We love Yoto!
Wonderful audiobooks for kids. Our toddler loves his Yoto player.
Generally good
Generally good player. The track selection isn’t as inuitive as it might be (to my mind the knob turns the wrong way), but does prevent accidental movement between tracks, as you need to quite quickly press when you have selected the right track. My two-year old can’t operate it, other than putting the cards in and out.
Would be good to have a sleep setting, to play for set period and then switch off automatically.
The remote control by app is fine if you are in the room, but otherwise doesn’t give sufficient feedback - it doesn’t tell you what is playing or whether your instruction to play or stop has been received and actioned. Maybe there’s a technical issue with sending data from the player to the app? Seems to be one way only.
Some small improvements could make this much better.
Would be good to have a sleep setting, to play for set period and then switch off automatically.
The remote control by app is fine if you are in the room, but otherwise doesn’t give sufficient feedback - it doesn’t tell you what is playing or whether your instruction to play or stop has been received and actioned. Maybe there’s a technical issue with sending data from the player to the app? Seems to be one way only.
Some small improvements could make this much better.
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Response from developer
Edit: We've just released better visibility of what is happening on your Player in the app to the App Store. Coming next is the sleep timer. Thanks for the feedback, all very useful stuff. The button twist one is tricky, and people tend to fall fairly evenly into clockwise and anti-clockwise camps! But we definitely take this on board. Oh, and for smaller ones, just pressing the button might be a better way for them to navigate tracks, especially since their cards will tend to have fewer chapters. You might be glad to hear we are working on a sleep timer setting, to be able to do exactly as you suggest, as well as an alarm setting to go the other way (start audio at a certain time). And regarding app to Player control, you are spot on, there is currently a technical limitation whereby the app and Player do not know what each other is doing, so commands are one way. We are also working on that so we can dramatically improve the UX around all that functionality.
Just awful
App is useless. I can’t even get it set up. In order to connect to Yoto I need to enter settings. When I come back in the app is frozen. I’ve spent far too long trying to get it connected, started from the beginning multiple times and it’s still not working. I think the most fun I’m likely to get from this very expensive toy is throwing it at a wall
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Fantastic product for younger children
Beautifully designed (Apple little design and build quality !) product which reduces screen time for kids and gives them access to a large and growing library of books, music, nursery rhymes, radio and more. Would definitely recommend this especially as a gift.
Blown away
We have been floored by the amount of intention that has gone into this App and its corresponding product. I wish I could gift one of these speakers to every child in the world right now. It has the feel of an “unplugged” analog technology while having the ease and access of the internet and the freedom it provides.
I love that my 3 year old daughter gets to practice her own autonomy and test our her own likes and dislikes with all of the safe, kid- friendly content available to her.
I love that I could easily upload the CDs from her read-along books so that she can read as many as she wants during her quiet time.
I love the exposure to international content through podcasts that are intriguing to her and bring up wonderful questions about the world.
I love that her aunts, uncles, and grandparents that she is unable to see right now can easily upload a recording of themselves reading her favorite books or curate a playlist of songs for her.
I love that there isn’t a screen to pull her attention out of her own creativity.
The app certainly has a few kinks, but honestly for how new and complex the product is I think they have pulled it off remarkably well. In the two months that we have had it, every time I think “I wish they would change____”, within a few days or weeks there is an update that addresses it. They are constantly trying to add more content and improve the user experience so I have no doubt things can only improve from here.
Thank you so much for this meaningful product, this is by far my favorite thing we have ever received for our kids!
I love that my 3 year old daughter gets to practice her own autonomy and test our her own likes and dislikes with all of the safe, kid- friendly content available to her.
I love that I could easily upload the CDs from her read-along books so that she can read as many as she wants during her quiet time.
I love the exposure to international content through podcasts that are intriguing to her and bring up wonderful questions about the world.
I love that her aunts, uncles, and grandparents that she is unable to see right now can easily upload a recording of themselves reading her favorite books or curate a playlist of songs for her.
I love that there isn’t a screen to pull her attention out of her own creativity.
The app certainly has a few kinks, but honestly for how new and complex the product is I think they have pulled it off remarkably well. In the two months that we have had it, every time I think “I wish they would change____”, within a few days or weeks there is an update that addresses it. They are constantly trying to add more content and improve the user experience so I have no doubt things can only improve from here.
Thank you so much for this meaningful product, this is by far my favorite thing we have ever received for our kids!
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Politely Innovative for a Tech-lead World!
We absolutely love our Yoto. Since making our purchase, we have submitted feedback for various ideas and things we would like to see as part of an update to both the app and the player in the future; customer service teams on all platforms are a delight to chat to, are polite and informative and seemed to genuinely appreciate customers getting on board to submit ideas! Our child loves the Yoto and I personally enjoy tinkering around with its different options and set ups, Make Your Own card and streamlining functionalities. I am fascinated by this politely innovation product the slots right in amongst our Montessori environment. Keep up the great work guys!
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Love the product, app almost perfect!
Hi! We ADORE our yoto. It gets 2+ hr of use a day. The app is a bit confusing to navigate at first and making your own cards is a little tough to figure out. (I wish the help prompts could pop up in the app rather than switching me to safari.) The settings for the player are iffy—I can get my nightlight to turn red but not purple...no clue what’s up with that!
However overall this product gets my recommendation to friends! There’s nothing else like it.
However overall this product gets my recommendation to friends! There’s nothing else like it.
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Love the Yoto, really dislike the app
Update: Switched from 3 to 5 stars, voluntarily, after receiving an incredibly thoughtful response from the developer. This response, in conjunction with the features section of the app, makes it clear that despite current issues, that they’re fully dedicated to creating a better user experience. They’re clearly listening to their users, and that makes all the difference. Thank you!
I am a user experience designer by trade, and this app has caused my undue frustration. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely would buy the Yoto again and again (my 3 year old is OBSESSED), but the app... oof. Where do I start?
- It is incredibly slow. The cards take forever to load, settings take forever to load.
- Stopping media from playing via the app is such a weird process. The icon is a square (stop) no matter what, so if you’re not actually hearing the Yoto, you have no idea if it actually stopped. You don’t even know if it’s playing. Just, why?
- Forget about lowering the volume via the app, even moving it a centimeter will lower it drastically. Whenever I try and lower the volume, literally moving it a hair, it lowers it so much that my toddler walks over to his Yoto and raises it right back up to full volume. You can’t even gaslight him into a lower volume. It’s so obvious that you’ve changed it.
- You can’t change a chapter via app, to my knowledge.
- Settings don’t load. Ever.
I think this generally captures it. I’m not sure how the Yoto can be so well designed, and the app an afterthought. Argh.
I am a user experience designer by trade, and this app has caused my undue frustration. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely would buy the Yoto again and again (my 3 year old is OBSESSED), but the app... oof. Where do I start?
- It is incredibly slow. The cards take forever to load, settings take forever to load.
- Stopping media from playing via the app is such a weird process. The icon is a square (stop) no matter what, so if you’re not actually hearing the Yoto, you have no idea if it actually stopped. You don’t even know if it’s playing. Just, why?
- Forget about lowering the volume via the app, even moving it a centimeter will lower it drastically. Whenever I try and lower the volume, literally moving it a hair, it lowers it so much that my toddler walks over to his Yoto and raises it right back up to full volume. You can’t even gaslight him into a lower volume. It’s so obvious that you’ve changed it.
- You can’t change a chapter via app, to my knowledge.
- Settings don’t load. Ever.
I think this generally captures it. I’m not sure how the Yoto can be so well designed, and the app an afterthought. Argh.
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Great app, content and speaker
Lots of great content (stories, radio stations, music etc) in the app and easy to use. Useful to be able to play direct from my phone/iPad as well as the Yoto speaker.
The speaker and cards are really good, with a variety of cards/content available from the website. Also seems easy to add content to make your own cards.
The speaker and cards are really good, with a variety of cards/content available from the website. Also seems easy to add content to make your own cards.
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Great alternative to Alexa
Fun little app—higher quality material than the random stuff have found on Alexa, including clever games, jokes/riddles that appeal to a 7 year old—looking forward to exploring more.
