I was disappointed at first, because brand new these are no softer than a T-ball, but more expensive. After some use, however, the ball broke in and became softer. My 6 y.o. was afraid of the ball, and would shy away from it. After the ball bounced off his glove a couple of times and hit him in the face and realized it wasn't as hard or painful he started going to the ball. Within a month he was regularly catching and stopped shying away from it. Get this and break them in. Fantastic for learning to catch and playing indoors.
I bought these a few years ago to help teach my oldest son how to catch, they were great. I ordered another set for my youngest son but these showed up very different. The first set was soft, these ones are overstuffed and are basically as hard as a baseball (which defeats the whole purpose).
If you are looking to introduce your children into baseball I would highly recommend getting a Swax baseball. It has the same weight as a regular baseball but with the added benefit of being padded.It is perfect for learning how to catch a ball especially for younger kids that are not very well coordinated, my 6 and 8 year old are getting better confidence at catching different ball variations without the risk of getting too badly hurt if they miss.While this is not as solid as a traditional baseball it can still hurt if you throw it with a decent amount of speed.If you are looking to do anything else besides playing catch, I don't know how durable this ball would be for hitting,
