Gaming
Is Fortnite Safe? An Honest Fortnite Rating for Parents
Recommended Age
10 and up
Overview
Fortnite was released in 2017, but millions of players still log in every day to take part in this epic battle royal-style game. What’s a “battle royale” game? Think of it kind of like the Hunger Games. Each round starts with players being parachuted onto an island. Players then scavenge resources to make weapons (like in Minecraft) and try to take down all of the other players so they can end up the last one standing. While this may not sound too bad, our honest Fortnite rating dives into the potential dangers of this app, so read on for the full scoop.
Harmful Content 😲
Violence
Make no mistake: Fortnite is a first-person shooter game, which means that the primary goal is to kill other players. This sort of violence is tempered by the cartoon graphics in the game, but graphic attacks are definitely common.
Chat
Like a lot of video games, Fortnite features in-game voice and text chat. While this may be fine if your kid is playing with their friends, when they’re playing with strangers it can be an issue. Racial slurs, profanity, sexual content, and more are often bandied about in intense moments throughout the game.
Predation 🚨
Fortnite, like any video game with chat capabilities, can be a haven for online predators — which is certainly something we wanted to consider when calculating our Fortnite rating. These adults strike up friendships with children while playing and eventually move conversations to other platforms, like Discord or Snapchat. Some even manipulate kids with promises of Fortnite V-bucks, the in-game currency.
Positive Value 💙
As many kids will tell you, Fortnite is a lot of fun — especially when you’re playing with good friends. There’s also a quirky culture that’s been formed around it, including ever-changing dance moves, customizable costumes, and even fan fiction. Getting good at Fortnite definitely takes perseverance, creativity, and an ability to think far ahead with their strategy.
Privacy 🔒
Through the game’s parental controls (discussed in detail below), you can create a relatively private experience for your kid, especially if you don’t let them play with strangers. From settings, you can hide other player’s names and make your child appear anonymous.
Parental Controls ✅
Fortnite has fairly extensive in-game parental controls, which is a breath of fresh air considering how many apps and games don’t. Even better, you can set a code to password-protect your changes. From the settings menu in-game, you can:
- Toggle off mature language from appearing in chat
- Disable friend requests
- Set your child’s name to “anonymous” to non-squad members
- Replace the names of non-squad members with “player”
- Disable voice chat
- Disable text chat
In addition to in-game settings, parental controls on consoles like Xbox and PlayStation give you even more options, like access to multiplayer gaming.
Bark also provides support for Fortnite players. We’re here to help you keep your kid safe by allowing you to:
- Block Fortnite entirely, if needed.
- Manage when your child can play Fortnite throughout the day.
So, should my kid download it?
Probably! Our Fortnite rating suggests that it’s fairly appropriate for kids about 10 and above. With supervision and parental controls in place, it can be a fairly safe game that kids can have blast playing with their friends — in moderation, of course.
More reviews
Lifestyle
Is Lemon8 Safe for Kids? A Lemon8 App Review for Parents
Depending on when you’re reading this, your news feed may be swimming with the 2023 TikTok hearings where Co...
Read reviewIs Lensa Safe? A Lensa App Review for Parents
When artificial intelligence, or “AI”, was first being talked about, we all thought the same thing: robot ...
Read reviewEducation
Is Duolingo Safe? A Duolingo App Review for Parents
Bonjour! Today we’re getting global as we review Duolingo, the world’s favorite language-learning app! Her...
Read review