At SuperAwesome, when it comes to kids trends, we like to go straight to the experts for their opinions (and drawings). Last year, we asked PopJam’s community to predict 2018’s biggest kids trends, and they accurately called out that slime, unicorns, fidget toys, squishies and iPhones would be the biggest hits of 2018.

When we checked in with the community for 2019’s kids trends, many kids predicted similar strands filtering through into next year. However, increasingly, kids are moving away from obsession with tangible objects like squishies, and directing their attention to the digital.

Here’s what the community called out for 2019:

Gaming

It’s no surprise that Fortnite is PopJammers’ biggest prediction for 2019 – it’s the game that’s dominated their playgrounds. Not all kids like it, but they acknowledge how big it is.

They love it for the emotes and dance moves as much as the game play – the increasingly digital nature of trends means that they cross over from YouTube to gaming and back. The Floss, the Hype, the Best Mates dance and Orange Justice are all huge dance trends that found an unlikely home on Fortnite.

Interested in kids trends? Every month we create a Kids Insights Report, digging into all the trends in our highly-engaged PopJam community. If you’d like to check out this month’s report, click here.

Is there any real competition for Fortnite? Not yet. FIFA 19 and Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 and other shooters were mentioned to be contenders. Roblox is still popular with boths boys and girls, but Minecraft, along with Overwatch and Clash Royale, are all clearly reducing in popularity.

Social Media Apps

The apps kids download and use are carefully selected, and depend heavily on what their friends are using. As far as predictions for 2019 go, despite the many question marks around the app’s suitability for younger users, it looks certain that Tik Tok will dominate.

tiktok

The change from Musical.ly to TikTok seems to have strengthened the social music video app’s appeal. Kids want the opportunity to be creators, even if it can be risky sharing personal info on 13+ apps. Instagram also gets multiple mentions, but TikTok is leading the way: you can share videos and stories on Insta, but TikTok gives you reasons and structure, plus you can watch your Vine faves.

Despite its digital death, there are predictions of a Vine resurgence. Byte (teased by Vine’s co-founder) is rumoured to be released in Spring 2019 – and the PopJam community are eagerly anticipating its new functionality.

YouTube

While concern around the content available on YouTube continues to percolate, the kids using the platform remain focused on the largely harmless formats they love:  DIYs (Do It Yourself videos with focus on art tips and life hacks), slime videos, random memes, more Fortnite dances and more dance challenges. Gacha Studios videos and videos about hackers (such as Project Zorgo) are also popular, as are TikTok and Vine (or Vine 2) compilations.

YT

2019 could see the push back against dangerous online challenge videos, starting with smaller organisations and charities and then reaching sponsors.

The best of the rest? 2019 will also be a strong year for squishies, phones (particularly the inevitable new iPhone updates), unicorns (naturally), Nintendo Switch, LOL Surprise Dolls, Stranger Things and money. Presumably we will eventually see slime go the way of the fidget spinner – but it doesn’t seem to be in any rush.

With kids spending more and more time online, it falls to parents and the providers of the platforms to provide suitable education and boundaries. Kids do a lot of their learning and socialising online, and the importance of it in their lives is only increasing.

READ: Dance Moves and Horror Games: The top kids’ trends of Q2 2018

READ: The top 5 kids’ trends so far in 2018


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Craig Donaghy is Head of Community for PopJam, the largest kid-safe social content platform.