Actually there are many ways to set parental controls on device and lock them with a passcode or you could use third party solution that use the Screen Time API but are compatible with Android.
It literally is though. The link "Learn more about Parental Controls" takes you here https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201304 which walks you through doing all the setup.
That walks me through doing things on an iPhone I don't own, what am I missing? The familylink.google.com page lets me manage my kids' devices directly on that webpage, which is the feature I would like Apple to have.
People have said you can manage it on the kids' device directly by logging in with your AppleId, but that doesn't help me if my kid is out and messages me asking me to allow an app or give her an extra half hour of screentime or something.
You do it on the iOS device you’re trying to set screen time limits on. If you don’t own an iOS device, you’re not going to be setting limitations on an iOS device.
The disconnect in your answers probably come from each other's expectations.
Parent mentions Google family link, whih can be setup and managed from litteraly everywhere. There's an iOS app and a fully functional website, so you can have no other android device than your kids, and still control everything.
Your kid can be visiting their grand parents and ask you to authorize some purchase or extra screen time, you'll be able to do it from your Windows computer.
That's the standard iOS' parental control is compared to.
Right, that was the point of the parent comment that started this, I wish there was a web app to do this like Google has. And someone replied saying there is, and linking to instructions on how to use an iOS device, which is exactly not what the original comment was about.
Well I have another iPhone and it's not much better, it's frequent that app install requests will get lost for hours. And there's no obvious way to go look for pending notifications, you need to wait for it to show up again.
Parenting controls still have a long way to go on Apple devices, but still it's miles ahead of other stuff (looking at you Netflix/Disney Plus).