While our filtering and categorization options are meant to fit your family’s specific needs, you may still find that your kids can either access a site that you’d prefer was filtered or cannot not access a site you'd like to allow. Custom Website Filters (or Custom Filters) allow you to control filter settings on a site-by-site basis (e.g., google.com).
How do Custom Filters work?
Custom Filters work a little differently than our standard categories, apps, or websites. Custom Filters allow you to bypass other Filter settings. Circle has 3 types of Custom Filters:
- Allowed: Makes a site accessible for profiles except during Focus Time, Bedtime, Pause, and after a Time Limit has been reached.
- Not Allowed: Ensures a particular website is not accessible.
- Unmanaged: Allows access to a particular website for an individual profile, even during Focus Time, Bedtime, Pause, and after a Time Limit has been reached. Keep in mind that Unmanaged websites are not tracked under Usage and don’t count towards Time Limits. Learn more about the Unmanaged filter setting.
Accessing and managing Custom Website Filters
From the Home Screen, select the profile for which you'd like to set Custom Filters.
- Select Filter from the profile settings of a particular family member.
- Tap the Custom Sites view of the filter settings screen (see screenshot below).
- Tap the Add a Custom Website button and enter the web address that you want to set as a Custom Filter and tap Done.
- If there is a pre-made filter that includes the site you are trying to add you will be prompted to use the filter instead.
- Click No, add custom website to continue with creating a custom filter, or click OK and you will be taken to the filter suggested.
- Your new filter will show with Allowed next to it by default. Tap this to toggle through the options: Allowed, Not Allowed, and Unmanaged.
How do I ensure my kid can access a particular website?
- On the Filter settings screen, tap the Custom Sites view.
- Tap Add a Custom Website and enter the web address (URL) of the site you’d like to allow.
- Tap Done.
- Make sure that the button beside the website says Allowed. If not, tap it until it does.
- Tap Save to confirm the change.
- The family member will now be able to access the site.
How do I filter out a website?
- On the Filter settings screen, tap the Custom Sites view.
- Tap Add a Custom Website and enter the web address (URL) of the site you’d like to block.
- Tap Done.
- Tap the button next to the URL to change it to Not Allowed.
- Tap Save to confirm the change.
- The family member will no longer be able to access the site.
How do I make sure a site is not managed at all by Circle?
- On the Filter settings screen, tap the Custom Sites view.
- Tap Add a Custom Website and enter the web address (URL) of the site you’d like to allow.
- Tap Done.
- Tap the button next to the URL to change it to Unmanaged.
- Tap Save to confirm the change.
- The site will always be accessible to the family member, and activity will not be managed by Circle's other features, like Pause, Focus Time, Bedtime, or Time Limits.
How do I remove a site from Custom Filters?
- On the Filter settings screen, tap the Custom Sites view.
- Swipe left on each website you would like to remove from the Custom Filters, then tap Delete.
- Tap Save to confirm the change.
Managing Custom Filters from Usage and History
The Usage and History sections allow you to add websites to each family member’s Custom Filters. From there, you can filter out sites that had previously been Allowed, or you can Allow sites that had been filtered out. For a photo guide on how to accomplish all of the suggestions below, feel free to reference this article: Managing or Filtering an App Like Discord with Circle.
Adding a Custom Filter from Usage
Select Usage from a family member's profile, and tap any website listed on the Usage summary screen. Select Set as Allowed, Set as Not Allowed, or Set as Unmanaged. This will add the website to the Custom Filter list with the setting you choose.
Adding a Custom Filter from History
Select History from a family member's profile, and tap any website you would like to add to Custom Filters. Select Set as Allowed, Set as Not Allowed, or Set as Unmanaged. This will add the website to the Custom Filter list.
Adding a Custom Filter from the History of Filtered sites
Select History from the family member's profile, and tap Filtered from the options at the top of the History screen. Tap any website you would like to filter, and select Set as Allowed, Set as Not Allowed, or Set as Unmanaged. This will add the website to the Custom Filter list for that family member.
📒 Custom Filter Limitations
- Individual IP address (e.g., 192.168.0.1) filtering is not supported. Circle's Custom Filter settings only support domain addresses, like google.com or facebook.com. IP address filtering is not supported at this time.
- Additionally, using wildcards like an asterisk ("*") to capture multiple subdomains at once (e.g., using *.google.com to manage all Google subdomains) is not supported.
- Do not include "www.", "https://" or "http://" at the front of your custom filter websites (e.g. www.google.com will not be accepted but google.com will).
- Sub-domains will be included when you set up a Custom Filter. For example: if you set mit.edu as "Unmanaged" scratch.mit.edu or projects.mit.edu will also be unmanaged.