Hacking a Toniebox
schafe-sind-bessere-rasenmaeher.de
schafe-sind-bessere-rasenmaeher.de
My brittle smart home setup is hanging on by a thread in the spousal approval department. I can’t handle the fury that will befall me if I fuck with the TonieBox.
Also I thought that the physical design was poor. Because the figures just sit on top of the box, you cant move it around whilst playing it or the figures just fall off and the audio stops. It was very frustrating watching my kid try to use it in the car on a long journery.
Scrapped that and invested in Yoto player, its pretty much the same thing but its so much better in every way. The cards push into a slot and so dont fall out, it has an app which enables full control of the player which Tonies didnt, and you dont have to hit it to change tracks (which we found incredibly violent). Also there are some nice extras like being able to tap the nfc cards against your phone to set the content.
I would encourage any prospective TonieBox buyer to check out Yoto before taking the plunge.
Really? Huh, that's interesting because I find them exceptionally well designed and very sturdy (i.e., kids-ready).
> Because the figures just sit on top of the box, you cant move it around whilst playing it or the figures just fall off and the audio stops.
The figures are magnetic and stay on the box when you move it.
> It was very frustrating watching my kid try to use it in the car on a long journery.
Do you have a different version, perhaps, than me?
We were aware of Tonie before Yoto because our children's friends had them and we decided to go Yoto instead, they're amazingly simple, the app is great with well thought out features, and we've even convinced some of those families with Tonies to switch to Yoto and they've also been very happy.
There's a pretty good market for second hand Yoto cards too in the UK though don't expect much in the way of deals, many of them sell for RRP or higher, though we have found some cards our 5yo really wanted but are only available in the US by buying them second hand.
When my 5yo was about 3 we gave her a CD player and bought lots of CDs, funnily she grew to think that was the height of cutting edge technology and digital (virtual) audio was the old tech. Needless to say, the CDs didn't last in the hands of a 3yo, then followed by a little sibling, they ended up scratched to pieces and wouldn't play any more, the card based approach of Yoto is much more suitable for young children, and the kids are learning lots, they particularly love the audio adventures.
As much as I'd love to hack the thing, I feel the same way another commentor does, that it shouldn't be touched, though I did manage to grab the URL from my OPNSense for the night time radio so I can stream it in my office because it's pretty good.
I am a little cautious that the cards only contain a URL and we don't actually have copies of any of the audio for the cards we've bought (other than what's in the device's cache); we have somewhere in the region of 200+ cards now; which is quite an investment, and it's very much at the mercy of Yoto and their servers remaining active and accessible.
But then I remind myself: it’s not a product made for me. I don’t have to like it. Clearly, the target group loves it. My kids have adored it for years. Even now, with my oldest having access to Spotify Kids, she still prefers her Toniebox in the evening before bed. The figurines aren’t just a medium, they’re toys in their own right. They’re shared, traded, and loved. And they really enjoy squeezing those silly ears.
Many other families in my circle tell the same story. Some tried similar products that launched soon after the original, often ones using cards (though not Yoto). But after a few weeks, their kids lost interest and asked for a Toniebox instead. (It reminds me of when my parents bought me a Sega Master System, even though all I wanted was a Super Nintendo.)
That’s not the point of the article, though.
It never says it’s not a good product. The issue is not that, it’s that it is a disposable product : the day the company behind it closes or decides to unplug the wires, the toniebox instantly becomes a paperweight.
That’s at least an ecological issue, but also a moral issue. I think it’s wrong in 2025 to give objects to our kids that we know have no future.
Disclaimer : someone offered a toniebox to my son so we own one. I agree it’s a good product.
But there was an opportunity to make it working fully offline and they decided not to for money reasons. The figurines could have had some mb of embedded memory, it’s not like they were cheap to buy.
Unfortunately, all memory degrades over time, especially the "modern" multi-level flash chips.
The fact these things work at all is a miracle of engineering and binning.
I'd vastly prefer being able to load an SD card in it instead of having it connect to the wifi, though.
I'm also in the process of trying to get my extended family to record something about their life for sort of an oral family history yoto card.
It's not, I've tried.
When you buy their blank cards (~£2 each last I checked) they come with a unique URI pre-flashed, that contains a form of unique identifier, what you're buying when you buy their blank cards is a licence (to the online storage, 500MB I think), when you scan it, it activates on your account and you now have a physical card linked to a virtual card/allowance; though you can also link existing digital cards (already scanned on your phone) to a physical card (still has to be one of theirs), in which case you don't benefit from the storage.
I ripped one of my daughter's favourite CDs and uploaded it through the app to link to a blank card I bought from Yoto.
1. Use NXP TagWriter to format card to NDEF format. 2. Use Smart NFC tools app to copy from existing MyYo card to new one. 3. Using the Yoto app, Play the playlist on the target Yoto. This will trigger the tracks to download onto the YoTo. 4. Make sure all tracks are downloaded onto Yoto before inserting new card.
Smart NFC tools: https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/smart-nfc-tools-read-write/id1...
NXP Tag writer: https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/nfc-tagwriter-by-nxp/id1246143...
After a few years now with two kids using Yoto, however, I think it is a little overkill to go this route and the reduced friction of using Yoto’s own cards makes it worth it, despite the cost. But this may help others who use them differently than we do!
Could you confirm whether this will do that? Much appreciated.
My children absolutely adore their Tonuino box, and the community around the project is fantastic, constantly sharing creative and impressive builds. If you're a bit handy and enjoy a good DIY project, I highly recommend checking it out. https://www.voss.earth/tonuino/
So we bought them a cassette/CD player from Sony for €100.
The idea that you’d buy a speaker with super expensive and proprietary figurines is a bit crazy to me.
Just like Nintendo Switch cartridges, kids can borrow the figures to each other. And here in northern Germany, we even have a public library where you can borrow a selection of figures for free (up to 2 at a time, up to 2 weeks). That means apart from the pricey initial purchase, you can get a wide variety of content legally for free, if you're willing to accept the slight inconvenience of renting/returning the figures in person. Plus no spyware, no notifications, no ads, no subscription. It's superior to YouTube kids in every way.
The toniebox can be put into an offline mode, plus I'm blocking the Mac address on my router. The box works fine, you can download new content (for which, of course, you must temporarily remove the above restrictions) and all my kids are doing with the box is put a tonie on top.
I'm all for privacy, especially wrt. to my kids, but I find this box less intrusive than their grandmother with her WhatsApp account.
Built one for my niece. She liked it.
Yes, it’s not selfhosted and autonomous. But it’s a pretty neat service.
Making your own cards is awesome and the players themselves are very repairable and sound great.
Jake (Yoto daily podcast guy) is a legend in our house.