Meta has reached a landmark deal with 52 US state attorneys general to reshape how teenagers interact with Instagram and Facebook. The deal, which still needs final court approval, will force Meta to turn on mandatory daily screen time limits, and pay a massive $18 billion payment spread over ten years.
The agreement resolves years of mounting legal pressure over how social media affects young minds. Under the new terms, teens under 18 will automatically face a strict two-hour daily limit shared across both Facebook and Instagram. Once that time runs out, teenagers cannot simply click past it. Only a parent can grant extra time.
Meta is also tackling bedtime distraction. The apps will enforce a default “Night Mode” that completely locks teenagers out of their main feeds, Stories, and Reels between midnight and 6:00 AM. During the day, “School Mode” will automatically mute push notifications from 8:00 AM to 3:00 PM, though direct messages and security alerts will still get through so teens can contact family.
Beyond time limits, the deal forces changes to what teens actually see on their screens. Users under 18 can now swap out algorithmic feeds for a simple reverse-chronological feed as their default, and autoplay will be turned off. Meta is also hiding public like counts on teen posts and banning plastic surgery and extreme makeup filters.
However, Meta made it clear that it does not want to bear these changes alone. In announcement materials, the company repeatedly called out its biggest rivals, TikTok and YouTube, urging them to adopt identical policies.
To push competitors into line, Meta worked financial incentives into the settlement itself. Around $5.3 billion of the total $18 billion payout is frozen. Meta will only have to pay that portion if YouTube and TikTok agree to match the rules, implement a one-hour daily limit, and pay a matching financial penalty.
If TikTok and YouTube voluntarily sign on to the agreement, Meta’s daily limit for teens will automatically shrink from two hours down to just one, and Night Mode will expand to run from 10:00 PM to 7:00 AM.
Meta’s legal chief, C.J. Mahoney, stated that while the company is proud of the deal, its overall success depends entirely on whether other platforms step up to follow Meta’s lead. To ensure compliance, an independent auditor will monitor Meta every year for five years.
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