What parents ask us before buying.

No – Komy speaks German, and so do the stories, the encyclopedia, the learning games and the parents’ app. The KOMY Phone is made for children who go to school in Germany or Austria and live their day in German. Contract language, terms and support are German as well; we are happy to answer e-mails in English.

The KOMY Phone is meant for children aged about 5 to 12. The morning routine, the timetable, the learning games and Komy’s stories are tailored to these years; younger siblings like to listen in, older children usually want more phone than the KOMY Phone allows.

No, the KOMY Phone does not make calls. There is no messenger either. From the parents’ app you send short messages such as “Come home” or “I’m on my way”; Komy tells your child, and you see that they have arrived. “Where are you?” quietly fetches the location; your child hears nothing of it. There is also Sprechfunk, like a walkie-talkie: hold a button, speak, let go, then it is the other person’s turn. Sealed with your family’s key, deleted after listening, no history. Only your parents’ phones can ring; your child cannot call anyone. After an SOS, too, your child can send one short voice message, and you can answer once – 15 seconds at most each, deleted after listening. Strangers cannot reach the child.

No. There is no browser, no app store, no WhatsApp, YouTube or TikTok, no advertising and no purchases – and this cannot be bypassed by restarting or through the settings. Anyone who resets the phone with the button combination erases everything on it. That is intentional: a children’s phone should keep a child reachable and bring a friend along, not open the door to the whole internet.

Yes – the KOMY Phone holds a whole children’s encyclopedia that works without the internet: 5,107 articles in German from the Klexikon and the MiniKlexikon, in twelve fields of knowledge, with a search that forgives typos. It is not a chatbot that makes up answers but a checked encyclopedia edited by adults; beginning readers get the simpler MiniKlexikon texts once you switch the encyclopedia on for them. Sensitive topics – war and violence, death, body and sexuality, addiction, crime – stay invisible until you switch them on in the parents’ app, and what your child looks up is not recorded. Content from the Klexikon and MiniKlexikon of the Zentrale für Unterrichtsmedien (ZUM), licence CC BY-SA; the Klexikon is an independent project, Sysea is not affiliated with ZUM.

Yes. Under “So passt es mir” (“This suits me”) your child sets up the phone themselves: larger type, more contrast, colours that stay easy to tell apart with red-green colour blindness, reading along – everything Komy says then also appears as text –, vibration and flashing in addition to sound, and “less at once”. If wanted, the phone reads everything aloud. A hearing aid or a switch can be paired over Bluetooth; the parents approve that in their app.

Komy is a companion, not a chatbot: no language model runs on the phone. Komy’s voice is synthetic; what Komy says was written in advance, checked by a human and stored on the phone as audio. What your child tells Komy is not recorded and not uploaded. Komy never gives the solution first, does not grade and does not quiz – he is the friend who needs your child’s help.

In the first year the KOMY Phone with data SIM costs €259 with the Samsung Galaxy A17 5G (€199 once for the phone plus €60 for one year of the KOMY service) or €219 with the Blackview Wave 7C (€159 plus €60); on the family rate with the Wave 7C it is €209 (€149 plus €60). Paid monthly it is €199 or €159 plus €5.99 a month. From the second year only €60 a year is due, or €49 with your own data SIM. Shipping to Germany and Austria is included.

No, you do not need a mobile contract. A data SIM is already in the device and included in the KOMY service; the service has no minimum term and can be cancelled monthly. If you prefer to use your own data SIM, the service costs €4.99 a month or €49 a year.

The included data SIM (1NCE) technically always runs as a roaming card, in Germany too. So “data roaming” must be switched on on the KOMY Phone – we do that before shipping, and with the data plan in the KOMY service it costs nothing. If it is ever off, the KOMY Phone has internet on Wi-Fi but not on the go. The parents’ app then shows “Mobile Daten unterwegs: aus” (mobile data on the go: off) with the steps on the KOMY Phone’s page as soon as the phone is on Wi-Fi. On the KOMY Phone: tap the clock six times → your Komy code → Einstellungen (settings) → at the very bottom “Geräteverwaltung (Eltern)” → “Mobilfunk / SIM” → switch roaming on and confirm “Daten-Roaming zulassen?” with OK. With your own SIM: a German SIM usually needs no roaming in Germany. For a trip abroad, enter the period in the timetable under “Ferien” (holidays) as “Im Ausland” (abroad) – otherwise the KOMY Phone blocks roaming for this SIM – and switch roaming on as above. What it costs depends on your tariff.

You choose between two Android phones with the same KOMY software: the Samsung Galaxy A17 5G (SM-A176B/DS, 6.7-inch display, 5,000 mAh battery) for €199 and the Blackview Wave 7C (6.56-inch display, 5,000 mAh battery) for €159. The Samsung is sturdier (drop class B instead of C) and comes with six years of security updates promised by Samsung; the Blackview costs less. We set it up completely before shipping and lock it down so that only Komy’s world runs on it – unpack, pair with the parents’ app, done.

Both run the same KOMY software with Komy, the encyclopedia, learning games, Sprechfunk and SOS. The differences, from the EU energy label and our tests: Samsung Galaxy A17 5G for €199 – drop class B, repairability class C, 1,200 charging cycles, almost 44 hours of battery life per charge, six Android upgrades and six years of security updates promised by Samsung, 5G. When your child outgrows it, you release it and it is a normal Android smartphone. Blackview Wave 7C for €159, €149 on the family rate – drop class C (a protective case is included), repairability class B, 800 charging cycles, almost 48 hours of battery life per charge, at least six years of software updates according to the manufacturer, 12 months manufacturer guarantee, 4G. The processor is simpler (Unisoc T310, 4 GB RAM); Komy runs smoothly on it in our test, and 4G is plenty for Komy’s world. To be honest: the Wave 7C is new for us. Pairing, Sprechfunk, knocking, SOS with a voice message and the parents’ messages we have tested on the device; the release to a normal Android phone not yet.

In about 20 minutes and eleven steps: install the parents’ app, pair the phones by code, set the Komy code and the child code, Wi-Fi, name and reading level, safe places, timetable, alarm clock, first chores, the encyclopedia topics and the choice of games. Every step is shown with a screenshot in the user manual (German), which is also available as a PDF to print.

Yes, with limitations: the parents’ app is currently available for Android only; all features are there. With an iPhone you set up the KOMY Phone directly on the device, in parent mode behind your Komy code – that works today. Location, messages, chores and the SOS alert currently only arrive on an Android phone or tablet, and the KOMY Phone can only be released from the parents’ app as well. A parents’ page in the browser is planned but not yet in the works; a dedicated iPhone app is planned, with no date yet.

You release the phone in the parents’ app: on the KOMY Phone’s page under “Sicherheit” (safety) → “Gerät freigeben” (release device), confirmed by typing the word FREIGEBEN. For now this only works with the parents’ app, so with an Android device. After that it is a perfectly normal Android phone: all apps, normal home screen, no locks – the device belongs to you, not to us. On release, what your child did with Komy is deleted from the phone; the backup on your parent phone stays, you cancel the KOMY service separately, and the step cannot be undone on the phone. Samsung promises six Android upgrades and six years of security updates for the Galaxy A17 5G; for the Blackview Wave 7C the manufacturer states at least six years of software updates in the EU product database EPREL. So far we only promise the release to a normal Android phone for the Galaxy A17 5G; it has not yet been tested on the Blackview Wave 7C.

Family Link and parental control apps restrict a normal smartphone after the fact – browser, store and accounts remain and can be bypassed with time and patience. On the KOMY Phone there is nothing to filter: no browser, no store, no messengers and no account your child would have to create or maintain on the internet; you have nothing to manage. Instead it brings Komy, a friend who accompanies the day – and when your child outgrows it, you release the device and it becomes a normal smartphone.

The parents’ app shows you that your child is fine: the chore is done, reading time happened today, the child has arrived at school, the battery is full. It does not show what your child tells Komy, and no trail of the day – you see the current place and learn when a safe place is reached or left.

What your child does with Komy – memory book, stories, game progress – is stored encrypted on the child’s phone; there is no cloud account for the child, and the only copy is an encrypted backup on your parent phone. What leaves the phone: the location (to your parents’ app, via Google Firebase in the EU region), by the same route the battery level, the status of chores, the “So passt es mir” settings and alerts to you (SOS, safe places, an almost empty battery); now and then a single word to our own server in Germany – a first name or a school subject that Komy does not know yet – so that it can be voiced once; the weather request with the place you chose and – only if you have set Komy time – how many minutes of it have been used today; if you have set a reading time, one word for today (open, started, done). Your child’s voice leaves the phone only in walkie-talkie and SOS messages that your child records itself: sealed with your family’s key, deleted after listening. Everything else Komy hears stays on the device. All services involved are named in the privacy policy of the KOMY service.

Yes, with Komy time. For each child you set how long they can play, work in My Notebook (Mein Heft) and call Komy each day – separately for school days and days off, each Off, 30, 45, 60, 90 or 120 minutes; both start out Off. Your child sees no clock and no number: Komy gives a friendly heads-up about five minutes before, and afterwards your child may still finish what they are doing. What never counts and always stays: SOS, the encyclopedia, My Plan, alarm clock, chores, routines, knocking, walkie-talkie, reading aloud to Komy and Komy’s stories – and during school time nothing counts at all. During homework time set with “Erst erledigen”, My Notebook does not count either. In the parents’ app you see how many minutes have been used today and can add more on the spot with “+15 min today” or “+30 min today”. Komy time is never a reward or a punishment and does not depend on stars or chores.

It invites reading – we promise nothing more. Your child reads to Komy from their own book (“Komy vorlesen”), and Komy listens. With reading time you set a fixed time per child each day, between 3 and 7 pm, 10 to 25 minutes; then Komy invites once: “Es ist Lesezeit. Liest du mir aus deinem Buch vor?” – never during lessons, not at night, never as a reproach. In “Komy erzählt” the text runs along and the sentence Komy is speaking is highlighted in yellow, so your child can read along. Nothing listens for this, and nothing goes online. You only see one word for today: started or done – no minutes, no titles, no mistakes. Reading aloud and Komy’s stories never count towards Komy time. Many primary schools have a “Leseband”, a fixed daily reading time in lessons. The KOMY Phone does not replace it; it complements it at home.

That is what school mode is for: during lessons the phone goes quiet by itself – it shows only the clock, the current lesson and Komy, waiting; games and reading pause. Only the children’s encyclopedia, My Plan and the SOS button stay open. Whether a phone is allowed in the school bag is up to each school – best to ask briefly. For the conversation with the school there is a page and a printable sheet (in German): komyphone.de/schule.

You lock the phone from the parents’ app: it then shows only a neutral screen, Komy’s data is sealed. If it turns up again, you unlock it; if it does not come back, Komy’s memory stays backed up, encrypted, on your phone. Restoring it onto a new KOMY Phone is something we are still building.

We deliver to Germany and Austria, shipping is included in the price. As a consumer you can withdraw from the order within 14 days of receipt without giving reasons; the phone goes back, you get the purchase price refunded.

The KOMY service ends at the end of the current billing period, the phone remains your property. Without the service, the data SIM, the parents’ messages, safe places and updates end; what works offline – Komy’s voice, the stories, the learning games, the morning routine – stays on the phone. You can cancel at any time via the cancellation button on this site.