Common Sense Media Review
By Dana Anderson
,
based on child development research. How do we rate?
Social networking and lots more; privacy settings important.
Parents Need to Know
Why Age 16+?
Any Positive Content?
Where to Download
Videos and Photos
Tango Text, Voice & Video
Privacy Rating Warning
Privacy Rating
Our expert evaluators create our privacy ratings. The ratings are designed to help you understand how apps use your data for commercial purposes.
Pass
Meets our minimum requirements for privacy and security practices.
Warning
Does not meet our recommendations for privacy and security practices.
Fail
Does not have a privacy policy and should not be used.
Privacy Rating
Our expert evaluators create our privacy ratings. The ratings are designed to help you understand how apps use your data for commercial purposes.
Pass
Meets our minimum requirements for privacy and security practices.
Warning
Does not meet our recommendations for privacy and security practices.
Fail
Does not have a privacy policy and should not be used.
What's It About?
Create a TANGO account through your Facebook account or by using your phone number and email. Provide access to your contacts, accept push notifications (a must for calls), and accept or decline location services. To make a call, tap on a contact from your list, and then tap on the video camera icon for video calling or the phone icon for a phone call. Numerous other options include browsing users nearby, playing games, group chatting, and reading or posting to the news feed (categorized by content groups, including sports, news, and music). Tango is a popular social-networking app with many options.
Is It Any Good?
Easy video chatting may be the feature that draws a lot of users to Tango. The developer says the app lets people "Connect, Get Social, and Have Fun." That's a simple way to describe the almost overwhelming multitude of options by which to communicate with people you know (and don't know), find and post images and information, play more than 40 games, listen to and share music, and more.
On the downside, there's a ton of ads on the free version. Its default profile setting is public, so teens should go to their profile settings and toggle "public" off to enhance safety and privacy. Tango likely draws a lot of hyper-social teens who love the barrage of options for more connections, more ways to find and share information, more ways to chat, and more ways to play. It's "Always on, so you don't miss a thing," which can be good or bad, depending on how well your teen regulates his or her screen time and privacy.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about apps like this that use location services to identify new contacts and why it's not always a good idea to connect with someone just because he or she happens to live nearby and use the same social-networking app.
Discuss your family's rules about in-app purchases with your teen, and read Common Sense's blog post 4 Ways to Curb Kids' In-App Purchases.
Group chatting with dozens (or hundreds) of people may seem like fun to super socially minded teens. Remind your teen that it's a small world everywhere, including online, and they should take seriously what they say or how they respond in a large chat as much as they would talking to one person face to face.
App Details
- Devices : iPhone , iPod Touch , iPad , Mac , Android , Kindle Fire , Windows app
- Pricing structure : Free (In-app purchases from $.99 to $1.99 for packs, ecards, and more; $9.99/month for premium service.)
- Release date : June 16, 2014
- Genre : Social Networking
- Publisher : TangoMe
- Version : 3.7.91338
- Minimum software requirements : iOS 6.0 or later, Android 2.1 or later.
- Last updated : October 21, 2019
Did we miss something on diversity?
Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive portrayals in media. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. You can help us help kids by
Suggest an Update
Common Sense Media's unbiased ratings are created by expert reviewers and aren't influenced by the product's creators or by any of our funders, affiliates, or partners.
See how we rate