Too young to scroll? The UK’s proposed under-16s social media ban

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Summary: The UK government plans to ban under-16s from social media from spring 2027, representing a significant shift in online safety regulation. Social media companies will face new responsibilities around age assurance, alongside existing Online Safety Act and data protection obligations. Drawing on lessons from Australia, affected businesses will need to prepare for stricter age verification, potential platform redesigns and increased compliance costs while navigating continuing uncertainty over how the new regime will operate.

Most people reading this will have opened their first social media account well before they turned 16. However, from spring 2027, under-16s will be banned from social media, according to UK government proposals released this summer.

The planned social media ban will be the UK’s biggest intervention in online safety since the Online Safety Act 2023 (the act). The act has been widely criticised, and Ofcom found this month that the regime hasn’t led to children encountering less harmful content online. The UK is now planning to follow Australia's social media ban, which has also faced scrutiny. Businesses that rely on young people’s attention will likely face a fresh wave of legal obligations, compliance costs, resourcing concerns and increased uncertainty.

The Online Safety Act 

The upcoming ban arrives as the UK is still implementing its current online safety regime. After years of divisive debate, the Online Safety Act received Royal Assent in 2023 and its duties on online platforms came into force from early 2025. The regulatory framework doesn’t ban specific online content, but requires online services to assess and reduce the risk of harmful content on their platforms. These duties are overseen by Ofcom.

The first duties for social media companies came into effect in July 2025, including the requirement to implement ‘highly effective’ age verification measures to keep children away from harmful content. However, the implementation of the act has faced fierce criticism from online safety campaigners over the strength of Ofcom's enforcement powers. 

As part of the act, Ofcom was given significant enforcement powers. It can fine a company up to £18 million or 10% of its qualifying worldwide revenue, whichever is higher, and can ask the courts to block online services in the UK. In practice, enforcement has been limited. The largest fine to date is £1.35 million, and most fines have targeted smaller pornographic sites. Ofcom used its blocking powers for the first time in May 2026 when it applied for a court order to restrict UK access to a suicide forum.  

Despite this, in October 2026, Ofcom’s first Online Safety Act statutory report found that there had been no significant drop in the proportion of UK children encountering harmful content online. 

Suzanne Cater, Ofcom's enforcement director, told the House of Lords Communications and Digital Committee in September 2026 that the majority of fines the regulator had issued went unpaid, noting the challenge of collecting penalties through UK courts from companies that have no assets or corporate presence in the UK.

The act has also already faced judicial review. In 2025, Wikimedia challenged the categorisation that left it facing the strictest duties alongside social media companies. In 2026, Meta disputed how Ofcom calculated fines based on global revenue.

What’s now being proposed?

The UK government announced on 15 June 2026 that social media companies will no longer be able to offer their services to under-16s. The under-16s ban marks a shift in the UK's approach to regulating online harm. Online platforms will no longer be asked solely to manage the risk of young people being exposed to harmful content. Instead, the ban will require companies to remove under-16s as users.

The decision follows ‘Growing up in the online world’, a national consultation held earlier in the year that received more than 100,000 responses. 90% of parents backed the ban and two-thirds of young people agreed that under-16s should be kept off at least some online platforms. In its proposals, the government said the ban will protect children from harmful online features, improve wellbeing and give young people a healthier childhood.

Some campaigners pushed the government to go further. The Children's Commissioner, Rachel de Souza, said all online services should be banned for young people until they turn 18 unless the platforms can prove their design keeps children safe from harmful content.

The government said the ban will be similar to Australia’s model, which covers social media platforms including Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, YouTube, Snapchat and X. Messaging services such as WhatsApp and Signal, as well as dedicated educational platforms, aren’t currently intended to be included.

The government has also proposed further measures:

• restricting livestreaming and contact from strangers for under-16s on other online services including gaming platforms; and
• avoiding a 'cliff edge' by placing a default overnight curfew from midnight to 6am for 16- and 17-year-olds, with notifications, autoplay and personalised feeds switched off by default. Users will be able to change these settings.

The first set of regulations is due before Parliament by the end of 2026.

Lessons from Australia  

Australia became the first country to ban under-16s from social media in December 2025. The ban requires online services to take ‘reasonable steps’ to keep under-16s from accessing their platforms. Platforms that fail to do so face fines of up to A$49.5 million.

The effectiveness of Australia's ban is uncertain. In the first month following the ban, 4.7 million social media accounts were shut down. In June 2026, the Australian government said the number of under-16s with social media accounts had fallen by 37%.

However, in March 2026, Australia's online safety regulator put Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok and YouTube on notice. Online platforms were required under the ban to implement age assurance. The regulator said the platforms weren’t doing enough to prevent under-16s from opening new accounts or bypassing age checks. Some young people use virtual private networks to get around age verification.

The UK government said it intends to follow Australia's social media ban but may take a tougher approach.

The challenge of age verification

Age assurance is the biggest challenge for businesses that must comply with online safety laws. It covers processes that online platforms use to work out a user’s age, such as ID checks, biometrics and AI-based facial and voice analysis.

The UK government said age verification may not be necessary for adults accessing social media because their accounts are often linked to credit cards or email addresses that have already been subject to age verification measures. However, the proposals also mention the possibility of a facial age estimation check for over-18s. The government has also yet to decide how YouTube's educational content will be treated.

In particular, age verification for 16- and 17-year-olds is challenging because young people may not have passports and are unlikely to have credit cards or full driving licences.

Age verification checks involving biometrics or ID scans may also be subject to data protection requirements under the UK GDPR. This creates further responsibilities for businesses, which must satisfy both regulators' requirements. In response, Ofcom and the Information Commissioner’s Office released joint guidance on age assurance in March 2026.

Ofcom warned in July 2026 that no single method will prevent under-16s from circumventing age verification. In October 2026, the regulator recommended four methods that would provide ‘highly effective’ age assurance for social media companies that must comply with the ban, including:

• photo ID matching: comparing a live image of the user with their passport or driving licence;
• banking-based checks: comparing a user’s age using bank records;
• digital ID services: verifying a user’s identity once and then reusing the check; and
• facial age estimation: using AI to estimate a user’s age from their facial features.

What can businesses do?

Social media companies face considerable uncertainty about their obligations under the new regime.

Social media isn’t currently defined in UK law. Social media companies are covered under the Online Safety Act because they meet the definition of user-to-user services. These services allow people to create, share and view content or communicate with others. They’re subject to highly effective age assurance duties. It isn’t clear how the ban will interact with these existing duties.

Online platforms subject to the ban will rely on Ofcom’s guidance. However, social media companies will be responsible for ensuring under-16s don’t use their platforms. Ofcom chief executive Dame Melanie Dawes said the regulator will take swift enforcement action against companies that fail to comply.

Ofcom plans to consult on its guidance after the government unveils the first set of rules on the ban at the end of 2026. With the ban expected in spring 2027, companies could therefore have a relatively short window in which to prepare.

Social media companies will need to:

• carry out age verification on millions of UK users and remove accounts belonging to under-16s;
• implement the Ofcom-recommended age assurance measures;
• redesign platforms for the overnight curfew and default-setting requirements for 16- and 17-year-olds; and
• detect and respond to attempts by under-16s to circumvent age verification checks.

Businesses likely affected by the ban should:

• consider their approach to age assurance using Ofcom's four methods;
• respond to Ofcom's consultation on its guidance; and
• learn from Australia's ban and platforms’ responses to it.

Online safety law and regulation is divisive; however, young people can be exposed to harmful online content on a daily basis. Social media companies face pressure to comply with uncertain regimes that focus on the challenge of age assurance. The UK’s next step in online safety is a social media ban for under-16s, but its success is far from guaranteed. With the ban expected to take effect in spring 2027, affected companies will need to follow the detail of the regulations closely and prepare to adapt quickly.

Scarlett Pontin is a trainee solicitor at RPC.