Are there any age-based access restrictions?
To ensure compliance with global privacy regulations and protect our younger users, Kahoot! implements specific limitations for young student accounts. This guide explains which features are restricted, how age thresholds work, and how educators can successfully navigate these safety measures in the classroom.
What are the age restrictions for young students?
In accordance with our Privacy Notice, we ask for a date of birth when someone creates a student or personal account. Users under 13 in the U.S. or under 16 in all other countries get a young student account, which has the following limits:
- Login Methods: They can't sign in with their email address. They sign in with their username and password, or with Apple, Google, Microsoft or Clever single sign-on. If they forget their password, they can reset it using the email address they signed up with.
- Content Discovery: On the Discover page, they see the same content as visitors who aren't logged in: public kahoots reviewed as suitable for all audiences. Paid and Marketplace content isn't shown.
- Sharing Limitations: They cannot share their kahoots with anyone.
- Visibility: They cannot make their created kahoots public.
- Receiving Content: Other users can't share kahoots with them directly, and they can't join groups or accept group invitations. Teachers can still give them any kahoot, including their own, through an assignment link or game PIN..
- Groups: They can't join groups or accept group invitations. To give them content, share an assignment link or game PIN.
- Question types: Young students can't host or assign kahoots with free-form questions such as Word cloud, Brainstorm and Open-ended; those questions are locked. In games hosted by a teacher, the teacher's settings decide whether these questions are available.
- AI tools: Students under 16 aren’t permitted to use Kahoot! AI tools, regardless of location.
- Assignments: Students can play any assignment their teacher shares with them by link or PIN, including assignments of the teacher's own kahoots. Students can create assignments themselves only from public kahoots. Their own kahoots are always private, so they can't be assigned, but students can still host them live.
Curious about how we keep our platform safe for young learners? Check out our interactive Privacy Notice for Kids, featuring a playable kahoot with Freddy the Fox. It explains how we handle data in a language kids can actually understand.
What are the regional age thresholds?
Kahoot! uses the date of birth entered during sign-up, and the country detected from the internet connection at that time, to decide whether age restrictions apply.
- United States: Restrictions apply to students under 13.
- Global (excluding US/South Korea): Restrictions apply to students under 16.
South Korea Exception: Students located in South Korea must be at least 14 years old to create a Kahoot! account. If they enter a date of birth under 14, they'll see a message that the account can't be created. Students aged 14 and over in South Korea get a regular student account with no age restrictions.
How can teachers collect kahoots from underage students?
Because young students cannot share their kahoots via links or direct sharing, educators cannot view their students' digital drafts directly.
To review student questions, teachers should download the spreadsheet template (in the kahoot editor, select Import spreadsheet, then Download our template) and distribute it to the class. Students can type their questions, answers, and time limits into the file and submit the document back to the teacher. The teacher can then import this spreadsheet into their own adult account to host the game for the class. Alternately, students can present their kahoots live from their own devices to the class.
Can I change a student's date of birth or region?
No. Once an account is created, the date of birth and region can't be changed in your account settings. Per our Terms and Conditions, users must provide accurate information.
If a student made a typo when entering their birthday, the only way to correct this is to permanently delete the current account and create a brand-new one with the correct details.
Accidental Student Accounts: If you are an adult but accidentally converted your account type to "student," please contact our support team. We can verify the error and revert the change. Redeeming a student pass from an adult account can also change your account type, so teachers should share student pass links only with students. Buying a kids subscription also changes your account to a young student account, even if you're an adult.
What happens when a student reaches the required age?
When a student turns 13 in the U.S., 14 in South Korea, or 16 elsewhere, they'll see a Confirm your details page the next time they log in. They'll need to confirm their date of birth, the email address they used when signing up, and their password. Once confirmed, the account becomes a regular student account and the age-based limits are removed. Students can then add their name and profile picture in Settings.
23 comments
This really is inconvenient. I'm a teacher and I sometimes assign students to create an original Kahoot with their content and they can't even share it with me. This should be changed for those who are using an educational domain email address.
I concur with limbruglia's comments that teachers should be enabled to be attached to student accounts to allow students ability to share their work with us. That would be fantastic!
I agree with the above statements. kahoot should allow sharing of students under the age of 13 with their teachers so we can help edit their work and share it with others who would use the kahoot.
It is very disappointing to younger students who love the kahoot product and want to share their work with the teachers and classmates.
I have an autistic student that just turned 13 and had a behavior break because he can’t access his Kahoot. How about making the age restriction 16 years worldwide.
What is the point of allowing students to make accounts if they can't do ANYTHING with their Kahoots except make them? Why would they even be allowed to make Kahoot quizzes? I would even be happy to be a verifying email for my students if that is required, but what should they do with their Kahoot accounts except play the games?
Has nothing been done about this issue ?
Lova
Not allowing kids to share with their parents is also a problem. Needing to login as the child to see their work is ridiculous.
I like how everyone who argues here are children and act like parents.
It's really annoying and I want to delete the account and I can't just because its a child account
Especially during this COVID crisis, it would be nice if students could post the kahoots they are making on our online classrooms so that they could play each others' games.
I completely agree with above statements regarding linking to a teacher account. I just had an assignment for students to study habitats and then create Kahoots about them... but they can't share their work with me!
I agree as well. I like them to make a Kahoot about a certain topic, and then quizz with the whole class. Now they have to send me pictures of their questions so that I can re-make the kahoot and actually use it. Very annoying and takes up too much time.
I think Kahoot should make it much clearer about this sharing rule. My students can't share the Kahoot with me (their teacher) and it is extremely frustrating.
There should be a way the students can share their Kahoot with a teacher or guardian.
It is also a shame that Kahoot doesn't respond to these comments people have made.
Same here. Very frustrating for the students and for me.
As a teacher I want to be able to use the Kahoot my students have created and also have the report for evaluation. Can't emails of students be linked to a teacher account? If not it really should be modified so I could access my student's Kahoot.
Please!
Agree with everyone here - same issue! Especially now with remote learning. Fix this Kahoot!!!
I am experiencing the same problem as everyone above.
My students have created their own Kahoot's as part of an assignment and their peers cannot access them.
I really think an update needs to be made regarding sharing permissions on created Kahoot's of users under 16.
4 years later and you have neither paid attention to the comments, nor done anything about it. It is really frustrating.
What is the point of sharing a Kahoot with a link if students can't play it without making an account, only to try to make an account and be told they can't? Kahoot went from an easy-to-use classroom tool to something I can only use with the whole group. Your competitors are making it way easier than you and therefore more likely that I will use them!
Thank you all for your feedback.
We understand your concern about younger students wanting to share their work with teachers and classmates. However, due to privacy regulations, Kahoot! currently does not allow students under the age of 13 in the U.S. (and under 16 outside the U.S.) to share their content publicly or with other accounts. These young students can present their own kahoots live to their class but cannot make them public or share them via a link or with another account. This policy is in place to protect the privacy and safety of young users.
This was implemented to enhance the security and personalization of the learning experience. However, we recognize that this can be a barrier, especially in classroom settings. To address this, we are working on features that will allow easier access for students. It should simplify the process and make it more user-friendly.
Has there been any progress on allowing teachers to access the Kahoots their students create? I just had students create Kahoots this week and they are disappointed that they can't easily share them with me and their classmates. It also makes playing them more difficult. I can project to the board from my device but not always from theirs.
Hi @debracsikos_vandrasi!
Thank you for reaching out regarding the issue of students sharing their kahoots. Due to our Children Privacy Policy, students under 13 in the U.S. and under 16 in other countries cannot share their kahoots directly.
However, there are workarounds to address this issue - you can download our Import Questions spreadsheet template and send it to your students. They can fill in the template with their questions and send the file back to you. You can then create a new Kahoot on your account using their questions.
Please sign in to leave a comment.