Whether it is a rainy Saturday or a snow day, sometimes you may want wholesome entertainment for the kids in your life. While most streaming video platforms offer children’s entertainment, you may want something different.

If you have a public library card, chances are your library might offer hours of free entertainment, including shows, interactive stories, games, and comics. Some have an educational leaning, while others are purely for fun.

Finding Free Kids’ Entertainment Through Your Library

Libraries are a great resource for parents or anyone with kids in their lives. Depending on your local library, it may host children’s activities like story hours, provide homework help, and loan toys, games, or books. Many libraries have expanded their digital offerings over the past few years and offer ad-free streaming video entertainment, e-books, and more.

If you are like many parents, you may be concerned about your kid’s privacy. The best digital libraries and library-associated platforms typically meet your local library’s standards. If you have questions, speak to a children’s librarian about how to best protect your kid’s privacy. The resources vary, but most platforms share a respect for user privacy beyond most ad-supported platforms, have professionally vetted content (though standards vary), and are free of advertising.

Keep in mind that library-affiliated platforms frequently cycle content, so availability varies. Most offer a chance to see which content is scheduled to cycle off and which was just added. Some platforms are purely video, like Kanopy, while others are multimedia with a mix of media, like Hoopla.

With that out of the way, here are the best places to find entertainment for your kids.

1. Kanopy Kids

Kanopy is possibly the top streaming entertainment platform available through universities and public libraries. Most schools and libraries limit the number of shows you can stream per month since they pay per stream. However, Kanopy Kids offers unlimited streaming.

Kanopy Kids featured content partners include:

  • Sesame Street
  • “Read along” stories and other shows for little kids
  • Jim Henson Company programming like Dr. Suess
  • Highlights videos
  • Selected GKids anime films
  • Educational videos to learn science, international languages, reading, and more.

Kanopy offers both a dedicated kids section and the main app that covers a full range of ages (including teens and adults). If your school or public library offers Kanopy, it is well worth a look. Some of the content on the main Kanopy app is suitable for the full family, but that isn’t guaranteed since Kanopy also focuses on indie, art, and international cinema.

2. Hoopla

While Kanopy focuses exclusively on video content, Hoopla offers a mix of media, including eBooks, comics, music albums, films, and shows. Like Kanopy, the borrows are limited by your library’s budget since the library pays per borrow. Hoopla offers content for all ages; if you share your device with a kid, you can limit them to age-appropriate content by toggling to the “kid-friendly” version of Hoopla’s library.

The kid-friendly version of Hoopla offers a collection of comic books, albums, eBooks, and shows for kids, including:

  • Popular classic kids’ books like the Harry Potter series, Diary of a Wimpy kid, the Narnia collection, and newer favorites.
  • Kid-friendly comics like Percy Jackson, Big Nate, and more.
  • Animated and live-action films like seasonal favorites, Disney films, family-friendly comedies, and the film version of classic kids’ stories.
  • Shows like Magic School Bus, Ancient Empires, Daniel Tiger, Pippi Longstocking, and more. Keep in mind each episode counts as a borrow.
  • Music like Kidz Bop, Disney film soundtracks, Baby Shark, High School Musical, and more.

Like Kanopy, Hoopla offers media for all ages, including teens and adults. Keep in mind that Hoopla has previously raised concerns among librarians, parents, and users due to how they select and vet some of their all-ages eBooks promoting controversial views, as reported by the Library Journal.

3. Binge Pass Through Hoopla

If your library subscribes to Hoopla, you can also borrow a “Binge Pass” for a week of unlimited content. While we already mentioned Hoopla, Binge Pass content providers are stand-alone content providers who partner with Hoopla offering a week of guest access through libraries.

Some of the Binge Pass partners offer child-friendly content like:

  • The Highlights Collection features puzzles, things to do, audiobooks, and multimedia stories created under the Highlights magazine brand.
  • Kidz Vidz offers kid-friendly, entertaining, and educational videos.
  • Kids Books in Action for more engaging stories.
  • Hellosaurus is an interactive video app where the kids participate actively in the story by drawing, singing, acting, moving, and problem-solving.
  • Read Along 2 Learn stories to support young readers.
  • Curiosity Stream offers a library of documentaries for all ages. To access Curiosity Stream, you will need to toggle from Hoopla “Kids” to the full version of Hoopla since Curiosity Stream isn’t specifically a kid’s platform.

4. Comics Plus

If your school or library subscribes to Comics Plus, you can borrow and read comic books and graphic novels using your phone or tablet. This isn’t specifically a kid’s platform. Though it contains child-friendly comics, it also offers a collection of graphic novels for adults and teens.

The kid-friendly options include:

  • Early readers comics
  • Manga
  • Spanish language graphic novels
  • Game and show tie-in comics like Halo, Sonic the Hedgehog, and Minecraft
  • Fantasy, superheroes, historic, and classic graphic novels.

5. Just For Kids - Access Video

Access video offers a variety, including animated shows, video field trips, arts and crafts, and educational programming.

Users can use it to stream kid-oriented videos and TV shows, including Sesame Street, Arthur, Reading Rainbow, Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood, Dr. Seuss, Baby Einstein, and more. If your library subscribes to this platform, simply follow a link from your library’s website to stream a video using a web browser.

Just for Kids is part of Infobase. According to its website, Just for Kids contains over 9,000 videos, audio content, and interactive games for kids.

Choosing Age-Appropriate Entertainment

Just like browsing the shelf of your library, you or your child may browse available content using the featured apps. If you prefer to research content first, you could use a review site like Common Sense Media to find entertainment suited to your kid’s age and interests. Other review sites may also give you ideas for content to search for.

Other Kid’s Entertainment Outside Your Library

Most likely, your favorite streaming service also offers kid’s programming whether you subscribe to Disney+, Netflix, Prime, or Hulu.

There are other video websites you can try if you're looking for more kid’s entertainment sources that are safe and fun.