KidsEmbrace 2-in-1 Belt-Positioning Booster Seat Review

KidsEmbrace 2-in-1 Booster Seat

KidsEmbrace has been making fun featured character car seats for many years, including their 2-in-1 Belt-Positioning booster.  We’ve spend some quality time with their combination car seat and were eager to see how the Justice League booster seat stacks up.

Widest part of the KidsEmbrace booster seat, on the low shoulder wings, is 17 inches wide.

The second thing that’s amazing, and less obvious, is the width. At the absolute widest, this seat is only 17 inches wide. Which honestly surprised me. It looks and acts like a wider booster that has plenty of room through the legs and hips.

My eight year old model never once found the seat uncomfortable.  She’s not super large, but she’s also not petite. It didn’t even occur to me that it would only be 17 inches wide — the seating area is so robust, I thought it would be much wider. With the cupholder attached, the seat is widest there at 20 inches across.

Typos on the labels. A “Backl” booster and requiring the child to be “3857 inches” to use.

I had a very interesting time with the manual and labels for this seat. The booster I received directly from KidsEmbrace included a manual that had typos and errors on nearly every page. There were spelling and typo errors on the labels as well.  While that was frustrating, we want to be clear — KidsEmbrace was very receptive to our feedback.  They redid the manual twice while we conversed on the subject.

If we were to hand out the very first CSFTL Manufacturer Most Receptive to Feedback award, it would go to KidsEmbrace for the way they responded to our concerns over the manual and the labels.

I don’t know if there will be a recall on the booster seats that ship with this really terribly written manual and typo filled labels. They are certainly not FMVSS213 complaint.

If you have a booster with these issues, please report the seat to NHTSA at https://www-odi.nhtsa.dot.gov/ivoq/Complaint.cfm, and contact KidsEmbrace for a new copy of a compliant manual.

KidsEmbrace booster in high back mode.

This seat is a traditional high back booster without lower anchors. Simply place the booster seat on the vehicle seat, thread the vehicle seat belt through the shoulder and lap belt guides, then buckle the child in. That’s it!

Our 8 year old model was able buckle herself into this seat in a variety of cars.  The booster is also light enough that if she did have to move it over a bit to access a buckle, that was very easy for her to do herself.

Like any seat booster that doesn’t have this booster should be buckled in when not in use to prevent it from becoming a projectile.

KidsEmbrace booster seat backless mode

In backless mode, this booster is what our young reviewer describes as a “plopper.”  Just set the booster seat on the vehicle seat, have the child sit on it, and then buckle them in or have them buckle themselves in. The backless mode belt path is open enough that most children should be able to route the vehicle seat belt appropriately with ease.  The belt guide is not so high that the armrests are uncomfortable or bulky for our passengers. As with any booster that has no lower anchors, it should be buckled in when not in use to prevent it from becoming a projectile.

KidsEmbrace Booster: 6 year old doll

When our 6 year old Huggable Images doll tried this seat, the vehicle seat belt fit was absolutely textbook perfect. The shoulder belt touches the collarbone and crosses it at the middle, and the lap belt is low on the hips and high on the thighs. The only downside is that my 6 year old sized doll is about to outgrow this seat in high back mode.

My 8 year old is too tall to comfortably sit back for a photo of the KidsEmbrace Booster Seat.

Here’s where we run into some trouble. My 8 year old model weighs 70 pounds and is 50 inches tall.  She wears a size 8 shirt so her torso is average for her age. She has long outgrown this booster in high back mode.

The lowest shoulder belt guide height is 16 inches, the highest is 18 inches high.  There are four notches in between those heights at nearly half an inch intervals.   That’s a 2 inch difference between the lowest and the highest settings.   Most booster seats on the market right now have a larger gap between the lowest and highest settings so a child can use it for a longer time.

She can’t even sit back in it to pretend to fit so I could get a picture.  When we were working on this review, she scooted her bum very far forward to get her shoulders to fit under the headwings.

If your child has an average to long torso and you’d want to use a high back booster past 6 years old, this is not the booster for you.

The least smug smile I could get out of her. Using the backless booster and belt guide on her shoulder.

Our model remains 8 years old, still weighs 70 pounds and is 50 inches tall.  The backless mode offered her a solid belt fit. In backless mode, the attached shoulder belt guide adjuster is required.

The good news is that it’s easy to use. It slides onto the shoulder portion of the adult seat belt and then it is adjusted to your child’s seated shoulder height.  She had no problem getting in and buckling herself in with the adjuster attached to the shoulder belt.

KidsEmbrace booster seat shoulder belt adjuster

It took a few moments to set it up for her but once it was set, we didn’t have to move it until she had a growth spurt and needed to move it up a bit.

Gap behind the KidsEmbrace booster seat.

The lap belt fit through the backless booster’s belt path is textbook perfect.

The biggest downside my 8 year old commented on for the backless booster was that because of the shape of the booster, and the shape of most cars’ backseats, there is a gap behind the booster that she could feel. She found this uncomfortable, but not so bad that she couldn’t use the seat. She did not complain about the holes for the back to connect to the backless portion, just the gap behind the whole thing. If you have a more flat curve to your backseat than I do, this may not be something your child notices at all. If you have a very curved backseat (like a sports car’s bucket seats in the back), this booster may not actually fit at all. In my car this was more of a problem than in my husband’s car.

I wish my model found this seat more comfortable in backless mode, but that’s more an issue of a square-ish booster trying to fit into a curved backseat space.  It’s not the first booster my family has used where that has been an issue.

The date of manufacture is a small white label on the underside. The seven year expiration is mentioned in the manual.

Expiration: The expiration is listed in the manual as seven years from the label on the seat. The label is located on the underside of the seat, nearly smack in the middle.

The manual storage location.

Manual Storage: The manual is stored under the trim cover on the outside of an armrest on the backless booster.

This seat is not certified for use in aircraft. These are more typos on the labels.

FAA Approval: Like all booster seats, this seat is not aircraft approved because it requires a lap and shoulder belt for use and airplanes only have lap belts. This is mentioned on the labels and in the manual.