1 in 4 children meet screen time guidelines in 2023

Around 1 in 4 (27.8 per cent) children aged 5–17 years get less than 2 hours of sedentary screen time every day according to new insights released today by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).

Suraksha Maharaj, ABS head of health and disability insights, said: ‘While 1 in 4 children meet the guidelines for sedentary screen time every day, almost half meet the guidelines on 5 or more days in a week.

‘We found that across all children aged 5–17 years, the average time spent on sedentary screen activity was 2 hours and 51 minutes every day.

‘On average, older children aged 15–17 years spend over 4 hours on screen activities every day, while younger children aged 5–8 years spend just under 2 hours every day.’

One in five (18.3 per cent) children aged 5–17 years are meeting the physical activity guidelines of 60 minutes or more every day.

‘The average time children spent doing physical activity each day was 1 hour and 25 minutes. This is because most children are doing more than an hour of physical activity on many, but not all, days in a week,’ Ms Maharaj said.

‘Active transport made up about 17 minutes of the average daily time for children’s physical activity, including walking and cycling to school.’

Find more insights about screen time, physical activity and sleep in today’s analytical article.