Tablet and headphones for 18 month old

[jimwilli]

As per title i'm looking for the best option for a tablet and headphones for my 18 month old. I'd rather not get one tbh but we are flying for 23 hours soon and going to have it as an extra trick up our sleeves to keep occupied on the flight. It will hopefully not be used apart from this journey.

My missus has seen good reviews on the amazon own brand one. Apparently they are good for kids? What about headphones does anyone have any recommendations for some headphones to connect to the tablet? Ideally with option of wireless and wired connection.

[Chilly for June]

We tried the Amazon tablet but we returned it not long after purchasing.

It was like going back in time in both processor speed and screen quality. It didn't fare well in sunshine for example as well as being a low resolution. There could be a higher spec one from Amazon, this was the cheapest.

We replaced it with a Samsung Galaxy Tab A. Wasn't much more expensive in a sale and while i'm not a Samsung fan it's perfect for what we need for the little one.

Headphones I have no clue, we haven't yet picked a pair up. Always the chance at that age they will just pull them off.

[vaud]

An 18 month old won't care about screen resolution ;-)

Ipad mini is a nice size though make sure it has enough storage. You can use tools like handbrake to take video files and make them smaller.

Headphones - over ear ones with funny characters on them are your best bet.

23 hours. Ouch. Good luck, that sounds like hell.

[fat80b]

jimwilli said:

It will hopefully not be used apart from this journey.

Good luck with that....


We went with amazon fire tablets and kids accounts and while it is a bit clunky in places, it's also totally fine for a kid to use. You can get big rubber bumper cases and this would be what I would buy. Apps, and downolading BBC / netflix content is a godsend.

Ours are now 7 and 9, and one of the original kindle tablets is still going well enough to download netflix etc for the annual holiday use case. The other kindle fire died because the USB connector was a weak point - I could probably have repaired it but we now have a nintendo switch instead for the eldest.

I'd personally go the fire route because they are cheap.
You don't want them to use your expensive ipad only for them to drop the thing in a bathroom abroad and smash the screen - tell me how I know that one......The cost of fixing the screen was double the cost of another fire tablet.......

[fat80b]

Headphone wise, cheapo ones are the choice - and make use of the volume limiting to protect their ears.

Don't bother with wireless or fancy as they will break them regardless of quality.

Last time round I bought a set of colourful ones on amazon - 2 sets (pink and blue) for £15 and they are great. Something like these https://www.amazon.co.uk/Nabevi-Headphones-Functio...

[Defcon5]

I found the Amazon ones more hassle than they were width with all the accounts etc

In my opinion nothing beats an iPad. My 3 year old is using an iPad 3, from about 2012 - they may be expensive but they will last

[Murph7355]

None of the truly cheap headphones had great volume limiting IMO. Certainly not that I'd trust.

tbh, I'm not sure I'd bother for an 18mth old. Just knock the volume down on the tablet and let them use it without anything. Headphones aren't just about noise (though young ears are easily damaged), they also isolate them from everything else around them. Not sure that's great for one so young.

If you really want some, we have Puro (2200BT I think) over ear headphones for our two boys (now 7 and 10. We've had them 3-4yrs). Excellent quality, noise limiter is spot on and they are robust.

Tablet? We had iPads for a while. Then switched to convertible Chromebooks.

[jimwilli]

Thanks for all the quick replies.
Storage is a must as we will be 30000 feet up in the air. Also I know they likely rip headphones off but don't want to subject the whole plane to the wiggles. I already know some of the songs off by heart.
Processing speed isn't a big thing. It will literally just be playing downloaded wiggles and elmo videos

[nebpor]

The Amazon kids tablet in higher spec is excellent - good battery and robust, with a really simple interface for kids and the ability to download all the content offline before the journey

Be warned, at 18 months old you might be lucky for them to engage for very long though - I was a frequent Sydney-Scotland traveller with young kids!!

[jimwilli]

I have just started looking at these amazon ones online. They do specific kids models.
Are you all getting the normal versions or the kids ones?

[Alorotom]

Another vote for iPad mini and a set of the kids JVC headphones

Worked on several long haul flights with our daughter (technically not for under 3s) but the volume limiter etc worked perfect and lasted until she was about 4ish.

https://www.jvcshop.co.uk/products/hakd7p?variant=...

[nebpor]

jimwilli said:

I have just started looking at these amazon ones online. They do specific kids models.
Are you all getting the normal versions or the kids ones?

Fire kids 10 - the 10 has a much faster processor and fast USB C charging

[Keypad]

I’d have serious doubts about headphones for an 18 month old, especially on a plane.
The ambient noise level on (say) an A380 / 777 is pretty high & I think they would be likely to be turned up far too high for such young & tender ears.
If you must go down the headphone route, bite the bullet & get a pair of noise reducing ‘phones.

[a311]

Another vote for the Samsung Tab A. The kindle fires are good value but chock full of bloatware so the ones I've used run like a bag of spanners.

In the headphones all I'd say is be warey of bulky ones, as I found in car seats etc they prevent the child from being able to sit back and be comfortable in the seat.

All kids are different, at that age ours wouldn't really entertain much on a tablet for long until they were older.

My Mrs re wrapped small all toys and broke out a little stocking type filler when the kids got really restless but this was a 5 hour flight......

[stevoknevo]

Don't bother with the kids version, flicking between the main part of the OS where you need to add everything that can be viewed in the kids part of the OS is a PITA! And you'll be controlling it/queuing stuff up at that age.

The Fire 8 HD plus version is £60 currently, buy a kid proof case, it's worth it for the extra gig of RAM over the non plus, does wireless charging (slow) USB C charging, SD card slot - you can easily add the Google Play store/Assistant/add Disney & Netflix/turn the ads off and various other things using a program called 'Fire Toolbox'. They're cheap, functional and absolutely bombproof - my two have an 8 and a 7, latter must be 4-5 years old. Whatever you decide, do not buy anything with 16gb storage as it'll cause you nothing but bother as you'll quickly run out of space and it'll hang anf lag until you delete stuff and clear caches...

www.amazon.co.uk/all-new-fire-hd-8-plus-tablet-8-h...

[jimwilli]

Just about to press the button on one of these tablets being as black friday.

I'm looking at the comparison table and am I right in thinking the number after 'fire' generally relates to screen size. As in a Fire8 isn't necessarily worse than a fire10 it just has a smaller screen?

I don't understand what "with ads" means? Obviously advertisements but for instance Fire 8 plus says 'with ads' in the listing at 62 quid. Without ads is 90 quid. Is it worth the difference?

[C G]

jimwilli said:

Just about to press the button on one of these tablets being as black friday.

I'm looking at the comparison table and am I right in thinking the number after 'fire' generally relates to screen size. As in a Fire8 isn't necessarily worse than a fire10 it just has a smaller screen?

I don't understand what "with ads" means? Obviously advertisements but for instance Fire 8 plus says 'with ads' in the listing at 62 quid. Without ads is 90 quid. Is it worth the difference?

I bought the Fire 8 a few weeks ago , 2020 model, think it was £40. Replaced a Fire 10 that expired after a few years use. It seems pretty much identical aside from a smaller and lower resolution screen, and actually the smaller size is much handier for use on-the-go (which is the only use for it really).

Don't pay more the ad free model as you can remove the ads for free by plugging it into a PC and using the Fire toolbox application that is freely downloadable.

I would agree with the other comments that an 18 months is quite young to be using a tablet and not to expect too much engagement!

[jimwilli]

C G said:

I bought the Fire 8 a few weeks ago , 2020 model, think it was £40. Replaced a Fire 10 that expired after a few years use. It seems pretty much identical aside from a smaller and lower resolution screen, and actually the smaller size is much handier for use on-the-go (which is the only use for it really).

Don't pay more the ad free model as you can remove the ads for free by plugging it into a PC and using the Fire toolbox application that is freely downloadable.

I would agree with the other comments that an 18 months is quite young to be using a tablet and not to expect too much engagement!

Thanks for the tip about the ad free. is this the app that also lets you access youtube and things like that? Is it relatively easy to use the fire toolbox app and make these changes i'm not massively tech savvy.

10" doesn't seem overly large to me so I thought I may as well go 10 unless there is massive price difference.

Yeh i'm not hoping for it to perform miracles with the nipper it's just going to be an extra tool in our bag of tricks.

[stevoknevo]

jimwilli said:

C G said:

I bought the Fire 8 a few weeks ago , 2020 model, think it was £40. Replaced a Fire 10 that expired after a few years use. It seems pretty much identical aside from a smaller and lower resolution screen, and actually the smaller size is much handier for use on-the-go (which is the only use for it really).

Don't pay more the ad free model as you can remove the ads for free by plugging it into a PC and using the Fire toolbox application that is freely downloadable.

I would agree with the other comments that an 18 months is quite young to be using a tablet and not to expect too much engagement!

Thanks for the tip about the ad free. is this the app that also lets you access youtube and things like that? Is it relatively easy to use the fire toolbox app and make these changes i'm not massively tech savvy.

10" doesn't seem overly large to me so I thought I may as well go 10 unless there is massive price difference.

Yeh i'm not hoping for it to perform miracles with the nipper it's just going to be an extra tool in our bag of tricks.

Fire Toolbox is very easy to use, you need to run it on a PC and connect the tablet to it over USB.

I think 10" is way, way to large for a toddler - my 9yo has an 8 and the 4.5yo a 7 (although Santa just bought him the new 8 today for £41)

[jimwilli]

stevoknevo said:

Fire Toolbox is very easy to use, you need to run it on a PC and connect the tablet to it over USB.

I think 10" is way, way to large for a toddler - my 9yo has an 8 and the 4.5yo a 7 (although Santa just bought him the new 8 today for £41)

Where did you get the 8 for 41?
I bought the 8 plus hd yesterday for 62 quid, I think it has 32gb memory. Wish me luck setting it up when it arrives tomorrow. I have a mac will I still be able to transfer the toolbox app with a mac?