A Social Media Ban for Teens in the U.S. Would Upend High School Recruiting, NIL and More, Overnight

With Australia already pulling the trigger, lawmakers in the U.S. are debating a similar teen social media ban, one that could radically alter recruiting, NIL, media coverage, and athlete visibility across the entire high school sports landscape

Could a ban on social media radically impact high school sports and the athletes who play it? / Evert Nelson/The Capital-Journal / USA TODAY NETWORK

When Australia enacted a ban on social media for teenagers 16 and under, which took effect on Dec. 10, it didn’t take long for the conversation to reach American lawmakers. Could something similar happen here? And if it did—what would that actually mean for high school sports?

From a student safety and mental health standpoint, I understand why the idea has traction. Social media can absolutely be damaging for teenagers. I will let the public debate on this play out, but from inside the high school sports ecosystem, I thought it would be helpful to point out that the immediate and massive ripple effects a teen ban would have on modern day high school sports.

This is more than the possible loss of social apps

This wouldn’t just be about kids losing access to apps. It would be about the entire visibility engine of youth sports being shut down.

Recruiting today does not happen through mailboxes and landlines. It happens through instant access. A highlight clip posted on Friday night can change a player’s future by Saturday morning. Hudl links live in bios. Commitment graphics travel nationally in seconds. Training videos introduce prospects to programs that may never otherwise find them.

Without social media, recruiting would slow to a crawl

Take social media out of the equation, and recruiting slows overnight. Discovery becomes exclusive instead of inclusive. Access shifts into closed networks controlled by gatekeepers. And the athletes who suffer most will be the ones who already fight hardest for attention: small-school standouts, inner-city prospects, late bloomers, and kids without built-in recruiting pipelines.

The viral moment that alters a career simply disappears.

NIL impact would be even more dramatic

The impact on high school NIL would be even more dramatic. Like it or not, NIL is built on visibility. Brands do not invest in athletes they cannot track, amplify, or measure. If teen athletes are removed from social platforms, most high school NIL opportunities vanish instantly. That means fewer local sponsorships, fewer training resources, and fewer ways for families to offset the escalating costs of elite competition.

For many households, NIL isn’t about clout—it’s about survival inside a fundamentally expensive sports economy. A ban quietly pulls that support out from underneath them.

Media coverage would also take a major hit

High school sports media would also be forced into a hard reset. Today’s coverage is built on real-time access. Commitments break on social. Injury updates originate from posts. Highlights circulate nationally within minutes. Without teenage social platforms, everything slows. Information becomes filtered only through adults. Transparency shrinks. And ironically, misinformation becomes easier to spread when firsthand sources disappear.

The athlete also loses something far bigger than screen time: control of their own voice. Today’s student-athletes share their journeys, setbacks, achievements, and community impact directly. They advocate for mental health, celebrate teammates, and build identity beyond a stat line. Take that away and autonomy disappears with it. Suddenly, every narrative must pass through an adult gatekeeper again.

Coaches may welcome the loss of distractions, but gain other responsibilities

Yes, some coaches would welcome the reduction in distractions. But they would also inherit the burden of athlete promotion, parental pressure, and the impossible task of fairly distributing exposure. It doesn’t remove pressure—it simply pushes it upward and concentrates power.

Are there other controls in place of a total ban?

Mental health matters. Cyberbullying is real. Anxiety is real. Addiction is real. Those problems require real solutions. But is a total ban policy overkill for a problem that demands surgical regulation? Do better answers already exist: strict age verification, content controls, NIL transparency, school-based digital education, and mental health accountability embedded into athletic departments?

Right or wrong, the impact could not be understated

If a teen social media ban ever becomes law in the United States, it won’t just change how athletes post. It will change how they are discovered, how they are recruited, how they earn NIL, how they are covered, and how their stories are told. It would be the most profound structural shift in high school sports visibility since the internet itself arrived.

If this debate is truly coming to America, the entire high school sports community—coaches, athletes, parents, recruiters, and media—must be part of it now.

Because once that visibility switch is flipped off, turning it back on won’t be simple.