety > Audience, media and tagging > Protect your posts
Set to: On
Only approved followers can see your child's posts. This is the most important setting for younger users.
Direct Messages
Location: Settings > Privacy and Safety > Direct Messages
Set to: Only people you follow
Prevents strangers from sending direct messages to your child.
Sensitive content filter
Location: Settings > Privacy and Safety > Content you see
Set to: Do not enable 'Display media that may contain sensitive content'
Keeps the filter active so graphic or adult content is hidden behind a warning screen.
Parent actions
Enable protected posts and review privacy settings together
Time: 10 minutes
Disable DMs from strangers
Time: 5 minutes
Discuss that posts on X are public by default and can be screenshot and shared widely
Time: 10 minutes
Related app guides
If you need to report this
In immediate danger: call 999. For non-emergency police matters, call 101.
Concerned about a child but it's not an emergency? NSPCC helpline 0808 800 5000. Childline for young people 0800 1111.
Myths & facts
Myth: X is where the news breaks, so it's basically an educational platform.
Fact: News on X sits directly alongside graphic violence, hate speech and adult material, and the algorithmic feed doesn't distinguish between them. During major events, unverified and distressing footage often spreads faster than accurate reporting.
Myth: The sensitive-content filter keeps adult material away from teenagers.
Fact: The filter mostly relies on posters labelling their own content, and adult material is permitted on the platform — so plenty goes unlabelled and slips through. The setting can also be flipped off in seconds from within the account, so it's a speed bump, not a wall.
Myth: My child only lurks — they never post, so there's nothing to worry about.
Fact: On X the main risk is what they see, not what they post: trending topics, quote-post pile-ons, and graphic footage of real events arriving unasked in the For You feed. A silent account still needs the content filter, restricted DMs, and regular conversations about what the feed is serving.
Age by age
- 8-10
X's minimum age is 13, so no account — and this platform would be a poor fit even if the rule didn't exist. If a big news story or a favourite footballer is the draw, look together at a child-appropriate source like BBC Newsround instead of the raw feed.
- 11-13
Still below or barely at the minimum age, and X is one of the hardest mainstream platforms to make child-safe, so our honest advice is to wait. If there's a compelling reason at 13 — a club account, a fandom — set up a protected account together with DMs closed and treat it as read-only.
- 14-16
If they use X, do the setup together: protect their posts, restrict DMs to people they follow, and leave the sensitive-media filter alone. Then keep talking — about pile-ons, about the fact that any public reply can be screenshotted and spread, and about what to do when the feed shows them something distressing.
- 17-plus
Shift to footprint and judgement: public posts are searchable by universities and employers years later, arguments with strangers rarely end well, and breaking-news misinformation is at its worst on X. It's also worth saying plainly that adult content circulates openly here, filter or not.
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