6 Apps That Make Potty Training Way Easier Than a DIY Sticker Chart
These stories, games, songs, and trackers make the process go smoother.
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Sadly, there is no magical app that will do the hard work of potty training for you — it's always going to take time, patience, and practice. But thankfully there are some apps that'll encourage your kids to listen to their bodies, entertain them while they sit on the potty, remind them to go, or take the work out of a rewards-tracking system for you. Here, some helpful toilet-training apps — and a few old-school, hard-copy books to help smooth the potty process.
Potty Time With Elmo
Daniel Tiger's Stop & Go Potty
If your kids hate the fact that they have to stop playing to go pee, Daniel Tiger can help. Daniel Tiger and his friends star in a series of games and, when the characters start to wiggle, kids can tell them to stop and go to the potty, flush, wipe, and wash hands before returning to play.
Potty Time
If your kids need to hear it from a higher authority, you can set this app so that they get a FaceTime-like "call" from a friendly host named Rachel Coleman when it's time for them to go potty. Bonus: Coleman does everything in sign language, too!
Potty Training Learning With the Animals
Perfect Potty
If you don't need all the songs, games, and interactive features, this is the no-frills app for you. It's really for parents: You can track your kids' attempts and progress or set alarms to remind them to use the toilet. You can get all the benefits of electronic tracking with none of the screen-time guilt.
PottiTrain
If you're an Android user, this is your bare-bones app. You can log meals, potty attempts, and (most helpfully) when and how much your child drinks, but no stories, no songs, and — best of all — no ads.
Potty Training Books
If you're not too fond of setting your kids up with an app to teach them about potty time — we get it, you might be begging for an accident involving your phone and some bodily fluids — try one of these books instead:
Potty by Leslie Patricelli
Potty Power by Eunice Moyle and Sabrina Moyle
A Potty for Me! by Karen Katz
The New Potty by Mercer Mayer
P Is for Potty, featuring Elmo!
And some for you, too.
Unfortunately, none of the apps give you the basics of potty training, so if you're looking to get started, try one of these books.
Oh Crap! Potty Training by Jamie Glowacki, best for those looking to get the basics done in one weekend.
Ready, Set, Go! by Sarah Ockwell Smith, for parents who want to try a gentler approach.
Potty Training in Three Days by Brandi Brucks, currently the No. 1 best-selling potty-training book on Amazon.
The Complete Guide to Potty Training by Michelle D. Swaney, a.k.a. CEO of The Potty School.
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Marisa (she/her) has covered all things parenting, from the postpartum period through the empty nest, for Good Housekeeping since 2018; previously, she wrote about parents and families at Parents and Working Mother. She lives with her toy-collecting husband and daughter in Brooklyn, where she can be found helping out her team at bar trivia or posting about movies on Twitter and Bluesky.
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