How Adults can Limit Adult Content on Apple Music
Screen Time and supervised mode can both be used to reliably limit explicit content or even disable features on the Apple Music app.
If you’re an adult who wants to block adult content in the Apple Music app, you might have wondered if this is possible to do without blocking the app entirely. Fortunately, it is possible to use a few different approaches to limit this kind of content while still allowing the Apple app to function properly. If you're a parent setting up a child's iPhone, see our parent's guide to blocking adult content on Apple Music instead.
On iPhones, it’s possible to manage some content on Apple Music using Screen Time, but a more effective approach for adults is to use Config Files . This guide compares both options.
Choosing an Approach to Block Adult Content on Apple Music
For adults, it’s often not very effective to rely on Screen Time only to limit adult content, and that’s why we recommend using a combination of approaches that go beyond basic controls.
For Apple Music, you have a few things to keep in mind:
- Apple Music usually allows explicit tracks by default if your Apple account age is above 18.
- Album art is often designed in such a way that it grabs your attention, and this includes explicitly-charged or “provocative” images.
- You often don’t want to completely block the app if you’re already paying for access to Apple Music. For example, if you’re subscribed to Apple One.
Apple Music can have most (although, unfortunately, not all) explicit tracks hidden with Screen Time, and while this is a good practice, we recommend using Config Files instead. Config Files are a better choice for adults because it’s very difficult to undo your own restrictions later, and Apple Music is just one of the features and apps you can control.
Manage Apple Music with Config Files
Most other online guides might recommend using Screen Time to limit the kind of content that Apple Music can display to you or play. While this is a good step (and I will include instructions later in this guide), we also have to realize that Screen Time isn’t always the best solution for an adult who’s self-managing their own iPhone. That’s why we often recommend an alternative to Screen Time that uses a Config Generator instead.
Here’s an example of how you might restrict Apple Music using Tech Lockdown’s Config Generator :
Create your Config and go to the General tab
Turning off Explicit Content behaves similarly to the Screen Time version of these instructions I’ll get into later, but if your iPhone has supervised mode enabled , it’s not possible to remove this Config File without following a specific (and time-consuming) process.
You could also restrict Apple Music so it only plays the music you have currently saved to your iPhone (no browsing):
Use Screen Time to Limit Content
Screen Time does include a few options you can use to limit Apple Music.
Here, you have several options available. Firstly, we recommend limiting the kinds of music that can be played to Clean.
Disable the Apple Radio Feature
In addition to blocking album art, you might prevent new kinds of music from being discovered using the Apple Radio feature in the Apple Music App.
We have a dedicated guide for disabling Apple Radio that walks you through multiple approaches. If done properly, Apple Music will not have a radio button available at all: