Toniebox 2 – What Is It and Why Should You Care? A Review
Over the past few weeks we have been using the Toniebox 2 in our house; getting off the ground with this device was a bit more work than I would have liked, but most of that was my own fault for moving too quick through tutorials and not actually reading things. Even before the Toniebox arrived, though, I had to ask: what is a Toniebox, what are Tonies, and why should I care?
The Toniebox is a screenless entertainment device for kids, that provides lots of interactions with no screens. Screen time has become a real problem in our western culture; everywhere you look, adults and kids are glued to phones and tablets. This happens at restaurants, sporting events, on trips to the mall. You go to a place, you’ll find someone mesmerized by a screen. While the Toniebox isn’t ideal for taking around – it can be done, but it’s not ideal in my opinion – it is a great place to get kids off screens in a place that probably has the most – your home.
The Toniebox is sharing the marketplace with other products like the Yoto Player, and shares a lot of the same goals and aspirations: to get kids entertained without screens. And the Toniebox does that really well in my opinion, even better than Yoto in certain areas. There are a lot of great games that you can play on a Toniebox that are both fun and educational, and great for the whole family. We will have a review of one of these games in a future article, but what I’ll say now is that this is the best screenless fun product I’ve used in quite a while.
Toniebox’s operate with Tonies, little figures that store games, music and stories. We have a few that we have been enjoying – again, a future article soon – but there are tons to choose from. The issue I have with these products – and it is the same issue I have with Yoto – is that the content is quite expensive. A single Tonie is going to run you about 26.99 CAD and each (generally) has a few stories and a few songs for kids. What I will say, though, that for younger kids, I think the appeal of little plastic toys that they can play with and put onto the device is really appealing. It’s brought me to the conclusion that while the product is great for a wide variety of ages – my eight year old is loving it! – that the Toniebox is best suited for younger children, for sure under 10.
As I used the Toniebox over the past few weeks, there is one thing I’m just not a huge fan of. You can purchase something called a Creative Tonie that allows you to upload your own audio to a figure and play it on the Toniebox. This is a really cool feature and allows our family members who don’t live nearby to create some audio books for us. There are limited to 90 minutes of content, though. While that’s a great feature, I do wish the Toniebox had bluetooth capabilities, so I could connect my Audible or Spotify to the device directly. I know this probably sidesteps the company’s mission of providing safe entertainment for kids (Bluetooth opens up a world of possibilities that cannot be controlled) but the inclusion of Bluetooth would make this device last long past when my child ages out of the toys and younger books.
That said, this is a device I can hand my child while cooking dinner and not have any worry in the world about what he might access or get into. Everything produced for the Toniebox is suitable for kids from ages 1 to whenever they age out of the product. It’s a fantastic design as well and really robust. I have very few concerns about this product breaking, and the soft sides make it nice to hold and carry. Interacting with the device is easy as well, a combination of knocking the sides to skip or go back, and pressing the “ears” for volume. There are also a variety of accessories you can purchase for wrapping the Toniebox, storing and carrying the device, and even places to store Tonies.
This is a well built product with a ton of upside for parents with young kids. The frustrations I have with the device are completely tied into the desire to make a safe space for kids, which I completely understand. If you are still on the fence, stay tuned for a few product reviews we have planned around specific games and Tonie figures!
Article By Adam
