How to stop a child spending money on your iPhone
Every few months someone discovers a four-figure bill from a game their six-year-old was playing. It is almost always the same mechanism: the child was using a parent's phone, the parent's payment method was already attached, and nothing stood between a tap and a charge. Here are the settings that stop it, and what to do if you're reading this too late.
The two switches that matter
Settings › Screen Time › Content & Privacy Restrictions. Turn the top toggle on if it isn't already, then open iTunes & App Store Purchases. Set In-app Purchases to Don't Allow and Installing Apps to Don't Allow. That's it — those two cover the overwhelming majority of accidental spending. While you're there, Require Password can be set to Always, which closes the fifteen-minute window where iOS won't re-ask after a purchase.
Why Ask to Buy doesn't apply
Ask to Buy is the feature everyone recommends, and it's the wrong answer to this particular question. It only works when the child has their own Apple Account inside your Family Sharing group, on their own device or signed in on theirs. When a child is using your phone, signed in as you, iOS sees your account making a purchase and there's no approval step to trigger. If the child doesn't have their own device, Ask to Buy does nothing for you.
Lock the settings themselves
Restrictions you can switch off are restrictions a curious ten-year-old can switch off. Set a Screen Time passcode in Settings › Screen Time › Lock Screen Time Settings, and make it different from your device passcode. This is also what stops someone undoing the work — without it, everything in this article takes about eight seconds to reverse.
Shield the App Store entirely
Blocking purchases still leaves the App Store sitting there. Apps built on Apple's Family Controls framework can shield it outright for the duration of a session, along with every other app you didn't allow. Reef does this as part of starting a session: the App Store and in-app purchases are both off while it's on, the app can't be deleted to escape it, and it holds through a force-quit or a restart.
If it already happened
Go to reportaproblem.apple.com, sign in, and request a refund for the charges. Apple's policy is discretionary rather than guaranteed, but accidental purchases by a child are a well-worn category and refunds in that situation are common — particularly for a cluster of purchases in a short window. Do it promptly; the request form only shows recent purchases. Then set the restrictions above before you hand the phone over again.
FAQ
How do I turn off in-app purchases on iPhone?
Settings › Screen Time › Content & Privacy Restrictions › iTunes & App Store Purchases › In-app Purchases › Don't Allow. Set Installing Apps to Don't Allow in the same place, and set a Screen Time passcode so the change can't be reversed.
Does Face ID stop my child buying things?
Not reliably. If your child's face is registered, or if they hand the phone to you at the confirmation screen, the purchase goes through. Turning in-app purchases off entirely is the setting that holds.
Will Apple refund purchases my child made?
Often, yes. Request it at reportaproblem.apple.com. It's discretionary, but accidental purchases by a child are a common and well-recognised case, especially several in one session.
Does blocking purchases also hide the App Store?
No — the App Store still opens, it just can't complete a purchase. To make it not open at all during a handover you need a Family Controls app that shields it as part of a session.
Hand over the phone, not the whole phone
Reef shields every app you didn't allow, gives your child a hub of the games and sites you chose, and needs your Face ID to switch off. Free to download — the shield, the PIN and passcode recovery are never paywalled.
Get Reef on the App StoreAbout ReefiOS behaviour described here was checked against iOS 26. Apple moves settings between releases — if a path doesn't match what you see, the feature is usually still there under a nearby name.