Russia unbans Roblox after 63,000 children wrote letters of complaint, half saying they wanted to leave the country

Russia restored access to Roblox on Wednesday after concluding the company had complied with local legal requirements, the Interfax news agency reported. The gaming platform had been blocked since December 3, cutting off an estimated 18 million monthly users, most of them children and teenagers.

The Digital Ministry said Roblox had implemented “a comprehensive set of measures to further protect children” and committed to combating “the spread of inappropriate content on the platform.” Under the agreement, Russian users will be sorted into age-specific categories, including Roblox Kids for ages five to eight and Roblox Select for ages nine to 15.

63,000 letters

The ban triggered one of the more unusual protest campaigns in recent Russian history. Ekaterina Mizulina, head of the Kremlin-aligned Safe Internet League, said she received 63,000 letters from children aged eight to 16, with half expressing a desire to leave the country.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov confirmed the presidential administration was “flooded with complaints” but played down the emigration claims. “They don’t write about leaving Russia, but they do write about this game,” he said.

Why Russia banned it

Communications watchdog Roskomnadzor blocked Roblox in December, citing content that could “negatively impact the spiritual and moral development of children.” The regulator also accused the platform of hosting extremist materials and content classified as “LGBT propaganda,” which Russia criminalised in 2023.

Roblox was the most downloaded mobile game in Russia in 2023. Banning it removed one of the most popular digital platforms for Russian children overnight.

What Roblox agreed to

The company acknowledged shortcomings in moderating in-game content and securing user chats, according to Roskomnadzor. It agreed to bring its operations into line with Russian law, including implementing the age-based account structure that Roblox had already been rolling out globally.

Roblox Kids disables all chat by default and restricts content to games rated Minimal or Mild. Roblox Select, for older children, allows more content but with tighter parental controls than standard accounts.

The stock moved

Roblox shares jumped as much as 5.37% on Tuesday after reports emerged that Russian agencies were seeking to lift the ban. The stock was trading at approximately $43.70 in New York on Tuesday morning, according to Bloomberg.

Russia’s 18 million monthly users represent a meaningful slice of Roblox’s global base of more than 100 million daily active users. Restoring access removes a headwind that had been priced into the stock since December.

The flags

Russia’s stated reasons for the ban, child safety and inappropriate content, overlap with concerns raised by regulators in Europe and the US. But Russia also cited “LGBT propaganda” and “extremist materials,” categories that reflect the Kremlin’s broader censorship agenda rather than standard content moderation.

What “compliance with Russian law” means in practice has not been detailed publicly. Roblox has not confirmed whether it agreed to restrict or remove specific content categories for Russian users, or whether the age-based rollout it was already implementing globally was sufficient to satisfy Roskomnadzor.

The reversal came after sustained public pressure from children and parents, not after a regulatory review found the original ban unjustified. Russia’s Digital Ministry framed the outcome as Roblox meeting its demands, but the timeline suggests the political cost of angering millions of young users played a role.