Clarification and Feature Request: Family Safety Screen Time During Lock, Sleep, and Hibernate

Question

Clarification and Feature Request: Family Safety Screen Time During Lock, Sleep, and Hibernate

Richard Tai 20

I am using Microsoft Family Safety to manage device screen time for my child and would appreciate clarification regarding how screen time is counted when a Windows PC is not actively being used.

I have reviewed the available Family Safety documentation and found statements indicating that screen time continues while a user remains signed in. However, I have not been able to find clear official documentation explaining how screen time is handled when the device is:

Locked (Win + L)
In Sleep mode
In Hibernate mode

Could Microsoft clarify whether each of these states continues to consume a child's daily screen-time allowance?

In addition, I would like to submit a feature request for consideration:

Proposed behavior

Screen-time counting should automatically pause when the device is locked, sleeping, or hibernating.
Screen-time counting should resume only when the user unlocks or actively resumes the session.

Rationale Many users choose Lock, Sleep, or Hibernate specifically to preserve their working state, including:

Open documents
Browser tabs
Running applications
Unsaved work in progress

Requiring users to sign out in order to stop the timer forces them to sacrifice session continuity, which undermines one of the major benefits of modern operating systems.

From a practical family-use perspective, a child taking a break, having a meal, attending a class, or listening to background music should not necessarily lose screen-time allowance while the device is locked or suspended. Pausing the timer in these inactive states would more closely reflect actual screen usage and encourage healthier digital habits.

If the current behavior is intentional, it would be very helpful if the official documentation explicitly described how screen time is counted for Locked, Sleep, and Hibernate states.

Thank you for your consideration.

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Answer 1

Hey there, Richard Tai

Have you submitted feedback to the Microsoft Family Safety team?

To submit feedback to the Microsoft Family Safety team, please sign into your account here: https://account.microsoft.com/family/home

Once you have signed into your account, please click onto "Feedback" at the bottom of the page

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You can then complete the feedback form to submit feedback directly to that product group.

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The team can then look at your feedback and take it onboard. When submitting feedback, I generally tick the box that says "You can contact me about this feedback". This allows the team to contact you if they have anymore questions.

In terms with how the timer counts down. I want to say, from past experience, it counts down regardless if you have locked the PC or not. This is because the PC still counts it as an 'Active' session, even if it is Idle. It would be just like you walking away from the PC without locking it.

With regards to sleeping and hibernating your PC. I suspect it would count this as an inactive session due to the PC having to put it's self in a low powered state. So I suspect this wouldn't count. However, to be sure, I would have to ask about this. However, in order to ask, I would need to dig out the email address I used last time to contact that product group providing I still have it.

Hope this helps,
Nathan