Canopy - Parental Control App Reviews

A close friend approached me several months ago and told me he had sifted through various filtering softwares and decided this app was the best, and he asked me to manage his account as a parental account. It has worked well since then; I have no complaints, and neither has he. Due to some ongoing, unresolved technical errors with Covenant Eyes, another friend and I have decided to matriculate his account to this app, which we will be doing soon.

I am no expert, but as a layman in the realms of software and app development, I am impressed. Aside from adding specific websites to the “allowed” list and other activities like that, I have not had a single problem or error since downloading Canopy . I still have not explored the extended features, but the base product works very well and more consistently than other softwares I’ve used.

Unrelated to the software itself—I’ve gotten to know one of the lead staff for this app, and I don’t think I’ve ever met someone with quite the same combination of dedication to helping people quit porn forever and the forward-thinking drive to help them do it. I think this app is in very good hands going forward, and I will be along for the ride.

As a young parent who was raised without internet controls, I am now very aware of how the internet shaped me in many negative ways. I aGarbage is being thrown at you even if you don’t go looking for it. We have this app on all our devices, because toddlers have a knack for finding things they shouldn’t. It has given us huge peace of mind. The only negative we found is that some our devices that we use for sound machines are so old that this app is incompatible. I like that you can outright block apps or websites that can’t be monitored, but you are still able to access content through the monitored Web Browser.

As a child i do not like Canopy! I have nothing to hide from my mom and i do not want to ruin my relationship with her. But Canopy has made our relationship more distant since there is no space between us. Me and my mom have always grown closely but Canopy proves she doesnt trust me. I am only 12 years old and im growning up knowing what is right and wrong. I am someone who suffers with bad anxiety and when i get upset i tell my friends what is happening im my life. Canopy makes it to where if i tell my close friends abt my personal life ik my mom is also knows about it, which is uncomfortable. My mom has been putting me through mental abuse and it has really effected me. Having no boundaries between your children can really mess up youre relationship! please think about this before getting Canopy !

I’ve used Covenant Eyes for years as a deterrent for my teen sons to have a lower chance of accessing pornography. I listened to a podcast interview with the creator of this app and was intrigued and frankly, attracted to this different form of digital protection. I installed this app on some devices and have been pleased. this app wouldn’t install on my old Mac laptop or my daughter’s iPod touch so I kept both memberships but since I’ve updated my laptop, I’ve decided to cancel Covenant Eyes because this app is a better fit for our current needs. We are all using it.

this app is a good start to help me teach my Son about pornography and inappropriate internet material.

It is not 100% but it’s a start. I too hope more control personally from a parents view point but I need to develop my sons heart not to want it.
Keep improving this app! Thank you

During this pandemic, everyone is on the computer more, which allows for greater risk and access to unwanted images. We need this product to protect our children from exposure to inappropriate content! Invest in your children by subscribing to this app and rest easier when your children are online. I gave it five stars because I think it is the best product of its kind, especially for boys! I have two sons and am thankful for this protection.

The idea behind Canopy is great and the way it works at filtering images is better than many other filtering systems, however I give my low rating because there is no way to customize what you want restricted. Canopy only blocks full nudity and technical pornography and while that is helpful it is not enough protection when there is still much sexually explicit material available through partial nudity and other sexual content that cannot be blocked. I would love to see an updated version with more options and I urge parents to not believe that full nudity is the only danger to the eyes of your children.

Had Bark parent control app and was introduced to this app and let me tell you Canopy is 100 times better and gives you more control and access to your kids phone accounts. Worth every penny in this subscription to keep your kids safe in this numbing digital age. Try it for a month and you’ll definitely want to pay for the subscription, also what’s 7 to 10 dollars compared to your kids safety.

I recommend this parental app. It’s easy to navigate and use. I really like that you can manually block certain websites or apps. There have been a few times (like maybe 2 times) where Canopy didn’t work for a very short period time but as soon as we updated that app and our phones it worked with no issues. If you need a parental app I definitely recommend this one! Easy to use and works great!

Even if your kids don’t have phones, it just takes a few seconds for them to be on yours and accidentally stumble onto something harmful. If they do have a device, they are l playing with fire unless they have this app installed. Please, please, please consider using this incredible software to protect your loved ones from horrific images that can be traumatic and debilitating.

The vpn connection is slow, at times makes the iOS devices near unusable. The parent app is slow, clicking on alerts results in getting kicked out of alert interface. Both my 12 and 14 year old figure out in 5 mins how to render it ineffective. I wont post how but it is trivial.

One of the biggest upsets is not being able to see what is blocked when, and not having access to any logs regarding search activity or website access. May be great for small children but user experience is not good for teens or parents. Disappointed

With 5 kids, we were always having to keep devices password protected and would worry about them using the devices secretly. Now, with this app we have taken off all the passwords knowing that we can be confident in their protection. The customizable nature of the program is also very appreciated. We will continue to use this app for many years to come.

I love Canopy. I’m a grandmother, teacher, wife, mother, and a foster child advocate. this app makes the internet safer for everyone in the family.

Inappropriate content has been harming people for years, but online access has made it way to accessible. this app not only protects, but it encourages more responsible internet use.

It will save many families from harm.

this app is a great program allowing us to limit the amount of screen time our child are on phones and computers. It is simple to use and allows control of a wide variety of areas. The best for us, is the bed time control which provides breaks from computer and phone use

It’s about time an app like this was created! What an amazing product that produces a tremendous amount of value.

I am remarkably refreshed and encouraged by this - to see that great minds teamed up and put together a platform that offers peace of mind to families and anybody desiring/fighting to live their lives with an “appropriate” filter on the content they consume. Thank you, this app!

I don’t expect kids to ride into traffic or off a cliff on their bike. But accidents happen, so I bike helmets are a must. Just in case. I love how this app is like that for phones and computers. It doesn’t give a detailed report of everything kids do online...it just protects kids if an accident(al click) happens.

We started with this app and it was difficult to set up. Once we did, it worked great for a couple months. Unfortunately, the credit card we set the account up with expired & it was IMPOSSIBLE to change it on my account. Tried through their website, Canopy itself, emailed customer service (got 2 replies of “We’ll get back to you - they didn’t), tried calling them several times but couldn’t get through. THEY LOST THIS CUSTOMER!!!

As technology gets more and more intertwined with our lives, the ability for parents to truly protect their kids from unwanted content has never been more important. What an impressive app!

Thanks for everything you’re doing, this app!

this app has helped our family stay safe online. Inappropriate pictures and ads have been an issue for us and Canopy helps with that and makes blocking inappropriate apps and websites very easy.

The data about what porn can do to your brain is truly frightening. Apps like this are such a powerful tool to keep your children safe while they are still too young to understand the consequences.

Am currently using the free trial provided, and as far as what they advertise, it's worked very well. There haven't been any glitches or bugs with the censorship itself so far, so it does what is shown. However, Canopy has drained my battery from 100% to 86% in only a few hours, just in the background. I have an iPhone 13 Pro Max, and I only opened up my phone a few times throughout this time frame, only to check notifications, and it's immensely frustrating to continuously charge my phone, which I bought for the sole purpose of a longer battery life. It is also horrendous to try and send photos through iMessage, and it's made me use more data and WiFi than I have before, even when streaming and multitasking. Canopy is great for those who just want a protection software on devices that are used in the house, but for others who have a busy life and are constantly on the go, this is a gruesome experience. One last thing. Because this is considered a VPN, and installs VPN protection on your phone, it is absolutely impossible to use within the workplace or schools due to their VPN blockers, and I'm pretty sure other places have implemented these as well.

We’ve had this app for at least a year now and I like many of its features which are unique to this app as an internet filter. In particular, it filters for sexting and also I love the down-time feature which shuts everything down at specific times whether for bedtime or school. I also like that you can set specifics for each app as there are some apps which may not need to be be filtered at all so you can set them to “unfiltered” or there are other apps or websites you may prefer to block altogether. You can also set particular websites to allowed and sometimes this is necessary for school things. I think there are areas for growth as with all of these internet filters but this app is trying improve and the apps kids are using as well as the ways they’re using them are constantly changing. I’m certain this app is only going to get better and I appreciate this product because it has given me a lot of peace of mine.

Edit: Response to developer - I understand how to cancel a subscription, but per my review (if you read it) I was only able to cancel 2 out of the 8 months we were charged. Also never received an explanation as to why the account was cancelled in the first place while you were taking our money and we were not receiving the product we were paying for. Or even an apology for the complete hassle this has been for us. Your customer service leaves much to be desired.

We had this app and paid with a debit card that was compromised. We had to update the payment method on the website and so we linked it to our iTunes account. We were charged for 8 months before we realized that this app had actually cancelled the account despite a new payment method being added. I was only able to request a refund for 2 of the 8 months that we were charged. this app itself says it’s not their problem because it was paid through iTunes (although I’m fairly certain they received the money). Terrible customer service and it really makes me question whether or not to continue with their service.

My mom has put this on my phone for the best of me and she put Canopy on her phone and mine so that she knows if I deleted Canopy . Canopy really is strict with the inappropriateness and is legit, but later I accidentally found a way in settings to remove the management of this this app app by searching in app in settings and I had the urge to do remove Canopy but I knew it wasn’t a good idea. Later at night where my urges are off the charts i deleted the management knowing that it will really unblock everything inappropriate on my phone or just ask me for a password that my mom put in. So I did it and it didn’t ask me for a password or anything it was so simple and I regret doing it. Is there a way I can’t unblock anything inappropriate from my phone through Canopy because I’m really trying to be the best version of myself and be the person I want to be.

Is this thing working? I truly have no idea. On the home page of Canopy it promises to show you screen time usage on which app, but if you click on it it says “unable to refresh.” I’ve written them twice about it because I’d like to see that info (or anything I’m paying for) and they just say “oh that’s still in development.” What? Why put it up there when you know it doesn’t work? The concept is great but seems shaky at best as far as keeping its promises.

Update: I was paying for Canopy for 3 months before I realized it was “disconnected” on my kids’ phones. When I reached out to customer service they asked “Are you sure you didn’t get notified?” No. Absolutely no communication from them, but they bill me every month. Removing this, deleting our account, and looking for protection that works and competent customer service.

As a child who uses this, it is very annoying that I only get the option to request an unban when I go into Canopy . Also, the fact that it uses VPN to run it is stupid. Considering that a lot of apps don't allow VPN. So now, some apps that I am allowed to use, just straight up don't work. When I also checked my settings for why my phone was dying so much more quickly, this app was using the most of it. I would be fine with using this app if it just fixed these issues. (I also just did 5 stars so you would look because I know that company's don't care about issues :)

We installed Canopy on our family devices nearly a year ago and have been impressed by the thorough filtering it provides! The few times we have had issues (just with switching devices and getting the software transferred over to the new devices) customer support has been responsive and thorough to ensure we are taken care of. Canopy has been a gift to our family, and we often recommend it to those around us.

Thankfully there is a free trial, where I learned this is a frustrating app to use. I installed Canopy on my son’s 2 devices (iPad and Mac computer). Easy to install. Ironically, also easy for my son to UNINSTALL from his iPad. He uninstalled it because as soon as this app was added, his apps stopped working. He’d be playing something and the apps would randomly quit. It made his iPad unusable. On his computer, he couldn’t open a website that I had put on the always approved list. When I tried downloading an app to his computer, it wouldn’t download and also wouldn’t alert me that something was being downloaded. It shouldn’t be this difficult to monitor certain behavior. The idea of Canopy is good, execution is horrible.

We are dealing with sexual integrity issues in our household and the feature that allows blocking of “edging materials” (scantily clad, but not nude) has been very helpful. So has the ability to approve pages remotely. If my husband needs to access a site that hasn’t been white listed yet, I can go take a look and approve it from Canopy on my phone, even while on break at work. I would have given five stars, but we have an Apple device and it doesn’t let me see a browsing history or check on texts and calls.

I’m very disappointed with Canopy. It hasn’t functioned as advertised ever. I’ve contacted support and they offer only apologies and say they’re working on it. I can’t see what apps my son has used today. I can’t lock his phone at bed time, only turn off the WiFi. Family link does for free what Canopy can’t do for $100/year. I wish it worked on iPhones. I would’ve canceled the subscription if they were willing to prorate but that’s not an option. I’m going to try Bark when this expires. I don’t recommend Canopy.

I just came back here to update.
What apps have been used today - still doesn't work!

This service does NOT work as advertised. They have a great idea, now only if they could implement it better. All of the child protection services that I have used have issues blocking Instagram messages and phone calls. Had issues with shutting off internet (and cellular data) at a certain time everything night, sometimes it worked but most of the time my kid was still able to surf the next after the hours were supposed to be blocking Canopy . Hopefully they get some developers that know how to do this stuff, cuz this is the best solution for child protection - IF it worked as it says it does.
Oh, the VPN connection they use also causes slow downs.

Canopy caught and alerted me to my teen son taking inappropriate photos of himself. i don’t know what his plan was with the photos but thankfully because of this app we put a stop to that behavior and a lesson was learned! i shudder to think what’s happening if you don’t have this app on your teens phone. this is a real review from a real mom of a hormonal crazy teen boy and i pay for Canopy every month without hesitation! i don’t say that about ANY APP. :)

The VPN used by this app kept interfering with my WiFi. Completely shutting it off. If the goal was to get the user to have zero access to anything on their phone…that was achieved. I found it more irritating than helpful. When it spontaneously worked, it did block harmful sites. They also mention being able to filter popular apps, but that is not true. They just create a shortcut to Facebook and Instagram to the web and filter the web, not Canopy . The dashboard was also very very simple, without much useful information. No notification if harmful websites were attempted. Removing Canopy and VPN was a NIGHTMARE. Since the VPN interferes with my wifi, and to remove Canopy , you needed to open Canopy , USING WIFI, it was quite the challenge to uninstall.

It takes forever to load and loads incorrectly sometimes. I can’t set the kids down time which I thought that’s what I pay for. The kids can uninstall Canopy but you wouldn’t know because the only notification it seems to give is their location. My son deleted it off his phone for 3 days before I realized it was gone. The VPN protects very little and is more a hassle than a contribution to kids safety. DO JOT RECOMMEND Canopy TO ANYONE. Clearly it’s not worth the price I can do all the same stuff plus more on google’s family link and that’s free. Only perk is it gives you a map to see where your kids are but that’s not even an exact location it’s a general vicinity.

Canopy has been great for younger kids who are learning how to navigate the internet without random ads or images popping up that you normally couldn’t control as a parent. I appreciate how intentional you guys were at creating this for parents and how user friendly it is! We use it on all of our devices and even our older kids now have appreciated it so they know their devices are safe to use.

I like Canopy and how it weeds out the undesirable content that you select. Precious companies I’ve tried require a long process to install the program using a computer etc and after all the set up would barely work properly. this app is an easy download and set up and is pretty spot on with the filtering. One set back I’ve been experiencing is the overall slow down of my phone. Basic websites like a restaurant website doesn’t load, or other harmless content I watch doesn’t load well.

Overall I like that app and will continue to use but I hope things improve with how it allows the overall phone processing to function at the same speeds as before.

Thank you for Canopy!

Our house rules require all homework to be turned and a minimum of a C average to enjoy social media and other online access. When I get notifications from school of missing assignments their phone is shut down within 30 seconds. I can have the phone locked down and limited to text and calls only. If you kids don’t like Canopy you know it works. This is Canopy you are looking for if you want control of your child’s phone. They also can’t ’turn it off’ or ‘delete Canopy ’ like many other parental apps. This is the real deal.

We have been using this app for several years now, specifically to filter our family computer as our kids don’t have cell phones yet. It does a great job at preventing unwanted content from showing up. Sometimes benign websites are blocked, but the phone app makes it easy to temporarily halt the protection, and I’d rather have it err on the side of too protective than too passive. Porn is a stain on our society and nothing good comes from it. The more companies that help families keep it away from their homes the better.

I am pretty happy with this app accountability software. This is truly a difficult segment, because no matter what program you use, the developers have to constantly work to update the software to work with the ongoing changes in iOS and develop perhaps.

It does work well to filter and block content. Customer service is friendly and helpful, although the hours are from noon until 8 PM, central standard time. A little awkward.

Overall, I would recommend this product, but expect a few witches, depending on which apps you daily Drive.

This is a great app and does what I need it to except it disabled my son’s antivirus. Because it’s set up as an MDM to prevent in installation (which is a bit extreme) I cannot set the permissions to allow his antivirus to run because it also has VPN capabilities. The VPN is also very invasive. My son can’t use a lot of apps when it’s active. You basically can’t prevent Canopy from being removed without allowing MDM and VPN. Lastly, it needs features like Communication Limits so I can keep away harmful texts from people who shouldn’t have his phone.

Navigating parenthood in the digital era can be daunting, but this app Parental Control App has proven to be a vital ally. Canopy gives you the control needed to keep your kids safe online, offering a customizable digital environment that’s both secure and enriching.

What sets this app apart is its ability to let parents handpick the apps and content their kids can access. It’s not just about blocking the bad; it’s about opening doors to the good, making it easier to guide young minds towards valuable information and experiences.

The downtime feature is a standout, allowing families to set specific times when devices are off-limits. This ensures that tech doesn’t interfere with homework, family meals, or sleep—crucial for a child’s overall well-being.

But the real game-changer? The peace of mind this app brings. There’s comfort in knowing you have a hand in protecting your child from the internet’s darker corners while fostering their independence and learning. It’s a balancing act that this app handles with ease.

I’d recommend this app to any parent striving for a healthy tech-life balance in their child’s life. It’s user-friendly, effective, and truly indispensable for modern parenting.

this app’s clarity and ease of using Canopy is great. Lots of details and choices about what to filter. It also has a good style layout. It’s not as cumbersome as other filtering technology we’ve used, but it does still make some things difficult. Try as we might, we can’t get Ticketmaster to be allowed through even though I’ve approved it many times. Things like that. Approval time for specific websites sometimes doesn’t work or takes a long time (15ish minutes?). Another perk, if you email for support they’re very prompt at responding.

This is unequivocally the worst app I’ve ever seen in my life. I thought it would be good idea to have this whenever I had my niece and nephew around and when I tried to delete it, it completely blocked me out of the Internet and no matter how many times I’ve tried to remove it. It keeps re-downloading itself back to my MacBook. I’ve tried contacting Apple and they don’t even know how to remove it. I work from home and this is my only computer. I have lost so much money but not being able to have access. I emailed this app last night and spent so much time on the phone which was absolutely pointless and they still never got back to me. Are they going to pay me back for I’ve lost for not being able to run my business? Of course not!! I’ve called multiple times and left multiple emails and don’t worry. Our tech team is working on it as if. If you want to download an app that will destroy any of your devices while getting subpar customer service then be my guest.

I appreciate the peace of mind I get from knowing our computers and phones are being filtered. I like the amount of control I have on the parent app. I can see what apps or websites have been used on each device and for how long. I can set controls to disconnect from the internet during homework or overnight hours. I can also easily pause this app on individual devices, while I’m supervising, so access to typically blocked websites is available. For example, I have the stricter settings on so it blocks our library website (that apparently has adult content). When we need to order books, I just pause this app while I’m supervising, we order books, and then I turn it right back on. Easy!