Life360: Helpful or Harmful?

Found on Life360 Website

A common household name, Life360, is used by parents and teens for safety, communication, and efficiency purposes. The app is primarily used for location tracking; some parents use it because it helps them feel less anxious about their child's safety, but many teens feel as though it restricts their freedom. During the aftermath of hurricane Katrina Life360 was originally conceptualized by Chriss Hulls and Alex Haro in 2005 as a school project. The original purpose was to help families reconnect during and after crises. In 2008, the app became available for download on the Google Play Store. Then, in 2009 it was added to the Apple App Store. As of August 2025, Life360 has 200 million downloads across the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store, 88 million of those being monthly active users. Users are not required to buy a subscription to use it, although certain features are restricted on the free version. Life360 has four levels of subscription: free, silver, gold, and platinum. Each level adds new features, such as more location history over a longer period of time, crash detection, emergency dispatch, free towing, medical assistance, and many more helpful features for the user's family safety. 

How do parents and teens feelings' differ about the use of Life360?

Teen response:

My experience with Life360 is complicated. My parents, being divorced, have different ideas of how to parent me, location tracking being one of those struggles. When I first got my phone, my mom installed the “Bark” app–which essentially allows parents to completely track all activity on their child's phone. It allows the parent to see flagged texts (which could be flagged for things like violence or sexual activity), what music their child is listening to, and track their child's location (similar to Life360). However, it got to a point where I was feeling more violated than protected. We would have conflicts based off of my playlists or text messages, which felt very controlling and nit picky, and not so helpful. After having a year long struggle, my dad went and bought me a new phone free from control. Once I had my new phone, my mother requested me to install Life360. In my mind, it felt like a compromise, something I could do without feeling violated, while allowing her to feel a sense of security. But similar to Bark, the use of Life360 between the two of us went south. One Sunday, while I was with my dad, I was going to get my nails done. While I was sitting in the parking lot (because we were at the nail salon about 45 minutes early) my mom looked at my location. Then I got a text from her asking if I was getting my nails done. I responded, “Yes I am!” I thought nothing of it. Then, maybe ten minutes later, she showed up at the nail salon to talk to me about something (I don't remember what). It felt like a major overstep of boundaries. There was no reason for her to show up when I wasn’t with her, especially since I wasn’t doing anything wrong. That’s when my distaste for Life360 began. 

Parent response:

Most parents download Life360 under the assumption that they will be keeping their child safe. The app helps parents feel less anxious about their child's movements and location, giving the parents a false sense of security: found on AEG Wellness (AEGwellness.com). More often than not, this turns into a control issue, writer Suzie Glassman talks about her personal experience using Life360 in her article “I thought life 360 would make my life easier– here's why I quit”. After giving her son his first iPhone at age 11, Glassman and her husband decided to use Life360 to keep him safe. “Having Life360 felt like a gift. My son would never be lost or out of reach. No one could kidnap him!” and, “Within days, I was addicted to watching the tiny blue dot that represented my child move across the map”. The control addiction began, and Glassman quickly figured out that this was becoming a problem. She had the realization, “As a teenager, I often lied about where I was and who I was with.” She worried that her son would do the same, so she brainstormed new ideas to still keep her son safe, but limit the amount of control the app allowed her to have. Suzie Glassman decided to input new rules on his phone, these being: 

1. Tell us where he’s going and call or text if he changes locations

2. Always answer or reply when we call or text

3. Keep his phone charged

4. Understand that we’ll use ‘Find My iPhone’ … in an actual emergency

After making the decision: Glassman realized that she and her teen were more united and had limited conflicts.

Now just because my experience and Suzie Glassman’s experiences were not positive, doesn't mean the app cannot be helpful. It definitely has its benefits: when used correctly it helps keep families safe. When the boundaries become blurred, it becomes a cause for tension between family members. It's not uncommon for parents to use location tracking services like Life360, for example many use Find My (Apple's location tracking app). These location-tracking tools can absolutely be helpful for safety reasons, and add a level of efficiency to users' lives. But, when does it go too far?