When is child ready for booster

The seat belts in your car are designed to fit adults, so a booster seat mimics the height of an adult when your child sits in it. It's hard to tell the right time to switch your child to a booster seat. Each child grows at different rates. However, here are some general guidelines that will help you determine if your child is ready to move to a booster seat. Although the draw of a booster seat is tempting for both parents and kids, there are some clear advantages to keeping your child in a five-point harness as long as possible.

Each time your child graduates into the next level of seat belt usage , they lose a layer of protection. The five-point harness of a car seat fits smaller children much better than a booster seat with the seat belt. As you move your child to a booster seat, they'll be free to move out of a proper seat belt position or even unbuckle the belt more easily.

While the child is sitting in the booster seat, make sure they don't put the shoulder belt behind their back or under their arm. If they insist on doing that to be comfortable, it's best to use a car seat with a harness or a different booster seat with an adjustable shoulder belt guide.

Most kids will find it difficult to will stay in a booster seat the entire car ride and keep the seat belt properly fitted until they're about five years old. There's no rush to move your child from a five-point harness car seat to a booster seat.

Instead, let your child grow out of their car seat, then make the transition to a booster seat. There are primarily two types of booster seats you can choose for your child: A high-back booster and a backless booster.

Backless boosters are easy to transfer from one car to another. In fact, children in the U. Thanks to advances in car seat safety technologies, four-year-olds that might have been moved into a booster 10 years ago can still safely ride in a rear-facing car seat. Even fairly tall children can remain rear-facing through toddler years and then switch to a forward-facing harness until kindergarten age. Any step up in car seats—from rear-facing to forward-facing, from the harness to booster—is actually a step down in safety.

The 5-point harness spreads crash forces over more points on a child's body, lessening the potential force any one part of the body must take in a crash. While some high-back booster seats have a minimum weight of 30 pounds, kids should weigh at least 40 pounds before riding in any booster seat.

From a practical standpoint, parents find that it is easier to keep the child sitting properly when in a car seat than in a booster; in a booster the child can unbuckle themselves more easily than in a car seat. They can also lean and slouch, which is dangerous.

They can't do that in a car seat when the 5-point harness is properly adjusted. The seatbelt cannot protect a child who is not in the proper position. Most children cannot be trusted to sit properly until at least five years old. Many parents find that their child is actually much older than four before they can be expected to sit still in a booster.

If your vehicle has lap-only seatbelts in the rear seats, keep your child in a harnessed car seat as long as possible. Harnessed seats can be installed with a lap-only belt. Extended harnessing, or using a harnessed car seat with a higher weight limit, is vastly preferable to moving a child into a lap-only seatbelt.

If you have a pre vehicle with a lap-only belt in the center, it is important to know that car seats can safely go there but boosters and big kids should not. Boosters and big kids need the protection of a shoulder belt. Therefore, if you need to have a kid ride in the center, make sure to use a car seat with a 5-point harness there.

If you think your child is outgrowing their harnessed car seat, first be sure that you're checking the right signs to judge the fit. Most children outgrow harnessed car seats by height long before they outgrow by weight, particularly with the pound seats.

When your child is forward-facing, the harness slots should be at or above the child's shoulders. When the shoulders are above the top slots, it's time to change seats. A forward-facing car seat is also outgrown by height when the tops of the child's ears reach the top of the car seat shell, unless the manufacturer states otherwise in the instructions. When checking the weight limits of the car seat, and be sure you're looking at the forward-facing harness weight limit, not the booster weight limit if it is a harness-to-booster seat.

There are many harness-to-booster car seats available today with a higher harness limit that later become booster seats if you're concerned about buying another car seat and then a booster.

Look for a car seat with a higher harnessed weight limit and a higher top shoulder strap height. This will allow the seat to be used longer in car seat mode and likely, but not always, in booster mode too. The range of car seats available today means no family should struggle to find even a budget model that allows their child to remain safely harnessed to a minimum of age five, and most likely far beyond that.

Still not sure if your toddler is riding safely in the car? Get diet and wellness tips to help your kids stay healthy and happy. Do not use more than one system unless the car seat manufacturer and vehicle manufacturer permit it. Consequence : Unapproved padding, including coats and sweaters, placed behind or under the harness can compress in a crash, creating slack in the harness system.

Recommendation : Place blankets or jackets over the child after the harness is snug and secure. Unfortunately, it takes time for state laws to catch up with best practice safety recommendations. All major safety organizations along with the American Academy of Pediatrics recommend this new guideline. Children in the second year of life are five times less likely to die or be seriously injured in a crash if they ride in a rear-facing car seat.

Turning a child under age 2 to a forward-facing position can result in head, neck or spinal cord injuries in the event of a crash. Keep your child in each stage for as long as possible.

Your child is ready for a booster seat when they have outgrown the weight or height limit of their forward-facing harnesses, which is typically between 40 and 65 pounds. A few measures can be taken to help eliminate negative feelings towards booster seat usage. Proper belt fit may not be possible in some cases until age 12 or A seat belt placed under the arm can cause fragile ribs to break which can in turn cause additional injury. A seat belt behind the back eliminates upper body protection and can cause serious spinal injury or even ejection.

What AAA recommends : Make sure children wear their seat belt properly with their booster seat and remain in proper position the whole trip. Use a booster on every trip and make arrangements in advance when carpooling to ensure your child has their booster seat.

What AAA recommends: Make sure your vehicle has head restraints to protect your child before considering using a backless booster seat. What AAA recommends: Buckle up booster seats even when children are not riding in the car to keep yourself and other passengers safe. Children at this stage are not yet ready for adult safety belts, which are designed for pound male adults. In fact, studies show that using a booster seat can reduce risk of injury in a crash by 45 percent over a seat belt alone.

Out-of-position lap belts can cause serious injuries to the liver, spleen or intestines. The shoulder belt fits across the collarbone and chest. Make car safety a family habit! To keep them as safe as possible, children under 13 should ride in the rear seats, even if they have graduated from a booster seat to a seat belt.

If a child must ride in the front seat, the vehicle seat must be moved back as far as possible. Caregivers should avoid putting car seats in the front passenger seat because of the presence of airbags. This should only be used as a last resort. School buses are one of the safest forms of transportation in the United States, as they are designed with different safety features than other passenger vehicles. In fact, the U. Department of Transportation school buses found that school buses are approximately seven times safer than passenger cars or light trucks.

School buses are larger and heavier than most vehicles, and distribute crash force differently than cars. However, some smaller school buses less than 10, pounds are required to have seat belts. Pre-school aged children should be restrained in child passenger seats when they ride a school bus. Children with special needs may also need a restraint system.

NEVER place a rear-facing car seat in the front passenger seat with an active airbag. If a forward-facing child must sit in the front seat, push the seat back as far back as possible. Keep in mind some manufacturers require the base of the car seat to by percent supported.

Under no circumstances are cargo areas to be used as child passenger seating. Children and adults can easily be thrown from cargo areas at even relatively slow speeds. Not only is it unsafe, but it may also be against the law in your state. All rights reserved. View Privacy Policy. Skip to content. Change Text Size. Motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death and injury for all children.

All vehicle occupants need to be properly restrained by seat belts or child safety seats to prevent injury in case of a sudden stop, swerve or crash. Seat belts and car seats contact the strongest parts of the body, spread crash forces over a wide area, help slow down the body and protect the brain and spinal cord. What care seat is safest? While all seats on the market are safe, they do differ in their ease of use in four basic categories: Evaluation of Instructions: Examines the content and clarity of the instruction manual for the restraint.

Vehicle Installation Features: Examines the ease of using features that pertain to installing the child restraint in a vehicle. Evaluation of Labels: Examines the content and clarity of the labeling attached to the child restraint.