Supreme Court Allows Texas Age Verification Law for Apps

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to block Texas from enforcing a law that requires app stores to verify users’ ages and obtain parental consent before minors under 18 can download apps or make in-app purchases, a decision with significant implications for digital privacy, online safety, and First Amendment rights.

Justice Samuel Alito issued a pair of one-sentence orders denying emergency applications from challengers, with no public dissents. The decision is procedural — it allows the Texas App Store Accountability Act (SB 2420) to remain in effect while the underlying constitutional challenges continue in lower courts, and does not represent a final ruling on the law’s constitutionality, according to AP News.

The Law and Its Path to the Supreme Court

Signed by Republican Governor Greg Abbott in 2025, SB 2420 requires app stores to verify all users’ ages at account creation, obtain parental consent before minors can download apps or make purchases, and display age ratings and content information. The law classifies users into four age bands and includes narrow exceptions for emergency services apps and those operated by nonprofit organizations administering standardized tests.

The law was originally set to take effect on January 1, 2026, but U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman blocked it in December 2025, issuing a preliminary injunction. Pitman compared the law to requiring bookstores to check customers’ ages before allowing them to browse, ruling it likely unconstitutional. However, in June 2026, a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated the law, finding that Texas had made a strong showing it would likely succeed on the merits, as SCOTUSblog reported.

The Legal Battle

Two groups challenged the law: Students Engaged in Advancing Texas (SEAT), a student advocacy group whose members “use mobile apps to teach other kids how to get involved in policymaking,” and the Computer & Communications Industry Association (CCIA), a trade group whose members include Apple and Google. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is the defendant in both cases.

The challengers argue that the law violates the First Amendment by imposing a broad prior restraint on speech. In their Supreme Court filing, SEAT argued that the 5th Circuit’s decision “would render virtually the entire internet — not to mention the distribution of every book, newspaper, magazine, movie, or record album — ‘commercial speech’ the government could more readily ban, restrict, edit, or compel.” The CCIA added that “no state has ever required its citizens to prove their age before reading a newspaper, entering a bookstore, or even accessing the internet,” as NPR reported.

Texas countered that the law regulates commercial transactions, not speech. The state’s Solicitor General William Peterson argued that “the modern digital world is different” from the physical world, and that the law was needed since children can access “any conceivable content” online without their parents’ knowledge. In its legal brief, Texas drew an analogy: “In the same way that the State can deny drivers’ licenses to children under sixteen, even though some fourteen-year-olds may wish to drive to a bookstore and purchase a book, the State can restrict children’s downloads of software applications.”

The 5th Circuit applied intermediate scrutiny — the standard for commercial speech — and found a reasonable fit between the law’s methods and its goals. The panel wrote that “requiring age verification, parental consent, and app-related content ratings likely directly and materially advances Texas’s substantial interest in protecting children’s data, safety, and privacy in a digital world.”

Broader Context and Implications

This case follows the Supreme Court’s 2025 ruling upholding a separate Texas law requiring age verification for pornographic websites, which split the court 6-3 along ideological lines. Similar app store accountability laws have been passed in Utah, Louisiana, and Alabama, and the Texas law itself enjoys broad bipartisan support — it passed with 93% support in the Texas House, and 80% of Texas parents reportedly back the requirement, according to Al Jazeera.

The decision represents a significant test case for state-level regulation of app stores and online platforms. It raises fundamental questions about the boundaries of commercial speech in the digital age and intersects with broader debates about children’s online safety, data privacy, and the power of tech platforms. Internationally, Australia became the first country to ban social media for under-16s in 2025, reflecting a global trend toward greater regulation of minors’ online access.

What’s Next

The constitutional challenge will continue in the district court and will likely return to the 5th Circuit and potentially the Supreme Court for a definitive ruling on the merits. If the 5th Circuit ultimately upholds the law, the Supreme Court may grant certiorari to decide the constitutional question definitively. Meanwhile, Apple and Google — as CCIA members — must implement age verification and parental consent systems for Texas users, raising practical questions about how such systems can be deployed without compromising user privacy.

Federal legislation on children’s online safety, such as the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), could preempt or complement state laws, adding another layer of complexity to the evolving regulatory landscape.