Toy age ratings are safety guidance, not a schedule. They tell you when something stops being a choking hazard, not when a baby will enjoy it.
What follows is roughly when things get interesting. Babies vary enormously and none of this is a milestone chart — if you're comparing your child against a list, this isn't the list to use.
0–3 months: contrast and being held
Very little is needed here, which nobody believes until afterwards. A newborn's world is faces, voices and being carried. Toys are largely for the adult's benefit.
If you want something: a soft, lightweight animal to have around. It won't be played with. It'll be present, which is how favourites start.
3–6 months: grabbing
Hands arrive. Everything within reach goes to the mouth, and that's the point — the mouth tells them more than their hands can.
Useful now: things light enough to lift and safe to chew. Knitted animals, small plush with no hard parts, anything with a texture. Floor time starts mattering, so a padded mat earns its place and keeps it for two years.
6–9 months: cause and effect
The big shift. They work out that they can make something happen, and then want to make it happen four hundred times.
This is when activity toys start to land — gears that turn, beads that slide, a latch that opens. Sitting usually steadies around here, which changes what's possible: a baby who can sit can use both hands.
9–12 months: in, out, and knocking over
Containers become fascinating. Things go in other things and come back out. Stacking toys arrive now, though for months the game is demolition rather than construction — knocking the tower down is the first half of the skill, not a failure of it.
Movement takes over too. Soft play tiles and floor surfaces matter more than toys for a while, and most tile sets are rated from around ten months.
12–18 months: carrying, posting, pushing
Everything gets transported. A toddler will move objects from one room to another with real purpose and no explanation.
Balance and stacking toys come into their own. So do things to push. Pretend play is still ahead — a toy kitchen at twelve months is storage with a door.
18 months–2 years: pretend begins
Now the miniature versions of real things make sense. Wooden pots and pans, tools, tea sets. They've watched you do it for eighteen months and are ready to copy.
This is also when open-ended toys pull away from the rest — the same stacking arches become bridges, tunnels and fences.
The pattern worth noticing
Almost everything useful arrives about three months later than the box suggests, and stays about two years longer than you'd expect.
Which argues for buying slightly ahead and buying plain. The toy bought for now is outgrown by spring. The toy bought a size too old sits in a basket for a season and then gets used until school.