Bark vs OpenBLD
Bark
bark.usOpenBLD
openbld.netSide by side
| Figure | Bark | OpenBLD |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | $4.08/mo | $15/mo |
| Free plan | — | Yes |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | — | Yes |
| Windows | — | Yes |
| macOS | — | Yes |
| Linux | — | Yes |
| iOS | Yes | Yes |
| Android | Yes | Yes |
| API | — | Yes |
| Self-hosted | — | Yes |
| Plans published | 20 | 3 |
| Spec score · Internet Filtering Software | 8.5 (#10) | 9.0 (#6) |
Plans
Bark
- Bark Jr$5 a month
- Bark Premium$14 a month
- Bark Home Monthly Lease$6 a month
- Bark Sync Monthly Lease$6 a month
- Bark Phone Finance$10 a month
- Bark Watch Device$10 a month
- Bark Watch Wireless$15 a month
- Family Wireless 4GB$15 a month
- Family Wireless 8GB$20 a month
- Bark Phone Pro Finance$25 a month
OpenBLD
- OpenBLD FreeFree
- OpenBLD Plus$15 a month
- OpenBLD Plus enterprise deploymentsPriced on request
In their own words
Bark
Bark is a paid parental-control service for Android and iOS, with plans starting at $5/mo and a 7-day trial. Its listed tools include content filtering, screen-time schedules, app blocking, activity reports, and location tracking. Bark Premium sends alerts about concerns such as bullying, self-harm, and online predators. Bark Jr lets parents schedule screen time and block internet access for apps and sites; its listed plan covers unlimited children and devices. Other offerings extend beyond the app: Bark Home filters the web and manages screen time for devices connected to home Wi-Fi, including platforms beyond iOS, Android, and Chromebook. Bark Phone has parental controls built in. Bark also offers phone, watch, and wireless plans. Family Wireless options have data limits: speeds are reduced after 35GB and may reduce further or stop after 50GB. Wireless plans do not support hotspots. Support is available daily from 8am to 12am Eastern Time. Bark is headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina.
OpenBLD
OpenBLD provides protective DNS to block malware, phishing, tracking and unwanted domains. It supports classic DNS, DNS-over-HTTPS and DNS-over-TLS. The free service can be configured on phones, browsers, computers and routers without installing an agent or additional software. Its ADA profile is adaptive for most users, while RIC applies stricter filtering that may affect some services. OpenBLD Free is presented for personal use, home networks and small offices, and is billed Free forever with about 100,000 DNS queries per day and a limit of 100 requests per second per IP. OpenBLD Plus is aimed at companies, security teams and managed service providers. It adds organization-specific policies, centralized DNS analytics, security events and corporate DNS integrations. Deployment options are Managed Cloud, Dedicated DNS and On-Premise; the On-Premise option keeps DNS traffic, events and analytics within customer infrastructure. The documentation says there is no Service Level Agreement for OpenBLD DNS, while Plus lists SLA options. The service was founded in 2019.