A baby may be drawn to the colours, movement and sounds on a screen, and can look intensely focused on what they are watching. But attention to a screen does not mean a baby is learning from it.
Through the first year, a baby learns mainly from direct interaction with people and the world around them: hearing their parents' voices, watching their faces, making a sound and getting a response, holding objects and moving and exploring them.
What do the international recommendations say?
The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends no sedentary screen time for infants under one year of age.
The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) explains that children under two need hands-on exploration and social interaction to develop cognitive, language, motor and social skills. Their ability to learn from two-dimensional content and carry what they saw across into the real world is still limited at this stage.
So even when a video is described as "educational", it does not give a baby the kind of learning that real interaction does.
A screen does not only take time
When we talk about screens, we look not only at the content or the number of minutes, but at the experiences a screen may replace.
Screen time can come at the cost of talking with the baby, play, movement, exploring objects, reading and eye contact. Those experiences are a core part of development in the first year.
Are video calls different?
Yes. Interactive video calls differ from passive watching, because they allow real social interaction: someone talks to the baby, waits for a response, and answers their sounds and movements.
That is why the American Academy of Pediatrics exempts interactive video calls from its recommendation to avoid screens for children under 18 months.
What does a baby need instead?
A baby does not need elaborate educational activities. Talking to them, singing, reading a book, playing on the floor, mirroring their sounds and handing them safe objects to explore — these are all genuine chances to learn.
In the first year a baby does not need a screen to teach them about the world; they need the chance to live in it and respond to it.