---
title: "Roblox, Fortnite, Discord: Age Ratings and the Real Risks Parents Should Know"
date: 2026-04-14
description: "PEGI and ESRB say 'suitable for 7+' or '13+' — but what are the actual risks on Roblox, Fortnite and Discord in 2026, and which controls work?"
tags: ["Roblox", "Fortnite", "Discord", "age ratings", "PEGI", "ESRB", "gaming", "grooming", "parental controls"]
categories: ["safety"]
author: "Agiliton"
slug: "roblox-fortnite-discord-age-ratings-risks"
translationKey: "roblox-fortnite-discord-guide"
further_reading:
  - "is-tiktok-safe"
  - "parental-controls-2026"
  - "layers-of-protection"
---

"My child just wants to play Roblox with her friends. It's rated 7+. What's the fuss?" Every child safeguarding lead hears this sentence weekly, and the answer is that age ratings measure the wrong thing. PEGI and ESRB rate *the mechanics* — cartoon violence, in-game purchases, user-generated content. They do not rate **who your child is going to talk to** while they play. That is where the actual risk sits.

This guide covers the three platforms where most 8-14 year olds spend their social screen time: Roblox, Fortnite, and Discord. For each, we explain what the rating does and does not tell you, the real risks reported by safeguarding professionals in 2026, and the controls that actually work.

## Roblox — PEGI 7, ESRB E10+

**What the rating means:** The core Roblox platform meets a 7+ bar — no gore, no sexual content. This is honest about the engine. It is dishonest about the ecosystem.

**What's actually on there:** Roblox is a platform for user-generated games. At any moment there are millions of "experiences" made by users, some by studios, many by teenagers. Moderation is reactive: a game is live until enough reports take it down. Parents have repeatedly discovered so-called "condo games" (sex-themed), gambling simulators, and violent roleplay that pass the automated filter.

**The real risks (ranked):**

1. **Chat and DMs with strangers.** Every Roblox player can receive messages from others. Grooming via Roblox is the single most reported child-safeguarding case pattern of the last three years. UK's NSPCC and France's Point de Contact both publish annual figures showing Roblox as a top source of in-contact grooming referrals.
2. **Robux-driven scams.** "Free Robux" schemes target young children, harvest account credentials, then leverage those accounts for further scams.
3. **Exposure to unmoderated user content.** "Sleeper" condo games evade the filter for hours before being reported and removed.

**Controls that actually work:**
- Account settings → restrict chat to "Friends only" (not "Everyone")
- Parental PIN on the account to prevent settings changes
- Device-level time limits (iOS Screen Time / Family Link)
- **DNS-level blocking of Roblox domains if your child is under 10** — realistically, under-10s should not have unsupervised Roblox access. In the Agiliton VPN Child profile, gaming is a category you can block.

## Fortnite — PEGI 12, ESRB T (Teen)

**What the rating means:** Stylised gun violence, competitive pressure, live voice chat. PEGI 12 is broadly honest.

**What's actually on there:** Fortnite is more than a battle royale. The Creative mode and Epic's UEFN let any creator publish mini-games — many aimed directly at younger audiences, some used as bait for grooming contacts into Discord. The Item Shop and skin economy are engineered for compulsion; children report significant peer pressure to own specific skins.

**The real risks (ranked):**

1. **Voice chat with strangers.** Squad mode matches your child with adult strangers who can voice-chat. Muting is possible but not default.
2. **Spending.** V-Bucks transactions and the battle pass create recurring cost pressure. "I accidentally bought 13,000 V-Bucks" is a weekly support ticket for Epic.
3. **Bridging to Discord.** Groomers frequently use Fortnite as the first contact point, then pivot to Discord where messaging is less moderated.
4. **Time compulsion.** Fortnite's season cadence is designed to require daily logins.

**Controls that work:**
- Epic's parental controls: require PIN for purchases, disable voice with strangers, set weekly playtime reports
- Family Sharing in the Epic store to require approval for each purchase
- Device-level time limits
- No voice chat for under-13s — this is the single most effective lever

## Discord — 13+ (by TOS)

**What the rating means:** Discord's own terms require users to be 13+. There is no PEGI/ESRB rating because Discord is not a game. In practice, a large number of users are younger.

**What's actually on there:** Discord is a messaging platform. For tight friend groups it is excellent. For anyone you don't know, it is the modern equivalent of walking into a random chat room from 2003 — with voice, video, and file sharing. Public servers aimed at kids around games (Roblox, Minecraft, Fortnite) are routinely infiltrated by groomers; law enforcement in Germany, France and the UK all flag Discord as a primary platform in open investigations.

**The real risks (ranked):**

1. **Grooming via DMs.** "Safe Messaging" defaults were improved in 2024 but only apply if the account is registered as under 18 — and children routinely register as adults.
2. **Nudified / CSAM distribution.** Closed servers have been used for distribution; server owners are not liable for content unless reported.
3. **Financial scams.** Crypto and Robux scams targeting minors are common in public servers.
4. **Sextortion.** A fast-growing category. A predator persuades a minor to share an image, then threatens to distribute it unless money is paid. Discord, Instagram, and Snapchat are the three most-named platforms in 2025 sextortion cases.

**Controls that work:**
- Under 13: Discord is not for your child. Block at the DNS layer if they try to install it anyway (our Child profile does this by default).
- 13-15: A supervised account with friend requests disabled from non-friends, DMs restricted to server members only, and file upload warnings enabled. Have "you will show me what servers you're in, when I ask" as a household rule.
- 16+: Same conversation as TikTok — algorithmic manipulation, social engineering, why strangers are never really strangers.

## How DNS Filtering Helps Here

For younger children, device-level DNS filtering is the one control that doesn't depend on them having the correct age on their account, not having a second account, or not installing a different app. When `roblox.com`, `fortnite.com` or `discord.com` do not resolve, the app and the website both fail to load.

The Agiliton VPN Child profile blocks the **gaming** and **social media** categories by default, which covers all three of these platforms. Our curated blocklist — built from HaGeZi Multi, OISD, and a Cloudflare top-10k safety allowlist, trimmed to around 15-30k domains optimised for German traffic — adds the specific platform domains on top of the baseline ad/tracker filter.
