Florida’s school cellphone ban prohibits elementary and middle school students from using phones or other wireless devices at any point during the school day, and prohibits high school students from using them during instructional time. The rules come from two laws: House Bill 379, signed in May 2023, and House Bill 1105, signed on May 30, 2025 and effective July 1, 2025.1CBS News Miami. DeSantis Signs Bill Expanding Cellphone Restrictions in Florida Schools Together they make Florida’s approach one of the strictest in the country.
What the Rules Say by Grade Level
Elementary and Middle School
Students in these grades cannot use a wireless communication device at any point during the school day. The restriction covers class time, transitions, lunch, and other non-instructional periods. Exceptions apply for students with documented medical or educational needs, including those with an IEP or Section 504 plan.2Florida Senate. CS/CS/CS/HB 1105 Bill Summary
High School
Phones are banned during instructional time. Schools must set up teacher-designated storage areas and can only allow device use in zones the school board has adopted for that purpose outside of class. The same medical and educational exceptions apply.2Florida Senate. CS/CS/CS/HB 1105 Bill Summary A high schooler can generally use a phone between classes or at lunch only if the local board has designated those times or places as permitted zones.
Devices and Platforms Covered
The law reaches beyond phones. Orange County Public Schools, for example, treats smartwatches and earbuds the same as phones under its full-day ban.3K-12 Dive. Signal Lost: Why More School Systems Are Saying No to Cellphones TikTok is separately banned on school-owned devices, and school districts must block social media platforms on district Wi-Fi.4Florida Politics. Legislature Unanimously Passes Bill Restricting Social Media, Student Phone Use in School
Exceptions and Emergency Contact
The written exceptions in the law are narrow: documented medical needs, or an IEP or Section 504 plan that specifies device use.2Florida Senate. CS/CS/CS/HB 1105 Bill Summary A general preference for being reachable is not a qualifying exception.
Parent concern about emergencies is the most common objection to these bans. A 2024 National Parents Union survey of 1,508 parents found that 78 percent wanted their children to have cellphone access during the school day for emergencies, 58 percent cited the need to reach or locate their child, and 48 percent cited transportation coordination.5K-12 Dive. Safety Concerns Around School Cell Phone Bans
Districts have set up workarounds. Orange County Public Schools directs parents to call the school office, which then pulls the student from class. Because Orange County keeps phones in students’ backpacks rather than in centralized storage, students retain access to their devices in a schoolwide emergency.6Orange County Public Schools. Student Cell Phone Policy Some students have reported feeling unsafe without direct phone access during a dangerous situation.7EdSource. How a Cell Phone Ban in Florida Is Affecting Students
How Schools Are Enforcing the Ban
Enforcement methods vary by district. Some Florida schools use Yondr pouches, lockable fabric sleeves sealed magnetically at the start of the day and unlocked at dismissal; the pouches run roughly $25 to $30 per student. Palm Beach County is among the Florida districts using them.8NBC News. Schools Spend Millions on Yondr Pouches to Store Cellphones Other schools require phones to stay in backpacks or collect them in manila envelopes in the main office.
Compliance improves quickly once enforcement is consistent. At Timber Creek High School in Orange County, staff confiscated 120 phones on the first day of the policy; within weeks that number dropped to about a dozen a day.9ClickOrlando. New Florida Law Targets Cell Phone Use in Schools In the large Florida district studied by economists David N. Figlio and Umut Özek, smartphone pings during school hours fell by roughly two-thirds after the policy took effect.10NBER. School Cell Phone Bans and Student Achievement
For the exact rules that apply to your child, the specifics live in your district’s Student Code of Conduct. Marion County Public Schools, for instance, updated its code for the 2025–26 school year to reflect HB 1105 and set out the board-adopted zones and teacher storage requirements at the high school level.11Marion County Public Schools. Florida House Bill 1105
What the Early Research Shows
The strongest evidence on outcomes comes from the Figlio and Özek study, published as a 2025 National Bureau of Economic Research working paper. It looked at student-level data from an anonymous large urban Florida district that imposed a bell-to-bell ban, phones silenced and stored in backpacks for the full day including lunch and transitions.10NBER. School Cell Phone Bans and Student Achievement
Academic effects took time. Test scores did not change significantly in the first year. By the spring of the second year, scores had risen by an average of 1.1 percentiles over the pre-ban baseline, with larger gains for male students (1.4 percentiles) and for middle and high schoolers (1.3 percentiles). By the end of the study period, scores were about four percentiles higher than before the ban. Unexcused absences also fell, and the researchers estimated that improved attendance explained as much as half of the test score gains.12NBER. The Impact of Cell Phone Bans in Schools on Student Outcomes: Evidence From Florida
The transition was rough. In September 2023, the first month of enforcement, suspensions rose 25 percent over the prior year. At schools with the highest pre-ban phone usage, in-school suspension rates for Black male students climbed 30 percent, while rates for white and Hispanic students stayed roughly flat. The researchers characterized this as an adjustment period; discipline rates returned to near pre-ban levels by the second year. They recommended that districts plan rollout strategies specifically to reduce that initial disciplinary spike.12NBER. The Impact of Cell Phone Bans in Schools on Student Outcomes: Evidence From Florida
Non-academic effects have also been reported at the school level. Orange County Superintendent Maria Vazquez said discipline concerns dominated parent town halls before the launch but faded from subsequent meetings, and teachers described students as more attentive with better classroom conversation. Administrators said students at lunch were playing games like spikeball and pickleball instead of scrolling.9ClickOrlando. New Florida Law Targets Cell Phone Use in Schools
What’s Coming Next
HB 1105 requires the Florida Department of Education to run a pilot program studying a full-day phone ban at the high school level. Six districts are to participate, two small, two medium, and two large counties. A model policy and report to lawmakers are due by December 1, 2026.13Florida Department of Education. HB 1105 Implementation Guidance The specific districts had not been publicly identified as of early 2025.14CBS12. Florida Bill Seeks to Expand Cell Phone Ban in Schools With New Pilot Program Depending on the findings, a full-day ban could be extended statewide to high schools in a future legislative session.