My Talking Tom — a free 4+ virtual pet whose App Privacy label admits tracking across other companies' apps and sites
Outfit7, 2013. Free iOS / Android pet care loop on a heavy ad-and-IAP surface. Tracking App Privacy label, a 2015 ASA ruling on an adult-site ad reaching a 3-year-old, and a "No Ads" upsell that trades ad pressure for currency pressure.
Outfit7 Limited (Slovenia). Released 11/13 November 2013. Free, Apple 4+, 366,917 App Store ratings at 4.33/5; the Talking Tom franchise has passed ~26 billion downloads (Wikipedia). A virtual-pet care loop monetized with a coins+diamonds economy, in-app purchases, an auto-renewing subscription, a "No Ads" upsell, and rewarded + interstitial video ads. The Apple App Privacy label reads "Data Used to Track You ... across apps and websites owned by other companies." Track record: a 2015 UK ASA upheld ruling (an adult-website ad reached a 3-year-old) and a 2019 CARU COPPA action.
How we got to 46
Safety < 60 — flagged for parental discretion.
The Play Score is a weighted average: Fun ×0.25, Learning ×0.3, Safety ×0.25, Value ×0.2. Anything below 60 on Safety caps the total at 70.
What parents wrote vs. what their kids did
Quotes are sourced from public App Store, Google Play, and Reddit reviews captured during research. Reviewer handles shown verbatim where the platform makes them public; we never invent quotes or named children.
""I was playing Flappy Tom and I crashed so then it asked me if I wanted to watch a add to save me. I didn’t want to so I just sat there and a add popped up so I had to watch a add." "Every time you touch the screen add add add.""
elsa 821, Apple App Store US (1★ — forced-ad cadence)· App Store""When I purchased the (NO ADDS) Option ... Now ... ALL the Foods, Wardrobe, Terrace, Kitchen and Bedroom Decorations has to be Bought with Coins, Diamonds or Real Money and I’m not able to watch a Free ADD to get those for FREE like before.""
iOSLover2003, Apple App Store US (3★ — the "No Ads" upsell trap)· App Store""A kids game came and theres A inappropriate add and it made me back then uncomfortable." "There’s way too many ads ... get rid of the ads." A current 1-star review echoing the long-running ad-network complaint."
Sonic.exe. 2018, Apple App Store US (1★ — inappropriate ad)· App StoreNone of the cited reviews describe a specific child reaction.
What's good, what's not
- ✓The core care loop is genuinely accessible to the youngest kids: tap to feed, swipe to wash, poke to hear Tom repeat what they say. Outfit7’s own official trailer frames it honestly — adopt a baby Tom and raise him from kitten to grown cat.
- ✓Free to download, Apple 4+, with a deep catalog of outfits, furniture, mini-games and travel spots. iOS App Store: 366,917 ratings at 4.33/5, and the Talking Tom franchise has passed roughly 26 billion downloads (Wikipedia) — the loop demonstrably holds little kids’ attention.
- ✓Outfit7 is unusually candid in its own store copy about what the app is. Verbatim: "This app contains: Promotion of Outfit7’s products and advertising; ... The option to make in-app purchases; Subscriptions which automatically renew." A parent who reads the box is told.
- ✓A documented free path exists: rewarded ads let a kid earn coins, food and outfits without real money — Outfit7 notes "alternative options to access all functionalities of the app without making any in-app purchases." (That earn-route is also the catch — see cons.)
- ✓Outfit7 responded to regulators when pressed: after CARU flagged its privacy policy in 2019, the studio removed the offending content and CARU took no further action. It carries a COPPA Safe Harbor certification.
- ✓The virtual-pet routine (feed / wash / sleep / play) is the kind of light caregiving pretend-play that a 3–5-year-old reads easily; the on-screen states (hungry, dirty, sleepy) are legible without text. The pretend-care framing is the one real developmental thread.
- —CONTRARIAN (track record): in 2015 the UK ASA upheld two parents whose seven- and three-year-old saw an adult-website ad; a 2019 CARU/COPPA action followed; a parent reports a violent interactive ad to a 6-year-old today. Outfit7: "impossible to eliminate the risk altogether."
- —On a 4+ app, Apple’s App Privacy label reads "Data Used to Track You ... across apps and websites owned by other companies," plus "Data Linked to You" (Identifiers, Location, Purchases) for Third-Party Advertising. Google Play self-discloses sharing "Device or other IDs."
- —The "No Ads" purchase is a trap, not a fix. Verified review, after buying it: "ALL the Foods, Wardrobe ... has to be Bought with Coins, Diamonds or Real Money and I’m not able to watch a Free ADD to get those for FREE like before." Pay to stop ads, get more currency pressure.
- —Ad cadence reads as adversarial. Verified 1-star: after declining a rewarded ad, "I just sat there and a add popped up so I had to watch a add," plus "every time you touch the screen add add add." Another: "theres A inappropriate add and it made me ... uncomfortable."
- —Engagement is gated by a wait-or-pay sleep timer ("YOU CAN’T DO ANYTHING WHEN TOM IS SLEEPY"), and the earned currency is not durable — recent reviews report balances wiped: "you took all my gold coins after years of me collecting them," "EVERYTHING IS GONE."
- —Common Sense Media rates the direct sequel My Talking Tom 2 at 9+, not Apple’s 4+, on the same posture: "banner ads ... buttons that will bring up video ads, and random video ads," with "data ... shared for third-party advertising." The 4+ rating undersells the surface.
What your kid is actually practising
The pet routine is light caregiving pretend-play — feed, wash, comfort, dress. It is single-player parasocial care, not cooperative play, so it sits low: the kid practices attributing needs to a character, but there is no second player and the loop is engineered for retention, not relationship. Outfit7 frames it as raising Tom from kitten to cat [c15].
Reading Tom’s legible states — hungry, dirty, sleepy — and acting on them is a small theory-of-mind exercise for a 3–5-year-old. It stays at level 2 because the states are one-dimensional prompts to tap, and the "sleepy" state is a monetization wait-gate as much as a feeling, per the verified review naming it [c12].
Tapping, swiping and dragging across feeding, washing and the mini-games gives real fine-motor practice for small hands. It is the most defensible skill here — but it is repeatedly interrupted by full-screen ads, including forced ones after a decline, which break the motor rhythm the loop is supposed to build [c8].
Dressing Tom and decorating rooms is a thin customization-as-creativity layer. It scores low because most of the catalog is gated behind coins, diamonds or real money — after the "No Ads" purchase the free earn-route to those items disappears entirely, so "create" mostly means "buy" [c9].
A calm care routine could support emotional regulation, but the design works against it: a sleep timer that stalls play, currency that vanishes, and an ad cadence that interrupts every interaction ("every time you touch the screen add add add") are friction generators, not calming ones [c8][c11].
A healthy way to play it
About 10 minutes per session
