Prince George is navigating his first year at Eton College with a basic mobile device that completely restricts internet access.
The 13-year-old enrolled at the boarding school on September 8, 2026, where first-year pupils are barred from using smartphones. Instead, Year 9 students receive basic “brick phones” designed exclusively for essential calls and text messages with their parents outside of school hours.
Prince William and Princess Kate have reportedly welcomed the school’s digital restrictions, which align with their household rules. In 2025, William told actor Eugene Levy on the Apple TV+ series “The Reluctant Traveler” that “none of our children have any phones, which we’re very strict about.”
During the 2025 Earthshot Prize events in Brazil, the Prince of Wales explained to Brazilian TV host Luciano Huck that protecting his children from social media harms had proved difficult. He said that secondary school would likely bring a basic device without web browsing capabilities, calling it “a little bit of a, like, tense issue.”
“We communicate why we don’t think it’s right. And again, I think it’s the internet access I have a problem with. I think children can access too much stuff they don’t need to see online, and so having a phone and text message, the old sort of ‘brick phone’ as they call them, I think that’s fine,” William said.
William and his younger brother, Prince Harry, attended Eton, making them both “Old Etonians.” Princess Diana’s father, John Spencer, and brother, Charles Spencer, also attended the school, as did Queen Elizabeth II’s cousins, the Duke of Kent, the Duke of Gloucester and Prince Michael of Kent.
Eton College said that the first-year smartphone prohibition aims “to balance the benefits and challenges that technology brings to schools.” The institution also tightened regulations on school-issued iPads in September 2026 following parental anxiety over gaming and web browsing.
Royal broadcaster Ian Pelham Turner told Fox News Digital that “Usage could get him into trouble but also allow him access to views on the royal family, good and bad, which may worry him,” adding that rumors had circulated about the couple navigating disputes with George over internet-enabled phones.
British broadcaster Helena Chard described Eton’s policy as “music to Prince William and Princess Catherine’s ears,” noting that the parents find comfort in knowing their eldest son avoids doom-scrolling, gaming, or inappropriate online material.
Beyond his studies, George has exhibited artistic talent, having created a colored pencil drawing of a kingfisher perched on a branch when he was 12 years old. That artwork was featured in an issue of Country Life magazine guest-edited by the Prince of Wales, who spent six months working on the issue and posed for a portrait at Anmer Hall on the Sandringham estate in Norfolk.
The young royal’s artistic background also includes a reindeer painting shared by his parents on Christmas Day in 2022 when he was nine years old, as well as family portraits created during an art session alongside Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis.
Fox News Digital reached out to Eton College and Kensington Palace for comment.