Why is Google Family Link not updating my child's location?

How do I stop my child from turning off my location?

How can I ensure that there's something on my child's phone every night?

This is a concern of mine that doesn't just relate to teenagers: it affects toddlers, teens, adults. This means that if you don't get involved right now, your child's digital life will be littered with the things that used to mean something important to them, from their friends' birthdays to their favorite TV shows.

So what do you do? I think that as a parent, you have to be both a guardian and a friend. If you know you're going to be able to handle something like this, then you should go ahead and block your child's phone at some point. But once you start limiting their access to their phone, what is your plan for providing them with something on their phone every night? Should you have an unplugged week once a month? Should you set a bedtime timer for every night that lets them know their phone will be turned off at that time? It's not about how much information they see; it's about quality of information.

You should also try to make sure that your child has some sort of outlet to use their phone for more than looking at social media. Kids are getting into social media at younger ages than they used to, and they need some way to use their phones to connect with friends while they're busy on their tablet.

There's a good chance that you're going to have some sort of conversation about online safety before your child turns 18. Some families handle this sooner, and some delay it. My oldest daughter (who is now 17) and I talked about this in her pre-teen years, and were ready for what was going to come when she turned 13. So if your child is in high school, or already in college, you'll have more time than if you have a younger kid who needs your attention right now.

So how do you talk to your child about online safety? I'm going to tell you something that isn't easy to hear as a parent: you can't always be their advocate for their digital life. You can't always be the one telling them to not post on social media or to be safe with their phones, and you shouldn't expect that you will be able to do this at all times. It's unrealistic and it's unfair to you, and it makes things hard on your relationship with your child.

Why is Google Family Link not updating my child's location?

I understand that Google Family Link is a way to share photos, videos and other content between your different family accounts (Google, Youtube, Drive, etc.) but I don't understand why it isn't updating my child's location.

The documentation claims that "you can link accounts or specific content between them, even if the content doesn't live on the same site". This is my case: I have an Android smartphone;. I'm using the same family account to sync my photo's and files I create;. I linked the "Family" project to my child's account on my Android device;. The phone is running the latest version of Android 9 Pie. Still nothing. No new event in my child's location from what I see.

There's only one thing new since the first day I installed the app (on my Android device): I added my son's profile as a friend;. We've been friends since before Google launched the app. All the other actions I perform with the Google Family app are working fine, I just don't understand why it's not able to detect my son's changes in location. Is it something related to how my son is sharing his location? Do I need to get permission from his parents to be able to see where he is? I assume there's a privacy issue here, but I have no idea where this issue would start from.

The answer was pretty simple: my son hasn't activated "My location.

Can my child turn off location on Family Link?

Location services is turned on by default on the Google family link app.

Can my child turn off location settings? It was on and I wasn't using it. It didn't matter which app I used.

Answer. Hello. There are a few ways you can turn off location for a family account. First, you can go to Settings > My Family and click Manage Location Access. Then you can select Turn off location. Once you have turned off location, you can turn on location again from this menu as well.

Additionally, if your child has a Google Account, you can go to Google settings on the phone, and find the setting that says "Keep track of my location" and uncheck that box. Lastly, you can go to Google settings on the phone, and then find the setting that says "My activity." Under that, click on Location History. Then you can select which apps have access to your location history. You can see what apps do have access to your location history in the "Manage App Access" section in the same settings menu. You will need to grant access to all apps that request access to your location history.

I hope this helps. If you have any additional questions, feel free to reply back or contact us.

Thanks for using the Google family help forum! -Andrew Jones. Ask Your Own Google Family Help Question. Customer reply replied 8 months ago. Thank you very much. This helped me so much.
Molly. No problem. This forum is great! Google Family Help Expert. May 9, 2025 at 10:47 PM. Hi there. Thanks for the feedback. I hope the answer was helpful! Best. May 11, 2025 at 8:55 AM. Thanks for the feedback! May 11, 2025 at 10:51 AM. I am sorry you found it confusing. Location services can be found under "Settings > Location". Within that, there is a menu called "My activity.