Bark Parental Control App Review

bark-dashboard

What exactly is Bark?

If you’re interested in parental control systems, an application known as Bark may lead you to believe it’s about checking up on your kid. That’s not entirely correct; in fact, it’s intended to keep track of something just as important, if not much – your children’s wellbeing and safety.

Bark is filtering, monitoring, and blocking widget and computer application that monitors, blocks, and filters messaging services, email, YouTube, and several social networks. It gives fathers and mothers the tools they need to have a reasonable degree of control about what their children do or whom they communicate with online.

It consists of the toolkits to raise a red flag on the moment for parents to supervise their kids, for parents who prefer to establish their children’s independence.

It’s a reasonably economical way with a broad extent and a variety of impressive features that help keep your children secure in the current digital age, with simplistic, flat-fee costing of $9 per month and $99 per year for an infinite variety of children. In our in-depth Bark review, we go over the app in greater detail.

How Does It Work?

Bark works by providing you access to your children’s internet activities, such as what they’re doing and whom they’re interacting with on their mobile phones or devices. To begin, connect the software to their social media pages, cellphone, or gadget, and you’re ready to start supervising their activity.

Pros and Cons of Bark App

What We Like

  • Website filtering
  • Monitors apps, emails, and texts
  • Subscription plans can be used for an unlimited number of children

What We Don’t Like

  • Sends many alerts
  • Limited customer support

Bark’s innovative approach to tracking children’s online activity has both advantages and disadvantages. It is particularly true when compared with other, more conventional parental control apps. In summary:

Downloading this phone monitoring app and connecting your child’s accounts and devices will only require a few minutes. Compared to other similar phone monitoring apps, you will be able to use Bark on multiple devices.

Its user interface is fantastic, and it is an excellent method for you to be in the loop constantly.

Suppose you want Bark Premium, but as it requires a more considerable investment, you would like to see if this phone monitoring app is suitable for you. You can beneficiate from a seven days trial in which you can test out what may be the best parental control app for iPhone.

The Premium Plan provides you with comprehensive features, allowing you to enjoy the best parental control app to the fullest.

Even though using this phone tracking app enables you to monitor your target’s Social Media accounts, it only covers a few of them. Furthermore, it has no immediate clarifying or parental influence restrictions, as with similar programs.

Compared to Premium Plan, Bark Junior only has a few features, but they are not sufficient to cover all possible actions of the target person.

Given that you will have to connect your target’s Social Media account, you’ll have to inform your child of using maybe the best parental control app.

Bark’s main disadvantage is that it can only detect severe threats and profanity due to its limited personalization options. As a parent, you may be discouraged from monitoring your children’s online activities.

Furthermore, some parents may be concerned about the unclear end of the trial package. The Bark app has a home screen that displays the days left in the free trial. It later asks for credit card information, even the free version option, which may raise privacy issues for some users.

After reading each pro and con overview of the Bark app, users may be considering other options with a better method and experience.

What exactly is the Bark app, and what are the monitoring capabilities?

Bark employs an advanced algorithm for detecting and proactively alerting parents to internet issues affecting their children, such as sexting, cyberbullying, and signs of anxiety and suicidal thoughts. It monitors text messaging, email, YouTube, and social networking sites and apps, four times more than any child tracking app.

You’ll receive automatic alerts for depression, cyberbullying, adult content, online predators, and other issues. Bark’s method saves parents time while also helping to build trust among parents and kids by only displaying potential problems.

Bark Jr

Bark Jr allows parents and guardians to control when their children use their gadgets and which websites they visit. They can use our Check-Ins feature to ensure their children are safe.

Barkomatic

It is the internet’s first configurable parental control resource. It is a free embedded device that allows the user to enter all of the systems and technologies your child interacts with — from games and apps to tablets and phones and obtain all parental control commands in one convenient location.

Till now, parents had to spend several hours poring over manuals and searching online for instructions on how to install parental controls for each device and app. Not any more! 

We decided that it was time to put together a completely free customized guide to keeping the kids safe online in one place and no more Searching online “How to Restrict Netflix” or digging through junk drawers for flimsy instruction manuals. When you use Barkomatic, you will receive emails with a personalized link to only the data you require whenever you need it.

Bark for Schools

Once schools provide students with laptops and email accounts via Outlook 365 and Google Suite, a fantastic world of educational activities and potential dangers opens up. 

Bark allows you to keep track of all the material your students create, share, and send using school-issued accounts. Bark for Schools is a free (forever!) service available to all private and public K-12 schools in the United States.

Additional Tracking Options

Bark has the following characteristics in addition to social media monitoring:

  • Email and text monitoring: Bark works with iOS, Amazon, and Android to monitor pictures, texts, videos, and other media.
  • Screen time restrictions: With Bark, you can set a time limit for your screen time.
  • Website filtering: Determine which apps and websites your children may and may not access.
  • Round-the-clock tracking: Bark monitors activity 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
  • Immediate parental alerts: Bark will notify you automatically if it detects any potential problems. They also provide advice from child psychologists about how to talk to your children about their online behavior.
  • Bark saves you time: Because of their real-time tracking and auto alerts, you don’t have to be connected to their console to see what your children are up to. It grants you peace of mind while also allowing you to gain the trust of your children.

How to Install Bark

Bark application is relatively simple to download and configure on both android and iOS devices. There is no need for a PC or even other devices to customize the software for Android. You will require A Mac or PC for the initial setup of an iPad, iPhone, and some other iOS devices. It would help if you linked the gadget with the computer. With that covered, the actual installation and configuration procedure is as follows:

  1. Create a Bark app account, which includes a free trial. Install the suitable Bark “parent” application for the gadget and the “kids'” software for their mobiles.
  2. Connect your child’s device’s services, accounts, and apps to the Bark application interface. It contains email and much popular social networking and other Internet-enabled applications, including top titles.
  3. Depending on the environments and apps you’ve chosen, you’ll receive a text or email alert notice whenever the Bark app detects something suspicious. It does not give you total direct exposure to all your child’s logs and documents on their mobile or some other devices. Instead, based on patented technology machine-learning algorithms, it acts as a protector dog (thus the logo and name) to notify you of potential problems.

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Customer Service

Bark’s app includes a live chat feature for customer support. Because there is a webchat option, it does not imply that their representatives are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They are only accessible during business hours. Even so, it may take a few hours for any of them to respond.

You can also send emails, and they will respond within a couple of days.

If you use this app to track children and do not live in the USA, you may have difficulty reaching live chat customer service at a reasonable hour, considering the time zone differences.

Pricing and plans

Bark’s power comes at a cost: Its Bark Premium plan costs $14 per month, or $99 per year, to safeguard an unlimited range of devices.

Bark offers a less expensive Bark Junior app for $5 per month or $49 per year. Still, it only includes the most basic parental control features: app management, content filtering, location monitoring, and screen time limits. The intelligent text processing technologies, which make Bark so appealing, aren’t included.

There are plenty of better deals available if you only need the basic parental controls or even better ones if you desire a state of the art monitoring. Our favorite, NEXSPY, offers you a lot more features, allowing you to be calm and quiet even though your little one is away.

However, if Bark’s integrated sensor tools seem attractive, it may be worth the price tag. Sign up, and Bark will not charge you for seven days, providing an opportunity to see how it works—canceling before the week finishes will not result in any fees.

Best prices

Get a 14-day money-back guarantee

Bark’s free trial and Refund Policy

For the price, Bark provides the most robust monitoring suites available. Bark Jr plans are $5 per month or $49 billed yearly after a 7-day free trial, and Bark is $14 Premium month-to-month or $99 invoiced annually after a 7-day free trial. As far as parental control software options go, it is one of the most affordable.

Policy on Cancellation and Refunds:

You can nullify your account option by sending an email to bark’s registered email.

When you withdraw your account, all of the content is immediately removed from the service. Because the deletion of any data is final, please ensure that you genuinely would like to cancel your subscription before proceeding.

If you withdraw the service in the middle of your subscription, you will not be charged again until the next billing cycle.

We reserve the right to cease or amend the Bark Membership service(s) at any time and for any reason. Without restricting any other solutions, Bark Membership may terminate or suspend your account if we assume that you have been implicated in fraudulent activity about the services provided by us (via settlement, conviction, insurance or investigation, or otherwise). 

Even if a plan is canceled in the middle of the month, no refunds are given. Clients will receive emails from Bark Membership verifying the cancellation of their SaaS subscription.

When a client cancels, no credits or reimbursements will be given for months, years, or quarters of service that are not completed.

The final word

If you’re a parent seeking a way to supervise your child’s internet usage, the Bark app is an excellent choice. But, like any other piece of software, it has advantages and disadvantages.

It is critical to have open and honest conversations about online safety for kids with everybody in your family. While blocking access and limiting social media use may be essential for young children, it is not a lengthy remedy for teaching your kids to keep safe online.

Bark is essential for measuring young teens as they explore social networks because it does not infringe on their private information too much. Bark’s slightly greater price tag is well worth it due to its ease of installation, excellent customer service evaluations, and unrestricted access for the entire extended family and all of their devices.

It’s a shame that Bark’s internet security app’s monitoring capabilities vary depending on the device. On Android, the software can monitor a wider variety of social media portals than on other computer systems. It makes it hard for parents to accurately track their children’s internet activity on iPhones or computers.

Another problem is Bark’s customer service. You won’t get round-the-clock assistance, and the live chat will be challenging to reach if you continue living in a time zone other than the United States.

Finally, the cost of Bark Premium membership is difficult to ignore. Many families may find parental control software to be prohibitively expensive.

On the plus side, we like how the app inspires open communication with your children. You’ll need the login information for your children’s social media accounts to set up the app. It means you’ll need to talk to your children about the significance of tracking the content they’re exposed to online.

Furthermore, the check-in characteristic has received positive feedback in other Bark reviews. While it is not a GPS tracker, it allows you to check on your children’s location with one’s permission.

Finally, the parents’ forum distinguishes Bark from competitors such as NetNanny and Qustodio. You can learn many valuable things from this forum, such as how to schedule your children’s computer time, censor their online content so that it wasn’t age-inappropriate, how and where to block inappropriate material, and new mothering tips and tricks.

FAQ

What exactly does the Bark app do?

Bark is a social network, email, and text messaging tracking app that allows you to keep track of your children’s online relationships and practices. It connects to over 30 social media platforms and closely monitors Google searches, videos, and posts. When it detects any unusual behavior, it starts sending you an alert with suggestions on approaching the issue with your kid.

Is Bark Genuine?

Bark app is mainly a family app that offers unrivaled coverage, monitors text messages and posts, alerts, and conversations, and protects your child’s privacy. It looks for signs of suspicious conversations and cyberbullying. Bark ensures internet security, especially about social media pages and internet Google searches.

Furthermore, the location of your children is never disclosed to third parties, ensuring additional online safety. On the other hand, Bark has a check-in feature that lets members of the family see their children’s position at any time. Bark is a legit application that provides a 24/7 view of your children’s activities thanks to technology.

Bark risk-free?

You won’t have to worry regarding spyware or malware contaminating your child’s phone and trying to gain access to data if you use the official Bark apps.

Is Bark software worth the money?

The overall score is Excellent. Bark provides among the most robust monitoring bundles in the parental supervision app scene at an affordable price. Bark monitors a wide range of social media channels in addition to text and emails.

Is it possible for Bark to see Snapchat photos?

Bark, on the other hand, is unable to view Snapchat images. It can, however, supervise Snapchat DM text conversations on Android devices.

On Android, Bark can presently only supervise Snapchat personal messages (text chat only). Snapchat makes monitoring its material on any platform incredibly hard. On iOS devices, no other monitoring software may presently examine Snapchat messages. They are developing solutions for Apple devices.