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That is picture-in-picture: some streaming apps shrink into a little window instead of closing when your child leaves mid-show. ShowHaven silences it straight away and every rule still applies — nothing unapproved can be played from it, and tapping it simply takes your child back to their approved show.

What we cannot do is make the window disappear. No app on Android is allowed to close another app's floating window, ours included — that is how the platform is built, not a gap in ShowHaven. We would rather say so than let you wonder why it is still there.

If you would rather it never appeared, you can switch it off at the source, one app at a time, on your child's device:

Settings → Apps → [the streaming app] → Picture-in-picture → Not allowed

It is worth doing for Paramount+, Prime Video and Max — those are the ones we have watched do it on real devices. Netflix and Disney+ did not. This is optional: ShowHaven keeps the rules enforced either way, and this only removes the window itself.

Netflix never tells us what is playing — only how. A show runs long and steady; browsing looks like short trailer bursts as your child drifts along Netflix's own rows. When ShowHaven sees the browsing pattern, it can bring your child back to their shows, or just note it in your feed — your choice, in Rules → Bring them back when Netflix looks like browsing. It is a judgment call made from the pattern, which is why it is yours to set. Steady playback is never interrupted either way.

Usually the streaming app was signed out, or its profile picker interrupted the hand-off. Open that service once, sign in, pick the child's profile, then try the tile again. If it keeps happening, email us the show and the service — that is a real bug on our side and we want it.

Some streaming boxes stop keeping track of which app is open after they lose power — being unplugged and moved to another room is the usual cause. It is the TV's own software, and only a proper restart clears it. ShowHaven keeps working meanwhile: your child still sees only their shows, and it still brings them back when one ends.

On a streaming box or TV: open Settings → System → Restart. The power button on the remote will not do it — on most boxes it only puts the device to sleep, however long you hold it. Please don't pull the power cord: that is what causes this in the first place.

On a tablet or phone: hold the power button and choose Restart.

Some Google TV devices ship that settings page broken: the switch is right there on screen, but the page ignores every remote. It is the TV's software, not you.

You can safely skip it. Your child still sees only the shows you chose, and ShowHaven uses the TV's sound to notice browsing and to bring your child back after a show ends — both work without this permission. The switch only sharpens things: reactions within seconds instead of within a few minutes, and pauses of any length (without it, a show paused longer than about five minutes is treated as finished — tapping the tile again picks up right where it left off). The parent app always shows exactly what is enforced.

Want the switch anyway? The page ignores remotes, but it does answer to a pointer. Pair any Bluetooth mouse with the TV (Settings → Remotes & Accessories → Pair accessory), or install a free “Bluetooth mouse” app that turns an Android phone into one. Point at the switch, click, done — you can unpair the mouse right after.

ShowHaven decides whether a show is playing by asking Android. A few services report this poorly. If it happens on a specific service, tell us which one and we will fix it there rather than loosening it everywhere.

ShowHaven has to be the device's home app for that to work. Android asks which launcher to use the first time you press Home after installing — choose ShowHaven and Always. You can change it back at any time in Android Settings.

In the app: Settings, then the PIN card, then “Forgot your PIN? Email me a temporary code.” A 6-digit code goes to your account email, works once, and expires in 15 minutes. Changing the PIN any other way requires knowing the old one — on purpose, so a child holding your phone cannot re-key the house. The child's device picks up the new PIN within a couple of minutes; if it is offline it keeps using the last PIN it saw, so connect it to wifi first.

Child devices check for changes every couple of minutes rather than instantly, to save battery. If a device has been offline it shows the last grid it had, with an “Offline” marker, rather than an error.

You can do it yourself, immediately, from Settings in the app. Here is exactly what that removes.