It may be a slow and potentially costly system, especially if you go down the cartridge route, but the children we gave it to really liked it. Kids eh?
It's not without its faults, but the nabi 2 is currently one of the best Android kids' tablets around. It's rugged and has an easy-to-use kids' interface. You're unlikely to want to use it yourself, but it does allow you to use the full Android interface, and now has Jelly Bean and access to the Google Play store and Google apps.
The iPad mini with Retina display is a fabulous tablet. The screen is excellent and more than worth the minimal weight gain. Performance is also excellent, and the 64-bit processor makes this much more future-proof than the original iPad mini. The higher price (compared to the original cost of the iPad mini) may be frustrating, but it's arguably better value than the iPad Air as well as being more portable. If you can afford it, you won't be disappointed.
This is one of the better kids' Android tablets we've seen but with a street price of £150, it's not cheap. Yes, you get Android Jelly Bean and access to Google Play, but the sluggish performance and poor cameras combine with the missing user profiles and imperfect screen-time management to outweigh those advantages. The new Kindle Fire HD costs £119 (or £139 if you want 16GB of storage) and has a much better kids' mode with user profiles and great screen-time management. The price doesn't include a child-friendly case, but these are sure to appear now that the FreeTime feature has been added.
The Kurio 10S has reasonably good child-friendly software and decent parental controls. A year on from our original review, the addition of Google Play and other Google apps is a major bonus and means you're not limited to the Kurio store. Keeping Wi-Fi turned off improves battery life, and at the current discounted prices, it's not a bad deal at all.
The Tesco Hudl is a budget tablet with a nice design and good build quality. Key specifications are better than the price tag suggests such as the processor and good quality 7 in screen. A microSD card slot and Micro-HDMI port are two reasons to opt for the Hudl over Google and Amazon alternatives.
The cameras are still not great, but in almost every area the Tesco Hudl 2 has been improved and it's still a bargain at £129 or even less with ClubCard Boost. The software is good but takes up valuable storage space and non-Tesco customers won't get the most out of it. A great screen, decent processor and microSD card slot make this an excellent tablet.
The specially built-for-kids LeapPad3 and LeapPad Ultra XDi are similar in specs and functionality. The larger, 7-inch, Ultra XDi has twice the storage as the 5-inch LeapPad 3 but younger children may prefer the 3's smaller size and weight. We think their upper-age range is seven rather than Leapfrog's claimed nine, but our eight-year-old tester still enjoyed her time with both. While the hardware is cheaper than normal tablets note that the software can be more expensive. The advantage of Leapfrog software is that, while not as cheap as normal mobile apps, it has been built by educational PhDs with both fun and learning in mind. With its white-list web browsing it's safer online than most adult tablets, although it's limited in its scope from that point of view. The LeapPads are bestsellers every year and the latest models build on an award-winning and popular formula without any huge leaps forward in terms of design or functionality.
It isn't perfect, but the HD 6 is really good value. Performance is well above the level you'd expect at this price, as is the quality of the screen. Some might find the 6in screen too small, though, so it's worth trying to track one down before buying.
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