The Best Co-Parenting Apps for Shared Custody, Scheduling, and Safety

Co-parenting apps can help you with everything from coordinating complicated schedules to keeping your child safe online and offline, and communicating more effectively. These apps are useful for both parents living under the same roof who want help with logistics and divorced parents who need more effective ways to communicate about their child. 

The best co-parenting apps make your life easier and reduce stress. Here's our roundup of the five best co-parenting apps.

1. FamilyWall

Best for: Families who want to organize everything in one place.

Available on: iOS, Android

Why you'll love it: FamilyWall is the app that does it all. It helps you manage logistics, share to-do lists, plan meals, communicate with each other, and locate your child when they’re away from home. 

Highlights: 

• Collaborative to-do lists
• Joint task management
• Shared documents folder
• Color-coded family calendar
• Private family social network
• Real-time location tracking with geo-fencing alerts
• Family messaging system for group and individual chats
• Shared storage for photos, videos, and documents
• Meal planning, shared grocery lists, and shopping coordination
• Safe list feature for emergency contacts
• Kid accounts

2. Our Family Wizard

Best for: Shared custody situations

Available on: iOS, Android, web

Why you'll love it: Our Family Wizard is a co-parenting app that helps streamline communication, coordinate schedules, and manage shared expenses. It’s customizable, court-approved in all 50 states, and designed to help two-household families parent amicably. 

Highlights:

• AI-powered communication suggestions to help reduce conflict
• Shared parenting schedule with yes/no responses to time-trade requests
• Messaging system with timestamps, read receipts, and login history
• Audio and video calls with automatic documentation and required consent
• Shared expense management with customizable splits and receipt sharing
• In-app bank transfers
• Shared, secure document storage
• Court-admissible, tamper-proof record keeping and audit trail

3. BrightCanary

Best for: Families who want a monitoring solution that helps keep their child safe online

Available on: iOS

Why you'll love it: BrightCanary monitors everything your child types across all apps and sends you real-time alerts about anything concerning, along with additional insight into their online activity. Because the monitoring is done remotely, BrightCanary is perfect for co-parenting situations. You get full access, no matter which house your child and their device are at. Plus, the Family Viewing feature allows the subscription holder to share access with a co-parent or other caregiver.

Highlights:

• AI monitoring of everything your child types across all apps and websites 
• Real-time alerts when your child types something concerning
• Video and image monitoring on the Text Message Plus plan
• Customizable alert categories
• AI-powered summaries
• Access to full transcripts when you need more information
• Emotional insights informed by the American Psychological Association
• Shared access for two-household families
• 24/7 parenting advice with Ask The Canary

4. Life360

Best for: Location tracking and safety features for teen drivers 

Available on: iOS, Android

Why you'll love it: Unlike some of the other apps on our list that include a lot of bells and whistles, Life360 sticks to doing a few things really well. This app focuses on safety, with various ways to keep tabs on your child and built-in emergency support. 

Highlights:

• Location sharing including up to 30 days of location history
• Crash detection
• SOS alerts
• Automatic emergency dispatch for SOS alerts and crash detection
• No-show alerts if your child isn’t where they’re supposed to be
• Individual driver reports
• Alerts when their phone battery is low or dead

5. Jam

Best for: Families who want to take calendaring off their plate with AI automations

Available on: iOS, Android

Why you'll love it: Jam takes the work out of calendaring. You give it your school emails, extracurricular schedules, and birthday party invites and, through AI magic, it loads everything into your calendar. 

Highlights:

• Shared calendars that auto-populate from emails, invites, and schedules 
• Driver assignments for events and activities
• Parents can limit what kids and other caregivers can access and modify
• Shareable to-do lists
• Automated nudges for important events and action items
• Integration with Google and Apple calendars