Earned access or Family media plan?

The difference between Earned access and Family media plan is mostly one axis: whether it applies to the adults. Earned access sits toward adult use is a separate matter; Family media plan sits firmly toward the rules are the same for the adults. They agree, more than most people expect, on other families, their own device and who picks. Neither is the correct one. What follows is what each asks of a parent, and where the difference actually shows up on a Tuesday.

Earned access

Screen time is the household currency: earned by the things that need doing, removed when things go wrong. It is easily the commonest approach in practice and the least often defended in print, which is a gap rather than a verdict. It works, in the sense that it reliably moves behaviour, and the thing it teaches about screens is that they are the most valuable thing in the house.

What it asks of you

A clear, stable list of what earns what, or it becomes a daily negotiation
Willingness to follow through on removal when that will ruin the evening
Accepting that contingency makes a thing more desirable, which is the mechanism working against you

Family media plan

Everyone sits down, the rules get written, and they apply to the whole house. The content of the plan matters less than the two features that define it: it is explicit, so nobody is improvising at bedtime, and it binds the adults, so it is a rule about the household rather than a rule about being a child. It is the approach most likely to survive a second parent disagreeing, because the disagreement gets had once and written down.

What it asks of you

Actually sitting down and writing it, which most households never get to
Living under your own rule, including the part about phones at dinner
Revisiting it, because a plan written for a five-year-old is wrong for an eight-year-old

Side by side

Where they differ

Earned access is the filled marker, Family media plan the hollow one. Widest difference first.

P2Whether it applies to the adults

adult use is a separate matterthe rules are the same for the adults

Earned access sits toward adult use is a separate matter; Family media plan sits firmly toward the rules are the same for the adults.

T3Tied to behaviour

never earned, never removedearned, and taken away

Earned access sits firmly toward earned, and taken away; Family media plan sits toward never earned, never removed.

P1What screens are

entertainment, at best neutrala skill worth building early

Earned access sits toward entertainment, at best neutral; Family media plan sits a little toward a skill worth building early.

Where they agree

Usually more than the argument between them suggests.

Other families. Both sit between the two.
Their own device. Both sit between the two.
Who picks. Both sit between the two.
Conflict the household can absorb. Both sit toward able to take the argument every time.
Shape of the rule. Both sit between the two.
How much the week needs them. Both sit between the two.

Neither of these is the correct one

Which fits depends on what you value and on what your week actually allows — and the second of those is the half nobody writes about. The questionnaire scores both.

See which one you are already doing