YouTube’s CEO limits his kids’ social media use — other tech bosses do the same

YouTube's CEO Neal Mohan is the latest in a line of tech bosses who have admitted to limiting their children's social media use, as the harms of being online for young people have become more evident.

Mohan, who took the helm of YouTube's leadership in 2023, was just named Time's 2025 CEO of the Year. He said in an interview with the magazine that his children's use of media platforms is controlled and restricted.

"We do limit their time on YouTube and other platforms and other forms of media. On weekdays we tend to be more strict, on weekends we tend to be less so. We're not perfect by any stretch," Mohan said in one TikTok video posted by Time Magazine on Thursday.

He stressed "everything in moderation" is what works best for him and his wife, and that extends to other online services and platforms. Mohan has three children: two sons and one daughter.

Experts have continued to sound the alarm on how excessive smartphones and social media use has harmed children and teenagers. Jonathan Haidt, NYU professor and author of "The Anxious Generation," has advocated for children to not have smartphones before the age of 14 and no access to social media before the age of 16.

"Let them have a flip phone, but remember, a smartphone isn't really a phone. They could make phone calls on it, but it's a multi-purpose device by which the world can get to your children," Haidt said in an interview with CNBC's Tania Bryer earlier this year.

This week, Australia became the first country to formally bar users under the age of 16 from accessing major social media platforms. Ahead of the legislation's passage last year, a YouGov survey found that 77% of Australians backed the under-16 social media ban. Still, the rollout has faced some resistance since becoming law.

Mohan said in a more extensive interview with Time on Wednesday that he feels a "paramount responsibility" to young people and giving parents greater control over how their kids use the platform. YouTube Kids was launched in 2015 as a child-friendly version of the Google-owned platform.

He said his goal is "to make it easy for all parents" to manage their children's YouTube use "in a way that is suitable to their household," especially as every parent has a different approach.

Several tech bosses have taken a similar approach. YouTube's former CEO Susan Wojcicki, also barred her children from browsing videos on the app, unless they were using YouTube Kids. She also limited the amount of time they spent on the platform.

"I allow my younger kids to use YouTube Kids, but I limit the amount of time that they're on it," Wojcicki told CNBC in 2019. "I think too much of anything is not a good thing."

Bill Gates, Microsoft's co-founder, is amongst the tech titans who are against allowing young people too much screen time. With three children, now adults, Gates openly talked about not giving them cell phones until they were in their teens.

"We don't have cell phones at the table when we are having a meal, we didn't give our kids cell phones until they were 14 and they complained other kids got them earlier," Gates said years ago.

Meanwhile, billionaire Mark Cuban would even resort to installing Cisco routers and using management software to monitor which apps his children were on and shut off their phone activity.