The legality of corporal punishment of children varies by country. Corporal punishment of minor children by parents or adult guardians, which is intended to cause physical pain, has been traditionally legal in nearly all countries unless explicitly outlawed. According to a 2014 estimate by Human Rights Watch, "Ninety percent of the world's children live in countries where corporal punishment and other physical violence against children is still legal". Many countries' laws provide for a defence of "reasonable chastisement" against charges of assault and other crimes for parents using corporal punishment. This defence is ultimately derived from English law. As of 2026, only one (France) permanent member of the United Nations Security Council along with three (adding Germany and Japan) of seven G7 members and seven (adding Argentina, Brazil, South Africa and South Korea) of the 20 G20 member states have banned the use of corporal punishment against children.

Countries (or territories) that have (or will have) completely prohibited corporal punishment of children are listed below (in chronological order):

Banned in 1813, school corporal punishment was re-legalised in 1817 and punishments by physical pain lasted until the 1980s. The instruments were rebenques, slappings in the face and others. All corporal punishment was prohibited by a law in 2014 which came into force in January 2016.

In Australia, corporal punishment of minors in the home is legal, provided it is "reasonable". Corporal punishment in public schools is illegal in all states, and in private schools it is only allowed in Queensland. Parents who act unreasonably may be committing an assault. The Australian state of Tasmania is continuing to review the state's laws on the matter, and may seek to ban the use of corporal punishment by parents. The matter is also under review in other Australian states. A 2002 public opinion survey suggested the majority view was in support of retaining parents' right to smack with the open hand but not with an implement, although as of 2010^[update], there are no laws against using an implement in any state or territory. In New South Wales, S61AA of the Crimes Act (1900) allows a parent a defence of lawful correction. In New South Wales, one specifically cannot smack a child on the head or neck, and the child cannot be more than briefly harmed or bruised.

School corporal punishment was explicitly prohibited in Austria in 1974. In 1977, corporal punishment in the home was outlawed by removing the section in the constitution of assault in the Penal Code that stated that parents who have used "reasonable punishment" of their children shall not be punished for assault. On 15 March 1989, corporal punishment of children became explicitly banned through a new law stating that "using violence and inflicting physical or mental suffering is unlawful".

Corporal punishment in schools was banned in Belarus during the Soviet era, however it was decriminalized after its authoritarian president Alexander Lukashenko took power in 1994. It is only permitted for male students older than 14. It cannot be inflicted on girls. School beltings are rare in major cities and remain much more common in rural areas, where parents tend to raise their children in more conservative manners. In 2018, Lukashenko rejected the bill that would have outlawed corporal punishments for minors both in educational facilities and at home, arguing that he himself belted his children in their adolescence to discipline them.^{[citation needed]}

In Canada, parents may use physical force to discipline their children, including spanking, but there are several restrictions.

Section 43 of the Criminal Code provides that parents may use "reasonable" force as a form of discipline. The constitutionality of this provision was challenged in the courts, on the basis that it infringed the rights of children, contrary to three sections of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms: the right to security of the person, protected by section 7 of the Charter; the right to be free from cruel and unusual treatment and punishment, protected by section 12 of the Charter; and the right to equality (specifically, age), protected by section 15 of Charter. In 2004, the Supreme Court of Canada dismissed the constitutional challenge on all grounds, on a 6–3 split, in Canadian Foundation for Children, Youth and the Law v. Canada.