[tomatocracy]

The most infuriating thing about Android/Google Play from this perspective is that there's no way to prevent a child from installing literally any and every free app which has the lowest rating.

On iOS you can disable installing apps, uninstalling apps, updating apps or disable the app store completely using Screen Time and before that you could (and still can) require a password/fingerprint/face ID for any app install including free.

It would take almost no effort from Google's part to replicate the last of these (add an option requiring a password to install any app, even free with lowest rating) but they seem to be unwilling to do so.

[viraptor]

Huh? This seems to disagree: https://support.google.com/families/answer/7039872 - you can set approvals for both paid and free apps.

[tomatocracy]

That only works if you set up a separate child account for a separate device and then manage it using Family Link.

If I want to hand my own phone over to a child for a while, there's no way (that I've found anyway) to prevent a child from installing all sorts of crapware on it.

[viraptor]

On non-ancient Android versions you can have multiple user accounts. Create a new one and log it into your kid's family linked account. You can switch the user before giving it to them and they'll get the expected restrictions.

[tomatocracy]

I'll give that a try, thanks!