<img src="web/static/brg-logo.png" alt="BrainRotGuard" width="300"> YouTube approval system for kids. Your child searches for videos on a tablet. You approve or deny from your phone via Telegram.

What Is This?
Features
Quick Start
What You'll Need
Documentation
License

What Is This?

BrainRotGuard puts you in control of what your kids watch on YouTube — without standing over their shoulder.

Your child gets a simple web page on their tablet where they can search YouTube and request videos. Every request sends you a Telegram message with the video thumbnail, title, channel, and duration. You tap Approve or Deny right in the chat. If approved, the video starts playing on their tablet automatically.

No YouTube account needed. No ads. No algorithmic rabbit holes. No "up next" autoplay.

How It Works

Kid's Tablet ----> BrainRotGuard Server ----> Router ----> Telegram Cloud ----> Parent's Phone
                                                |
                                          DNS (AdGuard/Pi-hole)
                                          X  youtube.com (blocked)
                                          OK youtube-nocookie.com (allowed)

Kid opens BrainRotGuard on their tablet and searches for a video
They tap Request on the one they want to watch
You get a Telegram notification with all the details
You tap Approve or Deny
Their screen updates automatically — approved videos play right away

Screenshots

Works on any screen size — desktop, tablet, and phone:

Demo

Kid searches, requests a video, parent approves via Telegram, video plays:

https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/e36eeb48-bb28-4edd-8d8e-10d2fd30d002

Why I Built This

<details> <summary>The short version: YouTube's algorithm was winning, and every parental control was either too strict or too loose.</summary>

I'm a father of a preteen son. I didn't want to block YouTube completely — YouTube is genuinely how I learn things myself, and I wanted my son to have that same ability to research topics, explore educational content, and develop the problem-solving habit of "let me figure this out." That's a skill I want him to have.

The problem was his feed. It was overrun with gamers screaming into microphones and brainrot content. I'd tell him to change the channel every time I walked by and heard one of those obnoxious gaming videos. He'd switch, but YouTube's algorithm would pull him right back within minutes. The algorithm is designed to keep kids glued — and it's very good at its job.

Every parental control I tried was either too restrictive (block YouTube entirely) or too permissive (YouTube Kids still recommends garbage). I needed the middle ground: let him explore and search freely, but give me the final say on what actually plays.

I'm not a developer — just a dad who wanted to protect his kid from YouTube's brainrot algorithms. I am a homelab enthusiast though, so I'm comfortable tinkering with self-hosted tools. I built this entirely with Claude (Anthropic's AI) — I described what I wanted, Claude wrote the code. Every release went through security reviews and code reviews via Claude before I pushed it.

BrainRotGuard removes the algorithm entirely. There's no autoplay, no "up next" sidebar, no recommendation engine pulling him deeper. He searches for what he wants, I approve or deny, and the video plays and stops. Done. No rabbit holes.

Don't want them watching gaming content? Block those channels. Tired of a specific creator? One tap. You can allow the channels you trust (educational, science, building, nature) and block the ones you don't — and it sticks. He picks what to ask for, I have the final say.

Now I curate his content and I can see the difference. He's not parroting gamer lingo back at me anymore. The stuff he watches is actually interesting — things he's curious about, things he's learning from. I pair this with Google Family Link on his device for general screen time, but BrainRotGuard is what controls YouTube specifically: daily time limits, scheduled access windows, and per-channel approval. Family Link says "the tablet turns off at 8pm." BrainRotGuard says "you can watch 2 hours of entertainment YouTube today, but educational content is unlimited — and only from channels I've approved."

</details>

Features

For Kids

Works on any device — it's just a web page. Android tablet, iPad, laptop, phone, Kindle Fire — if it has a browser, it works
Simple search — type what you want, see results, tap Request
Instant playback — approved videos play immediately, no waiting
Video library — browse everything that's been approved before
Category browsing — filter by educational or entertainment content with one tap
Channel browsing — see latest videos from pre-approved channels without needing to request each one
YouTube Shorts — dedicated Shorts row with portrait thumbnails and a 9:16 player
Thumbnail previews — hover or scroll to cycle through multiple thumbnails before requesting
Dark theme — easy on the eyes, designed for tablets

For Parents

Telegram approval — approve/deny from anywhere with one tap
Channel allow/block lists — trust a channel once, and new videos from it are auto-approved
Multi-child profiles — separate PINs, watch history, and time budgets per child
Edu/Fun categories — label channels and videos as educational or entertainment, each with its own daily time limit
Daily screen time limits — set separate limits for educational and entertainment content, or a single global limit
Scheduled hours — define when watching is allowed (e.g., 8am–7pm, not during school)
Per-day schedules — different time windows and limits for each day of the week (e.g., relaxed weekends, tighter school days)
Guided setup wizard — /time setup walks through limit mode and schedule configuration with inline buttons
Bonus time — grant extra minutes for today only (/time add 30)
Shorts control — toggle YouTube Shorts visibility across the entire app
Watch activity log — see what was watched, for how long, grouped by category
Localized UI and bot — English and Norwegian support, with locale-aware or forced 12h/24h time display
Word filters — block videos whose titles contain specific words
Search history — see everything your child has searched for
Starter channels — curated list of kid-friendly channels (edu + fun) to import on first boot
Update notifications — automatic Telegram alert when a new version is available on GitHub
PIN lock — optional PIN gate so only your kid can access the web UI on the right device

Privacy & Security

100% self-hosted — runs entirely on your own hardware inside your home network. No cloud service, no third-party accounts, no subscriptions
No YouTube account required — no sign-in, no tracking, no personalized ads
No API key needed — uses yt-dlp for search and metadata
Privacy-respecting embeds — videos play via youtube-nocookie.com (Google's reduced-tracking embed domain)
Single-file database — all data is one SQLite file on your machine. Nothing phones home.
Container runs as non-root — Docker security best practice

Quick Start

Prerequisites: Docker, a Telegram bot token, and your chat ID. New to this? The full setup guide walks through everything step by step.

git clone https://github.com/GHJJ123/brainrotguard.git
cd brainrotguard
cp .env.example .env
cp config.example.yaml config.yaml
# Edit .env with your bot token and chat ID
docker compose up -d

Open http://<your-server-ip>:8080 on the kid's tablet.

Pre-built image (no build step, supports amd64 + arm64):

docker pull ghcr.io/ghjj123/brainrotguard:latest

See the full setup guide for compose file details.

Unraid: Search for BrainRotGuard in Community Applications, or download the template manually:

wget -O /boot/config/plugins/dockerMan/templates-user/my-brainrotguard.xml \
  https://raw.githubusercontent.com/GHJJ123/brainrotguard/main/unraid-template.xml

See the full Unraid setup guide for details.

Important: You'll also want to block YouTube at the DNS level on the kid's devices — otherwise they can just open youtube.com directly.

What You'll Need

| Requirement | What It Is | |-------------|-----------| | A computer that stays on | Raspberry Pi, old laptop, or home server — anything running Docker | | Docker | Install Docker | | Telegram account | The messaging app where you'll receive approval requests | | Telegram bot token | Created in 5 minutes via @BotFather | | DNS-level blocking | AdGuard Home, Pi-hole, or router-level blocking |

Why Telegram? It was the easiest way to build instant notifications with approve/deny buttons that work from your phone. No custom app to develop, no push notification infrastructure to maintain — Telegram handles all of that.

Network note: BrainRotGuard runs on your home networ

Brainrotguard

Install / Use

README

Contents