Features

The target market for this phone is kids ages 8 to 12, although I recommend it more for the younger half of the group. 6 and 7-year-olds might be able to use it depending on the child.

We know how kids are reckless about making and receiving too many phone calls. Firefly lets parents control who they call. The phone comes with a PIN so parents can program the phone and kids can’t change it unless they figure out the PIN. The female button is typically the button for calling mom. The other one for calling dad. I programmed it so the female calls home and male calls Dad’s cell phone.

The address book only shows phone numbers for the people that the parents entered into the phone. The child also can’t view his phone number, so it’s possible to make it a one-way phone (calling out). I am comfortable with technology and I couldn’t figure out how to program it without reading the instructions and this is a rarity for me.

But it’s easy to do once you get it figured out… a little tedious as there are no numbers on the phone. But that keeps it very lightweight. Besides, once you’ve entered the acceptable phone numbers — you won’t need to deal with entering phone numbers again except to add someone new.

It might be a good phone for my 6.5-year-old because it would let him get in touch with us should anything happen. For my 11-year-old, I far prefer her sidekick since she can type to me (I’m hearing impaired) and besides — it’s better letting her get calls from friends on her own phone so she doesn’t take up our phone line.

This comes in multiple colors. I read some kid reviews who said it was an ugly phone. I think the male / female icons should be something else. But it’s a simple phone — how can it be ugly? When I was in the paging business, jellybean pagers (similar to the Firefly phone — oval, different colors) were a hit with kids. So I can’t imagine the issues with the looks.

It also has a useless, but cute and fun feature where you push a button and it does fireworks — the phone lights up, makes music, and shows a cartoon in the screen. It will probably get old fast even though there are about five different choices. You can also program the keys to have different colors in the screen. Kids like that stuff.

All in all… it’s a good starter for the younger set. Nothing fancy. Give it about 3 to 3.5 out of 5 stars.

Price: USD$99.00

Colors: USD$12.99 except white glow-in-the-dark is $9.99 (bubblegum pink green limeade clear x-ray white glow-in-the-dark skin)