Privacy policy
1. Who we are
Sprell is made by Sprell Limited, a company registered in England and Wales (company number 17509243), whose registered office is 225 Gray’s Inn Road, London WC1X 8RH. In this policy “we” and “us” means Sprell Limited, and “Sprell” means the app.
We are registered with the UK Information Commissioner’s Office, registration number ZC269681.
Questions about privacy, or a request about your data: privacy@sprell.app. We aim to reply within one month.
2. The short version
Your adventures stay on your phone. Sprell has no accounts, and we never receive your routes, stops, notes or anything else you log.
To show maps and suggest nearby places, the app asks online services for map pictures and place lists. Those requests show roughly where you are, and in one case exactly where. Section 4 lists each one.
We don’t use analytics, advertising or tracking tools, and we don’t sell data.
3. What Sprell keeps on your phone
Everything below is stored only in the app’s own storage on your phone. We can’t see it.
| What | Why |
|---|---|
| Your route: positions with times, recorded while an adventure is running | To draw your map, distance and pace |
| Steps, from your phone’s step counter | To show steps and award badges |
| Stops you name, notes you write, and sets you log at festivals | To show them on your map and cards |
| Drinks, water and food you log | To count them, remind you to drink water, and award badges |
| Challenges, badges and festivals | To show your progress |
| Your avatar’s look and your settings | So the app looks the way you set it |
| The month and year you were born | To check you’re 16 or over, and if you’re 16 or 17, to leave alcoholic drinks out of the drink list and start cards with the ends of your route hidden |
| Place lists for areas you’ve checked in, kept for up to two weeks | So repeat check-ins are quick and work offline |
| A list of the last 20 app errors | To help find the cause if you report a problem; the app doesn’t send it anywhere |
It stays until you delete it. You can delete a single adventure in History, or everything at once in Settings › Delete all my data, and removing the app deletes everything it stored. You can export your history as a file at any time.
4. What leaves your phone, and who receives it
Sprell sends requests to the services below. Like any web request, each one includes your phone’s internet (IP) address and the time.
| Service | What it receives | When | Can you avoid it? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Map pictures: Esri (USA) | The area of map on screen, which shows roughly where you are or were | When a map is open, and when you make a card with a route | Yes: turn location off or the map off on cards |
| Place squares: our place lists, hosted by GitHub (USA) | Which square of the map you’re in: about 100 m across in busy city centres, up to 25 km in the countryside | When you check in, unless that square is already on your phone | Yes: type the stop’s name instead |
| Place search fallback: Overpass API, run by FOSSGIS e.V. (Germany) | Your exact position | Only when you check in outside the UK, or when our place squares can’t be reached | Yes: type the stop’s name instead |
| Android backup: Google | A copy of the app’s storage, including your adventures | Only if backup is turned on in your phone’s settings | Yes: in your phone’s backup settings |
| Apps you share to | The card, route file or history file you choose to share | Only when you share or save one | Yes: don’t share |
Place names come from OpenStreetMap, © OpenStreetMap contributors.
Your phone’s own location services (Google or Apple) work out your position. They are covered by their own privacy policies.
Cards you save go to your phone’s photo gallery (Pictures › Sprell), and exports go to your Downloads (Downloads › Sprell). Other apps you allow to read those folders can see them, and they stay after you delete the adventure or the app.
5. Permissions the app asks for
| Permission | Why | If you say no |
|---|---|---|
| Location | To record your route while an adventure is running, including with the screen off | Adventures still work, with no route, map or nearby places |
| Physical activity | To count your steps | No step counts |
| Notifications | For water reminders, quick logging, and the notice Android requires while your location is tracked | No reminders or quick log; the tracking notice still shows |
| Photos you pick | To put your own photo behind a card | You can still make route cards |
While an adventure is running, Android shows a notification saying Sprell is tracking your adventure. It goes away when the adventure ends. If you turn on Quick log in Settings, a second notification with buttons to log a drink or water shows while an adventure is running, on your lock screen too. You can say no to notifications altogether: tracking still works, and Android shows its location symbol instead.
6. What we don’t do
- No accounts: the app never asks for your name or email.
- No analytics, crash reporting or advertising tools in the app or on this website.
- No selling, renting or sharing of data for advertising.
- No profiling or automated decisions about you.
If we add accounts, backups or usage statistics in future, we’ll update this policy first and ask for any consent the law requires.
7. This website and the launch list
sprell.app is hosted by Cloudflare (USA). It sets no cookies and runs no analytics or advertising, and its fonts come from this site, not from a third party. To deliver the pages and protect the site, Cloudflare handles your internet (IP) address under its own privacy policy. We keep no logs of visits.
If you join the launch list, we keep:
- your email address;
- when you joined;
- the words on the form you agreed to (“One email when Sprell is live. That’s all.”);
- which form you used (the top or bottom of the home page, or the try-again page).
We use it for one thing: to email you once when Sprell is available to download. Our legal basis is your consent. The list is stored in Cloudflare’s database service, and nobody else gets it. We delete the whole list within 30 days of sending that email.
You can change your mind at any time: email privacy@sprell.app and we’ll take you off the list.
8. Our legal basis
Where UK data protection law applies to the requests in section 4, our basis is legitimate interests: showing you a map and suggesting nearby places is how the app works, and each request carries only what’s needed for it. For the launch list, it’s your consent (section 7).
Everything else in section 3 stays on your phone and is controlled by you.
9. How long things are kept
- On your phone: until you delete it or remove the app. Saved cards and exported files stay in your phone’s folders until you delete them.
- Android backup: for as long as Google keeps your phone’s backups.
- Requests to the services in section 4: each service keeps its own server logs under its own policy. We keep no logs of these requests ourselves.
- The launch list: until 30 days after the launch email, or until you ask us to remove you.
10. International transfers
Esri, GitHub and Cloudflare are in the USA, and FOSSGIS is in Germany, so requests to them, and the launch list, can be handled outside the UK.
11. Your rights
Under UK data protection law you can ask to see, correct, delete or move personal data an organisation holds about you, and object to how it’s used.
Because your adventures stay on your phone, you can do most of this yourself in the app:
- See and move: History › Export history saves everything as a file.
- Correct: undo a log straight after you make it, and change your settings and look at any time.
- Delete: delete an adventure in History, everything in Settings › Delete all my data, or remove the app.
Apart from the launch list, if you’ve joined it, we hold nothing else about you. If you think we do, or you have any other request, email privacy@sprell.app.
You can also complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office at ico.org.uk or on 0303 123 1113.
12. Age
Sprell is for people aged 16 and over. When you first open it, the app asks for the month and year you were born and keeps them only on your phone (and in any history file you export). If you’re 16 or 17, the drink list leaves out alcoholic drinks, and cards start with the beginning and end of your route hidden. We don’t knowingly let anyone under 16 use Sprell.
13. Changes to this policy
We’ll update this policy when the app or this website changes how it handles data, and show the new date at the top. If a change affects you significantly, such as adding accounts, we’ll tell you in the app before it takes effect.