Meta, the parent company of Instagram and Facebook, announced a major overhaul of its youth protection policies on October 14, 2025, automatically imposing a content standard on all users under the age of 18 that is designed to be the digital equivalent of a U.S. movie “PG-13” rating.
The company called the update its “most significant teen safety change yet,” as it continues to face intense scrutiny from lawmakers and child safety advocates over the impact of its platforms on young people’s well-being.
The new “13+ content setting” will become the automatic default for all existing and new teen accounts, regardless of the user’s previous configuration.
Teens will only be able to opt out of these restrictions with the explicit permission of a parent or guardian.
This empowers guardians with greater control over their children’s digital exposure, with Meta stating its intent is to make the online experience feel “closer to the Instagram equivalent of watching a PG-13 movie.”
The core of this updated policy focuses on the types of content that will now be proactively hidden or prevented from being recommended to teen users, expanding beyond the platform’s existing ban on extreme content like self-harm and graphic violence.
Under the new “PG-13” equivalent standard, content featuring strong language and explicit swearing, certain dangerous physical activities or risky stunts, and images of marijuana paraphernalia will be significantly limited or blocked.
Meta has stated its commitment to making instances of sexually suggestive content “as rare as possible” for its younger audience.
The changes also extend to how teens can search and interact on the platform. Meta is expanding its list of blocked search terms to include a wider range of mature topics such as “alcohol” and “gore,” with the system being trained to also catch common misspellings.
Furthermore, the company’s AI-powered features, including its chatbots, are now guided by the PG-13 rating. Meta stated that its AIs “should not give age-inappropriate responses that would feel out of place in a PG-13 movie,” directly addressing concerns about minors encountering inappropriate conversational content.
For parents who want maximum filtering, Meta is also rolling out a new “Limited Content” option, which provides an even stricter experience by blocking additional content categories and disabling social features like the ability to see or leave comments under posts.
The new content settings are rolling out immediately across the U.S., U.K., Australia, and Canada, with a gradual global deployment expected to be complete by early next year.
