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Pick a country’s rating and a child’s age, and see whether a title is likely suitable, what the equivalent rating is elsewhere, and which content descriptors to check for.
Choose the rating system you are looking at, pick the certificate, then set the child’s age. The verdict, the cross-country equivalents and the descriptor list update as you go.
Nothing is stored and nothing is sent anywhere. The slider covers ages 2 to 18; for anyone older, the rating stops being the useful question.
A rating is a floor, not a ceiling: it tells you the youngest age the certificate was designed around, and nothing more. Two films with identical ratings can be very different experiences, so check the descriptors and a parent-facing review before you commit an evening.
Every rating system in the world is doing the same job with different vocabulary. It names the youngest age the certificate was designed around, and it asks a parent to fill in the rest. That second half is the part people skip. A PG-13 in America, a 12A in Britain and a U/A 13+ in India are broadly aimed at the same territory, but not one of them promises that a thirteen-year-old will be comfortable with what is on screen. The certificate sets a floor. It has never been a ceiling, and it has never claimed to be one.
This tool starts from that position deliberately. It tells you whether a title carrying a given certificate is likely to suit a child of the age you enter, and it answers conservatively: when a child sits just under the band, it says borderline rather than yes. That is not hedging for its own sake. Ratings are assigned by committees working to content thresholds, then stamped onto a whole film with a single letter, and the distance between the mildest and the harshest title sharing that letter is enormous.
Why does an identical film walk away with a PG-13, a 12A and a U/A 13+? Because the three systems are answering slightly different questions. The MPAA is a voluntary American industry body, funded by the studios whose films it rates, and its categories describe who should be admitted and whether a parent ought to come along. The BBFC is an independent UK regulator with statutory backing, and its 12A means a child under twelve is admitted to a cinema only with an adult, which is why the same content can be a 12 on disc and streaming and a 12A in the cinema.
India’s CBFC works differently again. Its U/A categories, including the newer U/A 7+, U/A 13+ and U/A 16+ bands, sit alongside an A certificate that bars anyone under eighteen outright, and its cuts are mandatory rather than advisory. Add regional sensitivities, release-version differences and distributors who re-edit for a territory, and comparing ratings across countries becomes a rough guide to tone rather than a precise conversion. The equivalents this tool shows are exactly that: a rough guide, useful for orientation, not a substitute for the local certificate.
The letter is a summary; the descriptors are the detail, and they are where a parent gets something usable. Every system publishes short content notes, and most break them into categories such as violence, language, sex, nudity, drugs, threat and discrimination. A PG-13 example is typical: violence without blood, some sexual innuendo, strong language in moderation, and intensity that may frighten younger viewers. Compare that with an R, where the same categories are not moderated at all: sustained violence, strong language throughout, sexual content or nudity, and drug or alcohol use.
Read the descriptors before the certificate, and read them asking about the things that actually upset your child. Plenty of children take screen violence in their stride and are undone by a film about a lost parent; plenty are the reverse. The descriptor list lets you shop for the content type rather than the age band, which is the only version of this that works for one specific child on one specific evening. Our guide to what the ratings mean in practice goes through the categories system by system.
Most genuinely difficult calls sit at the edge of a band: a child a month short of thirteen who wants the 12A, a mature twelve-year-old and a sheltered fifteen-year-old who are nothing alike, a horror fan who has already seen worse on a phone. The tool calls these borderline and explains why, which is more honest than a yes or no. In practice three things settle it: what the descriptors say about this particular film, whether you will be watching with them, and whether they can stop without losing face in front of whoever is in the room.
Supervision changes the calculation more than anything else on the list. A 12A exists precisely because the BBFC thinks an adult in the room is the right safeguard, and the same logic applies at home: a borderline title watched with a parent who can pause and explain is a different experience from the same film watched alone at midnight on a tablet. If you cannot be there, a film one band lower is usually the better call, and it costs you nothing but a wait. If you want the practical setup rather than the theory, our guide to parental controls on the major streaming apps covers profiles, PINs and maturity settings.
Use this tool as a first filter rather than a final answer. Start with the certificate, take the borderline verdict seriously, read the descriptors for the specific film, and then look for one parent-facing review that describes what is actually on screen: not what the plot is, but how long the frightening scene lasts and whether anyone dies. We keep a fuller guide to family viewing and age ratings for the cases where the certificate and your child clearly disagree.
From there the rest of the site is here to help. The watchlist picker will find something for the whole household when the first choice is too old, the app safety checklist is worth working through before a child gets their own profile, and the cost calculator covers the other household question that never stops. If you end up watching something on the edge of a band, the rating scorecard is a good way to talk about it afterwards.