The options

There are broadly three: a dedicated device such as a kids' phone or GPS tracker, the phone's built-in location sharing, and a parent-child location sharing app.

If your child uses an ordinary smartphone, an app is the most flexible. It works when parent and child have different devices, and it lets you set the things parents actually need, such as arrival alerts for school. The comparison is in three ways to share location with family.

Talk to your child first

A child who feels watched will turn off location permission or delete the app. Before you set anything up, talk through these points at a level that suits their age.

• Why it is there — not to catch them out, but to find them quickly if they are late or lost
• Who can see it — only family members who have accepted each other
• When alerts happen — leaving school, arriving at an activity or at home
• It works both ways — your child can see the location of the parents they are connected to

Depending on your child's age and where you live, sharing a child's location may require verifiable parental consent. Go through the consent screens during sign-up together.

Setting up parent-child sharing in DOKOPANG

1. Install DOKOPANG on the parent's phoneSign up with an email address or a social account, and verify your mobile number.
2. Install DOKOPANG on the child's phoneOne account per verified mobile number, so use the child's own number.
3. Set the permissions togetherLocation "Always", notifications allowed, activity recognition allowed, and on Android the battery setting "Unrestricted". Settings > Permission status shows them all in one place.
4. Send and accept the requestThe parent sends a request to the child's number from Connect, and the child accepts on their phone.
5. Add school and activities as safe zonesUse quick add in the Safety tab. Pick a radius that fits — 200 m for a school with grounds, 50 m for a small building — and choose the weekdays. Home is not needed: the return-home alert works it out.
6. Tune the alertsSelect your child and check place entry and exit, low battery and the morning briefing in their profile settings. Risk prediction alerts are off by default, so turn them on if you want them.

What the location screen shows

• Status — moving, staying, stopped, or nearby
• While staying — the place, how long they have been there, estimated departure time
• While moving — distance remaining, mode of travel, estimated arrival time
• Also — distance from home, phone battery level, distance from you
• Today's activity — where they have been, with arrival and departure times in order

To get the school run as alerts rather than checks, see know when your child leaves school and gets home.

Respect your child's privacy too

As your child grows, revisit how much is shared. In DOKOPANG, sharing can be paused without disconnecting, every view of a location is recorded in the view history, and location history is deleted automatically after 12 months.