Privacy Policy

The short version

Solmate uses your information to run your account, size sessions to your skin and the UV where you are, keep your history, connect you with friends, and answer the questions you ask Sol. Some of it is sensitive, like your skin and sun-sensitivity answers. Most of it is stored on our servers, not only on your phone; your progress photos and Notes for Sol are among the things that stay on the phone. We don't sell personal data and we don't run ads. The app counts how it's used with one analytics service, PostHog, never with your photos, chats or location, and you can turn that off in the app. This website uses no analytics or advertising tools.

Solmate is operated by Master Software Solutions LLC (“we”, “us”). Questions about this policy go to support@usesolmate.app.

What we collect, and why

Your account

Your email address, the display name and username you choose, and your settings. If you use Sign in with Apple, Apple shares your name and an email address, which can be a private relay address; we also keep an encrypted Apple authorization so we can disconnect Sign in with Apple if you delete your account, and only our account-cleanup service can use it. Sign-in codes are emailed to you and expire after an hour. Setup saves your answers as you go, under an account created when you claim a username, before you add an email.

Our email provider tells us whether each email we send you was delivered, bounced or marked as spam. We keep that record with the email's subject and a scrambled form of your address, never the address itself, so we can spot sign-in emails that aren't arriving.

Your age

We ask your age in years (not your birth date) and use it to decide which features you can use. See Age below.

Skin and sun answers

Your skin type, how you burn, your current and goal shade, anything that makes you more sensitive to the sun (such as a recent sunburn, a skin condition, a medication or a history of skin cancer, if you tell us), your sunscreen habits, the products you use, and when you're usually free. This is health-related information. We use it to size your sessions, run your plan and answer your questions, and never for advertising.

Sessions, plans and your Tan Diary

For each session or log: when it started and ended, its type, the UV and the dose Solmate estimated, the sunscreen you declared, whether you were with friends, and, if you chose Tan anyway on a rest day, what you confirmed. Your plan and its settings, and your Tan Diary entries: how your skin feels, sun without sunscreen, the SPF you wore, water, and any note you write.

Location

If you allow it, Solmate reads your location only while you're using the app, asking iOS for an accuracy of about a kilometre; you can pick a city instead. A Quick start shortcut uses the last location saved on your phone. We use your location to get the UV and weather where you are: your approximate coordinates, rounded to about a kilometre, go to our server, which asks Apple WeatherKit for the forecast, and we don't store those coordinates with your account. When you finish a session, we save its city, country and coordinates rounded to about a kilometre, which your history, trips and Tan Passport are built from. Your phone looks up place names with Apple's map service, and keeps your saved places and your last location on the phone.

Photos

Profile and cover photos are uploaded to our storage and served from public links, so anyone who has the link can open them. Pick ones you're happy to share.

Progress and session photos stay in Solmate's storage on your phone, and in your phone's backups. If you're 18 or older, you can send a progress photo for a shade estimate: before anything is sent, the app says the photo goes to OpenAI and asks you, every time. Tap Scan & analyze or Analyze photo and a copy of that one photo goes through our server to OpenAI, without your notes, answers or chats; or keep the photo on your phone and choose a shade yourself.

We don't keep the copy: our server passes it to OpenAI and doesn't save it. OpenAI processes it under its API data policies, with response storage turned off (see Who handles it for us), and deleting your account can't recall a copy that was already sent. A shade estimate describes how the photo looks; it doesn't diagnose your skin, can't establish your skin type or how easily you burn, and doesn't change your answers or your exposure limits.

Ask Sol

Ask Sol is for adults 18 and over with Premium. Before your first question, the app asks your permission once and lists what each question sends; nothing goes to OpenAI until you allow it. We save that you allowed it, and when, with your account. You can turn Ask Sol off anytime in Profile → Privacy, which clears that record, and nothing more is sent until you allow it again.

Each time you ask a question, your message and recent chat go through our server to OpenAI, with a snapshot of your Solmate account so Sol can answer about you: your name and setup answers (including skin type and sun sensitivity), your goal, sunscreen and products, today's plan, the UV now and for the next six days, the last 7 days of sessions and diary entries (notes included), your streak, weekly UV and rest timing, Passport cities, saved places, the place and time zone Sol is reading, reminder settings, Premium and badge status, how many friends you have, and your Notes for Sol. It doesn't include your photos, only how many you have and your latest shade. Messages are also checked by OpenAI's moderation service. We save your questions and Sol's answers so you can reopen them. Notes for Sol are kept on your phone and leave it only as part of a question. AI answers can be wrong and aren't medical advice.

Contacts, if you choose

If you tap Find friends from Contacts, your phone turns each phone number and email address in your contacts into a hashed code and sends only those codes to find matching accounts. We don't keep them. Hashing isn't anonymity: the code for a known number can be matched. So that matching works, we keep the same kind of code for your own email address and phone number, which lets people who have them in their contacts find you. Only adult accounts are suggested this way. You can add friends by username, code or QR without sharing contacts.

Friends and rooms

Your friends and requests, who you follow and who follows you, nudges, blocks, the group rooms you host or join, and the songs you add to a room's queue. If you report someone, we keep your report and any details you add so our team can review it.

Music

If you connect Apple Music, Solmate reads your library playlists on your phone and plays music through Apple Music. Playlists you save in Solmate (song titles, artists and song identifiers) are stored on our server.

Purchases

Apple takes payment for subscriptions; we never see your card. RevenueCat tells the app which subscription you have, using your purchase history and your Solmate account ID. We keep your subscription status and a record of subscription events, such as a renewal, under that ID.

Notifications

A push token for your device, so we can reach it. Notifications from our server, like a friend's nudge, are delivered through Apple's push service and can include that friend's name; reminders such as flip cues are scheduled on your phone. We may also send occasional announcements. You can turn notifications off in iOS Settings.

Your app version

When you're signed in, the app tells our server which version of Solmate and of iOS your phone runs, at most once every 30 minutes, and we keep the last time it did. It shows us when an old version can safely be retired and who that would affect. Turning off Share usage analytics in Profile → Privacy stops it. It isn't used for advertising, and it's deleted with your account.

Support, feedback and this website

Bug reports and suggestions you send from the app (a bug report includes your app version, iOS version and device model), and messages you send through this website's contact form: your name, email, topic and message, which go to our support inbox so we can reply. This website doesn't use advertising or analytics cookies.

How Solmate is used

The app counts how it's used with PostHog, an analytics service in the United States, so we can see what to make better. It records events such as which setup screens are shown, when an account is saved or a username claimed, what happens on the Premium screens (which plan is tapped, and whether a purchase finished, was cancelled or failed), when a session or log starts and is saved (its type and length), and when Ask Sol, a face scan, Learn, a friend request, a follow, a group room, music or the notification prompt is used, plus when the app is installed, updated, opened or sent to the background. Each event carries technical details such as the app version, iPhone model, iOS version, screen size, language and connection type, and a random ID the app makes for that phone.

Until you save your plan, these counts aren't linked to any account. Saving your plan ties them, and the ones after, to your Solmate account ID, with your plan (free, trial or Premium), your age group (13–17 or adult) and the app version. They never include your email, name, username, photos, chats, location, skin or sun answers, or anything you type. PostHog receives your IP address with each connection; we've set it not to keep it or work out a location from it. There's no session recording and no recording of your taps.

To stop it on a phone, turn off Share usage analytics in Profile → Privacy. It stops at once and stays off on that phone, even after you sign out. We also learn from the records above (for example, how many sessions are run), a few in-app events such as sharing a gift code, and counts of AI requests and their size, without their content. An optional diagnostics log you can turn on in the app stays on your phone unless you share it.

How we use it

• Run your account and the features you use, sized to your skin, the UV and your age.
• Show friends and followers what you've chosen to share.
• Answer your Ask Sol questions and analyze the photos you choose to send.
• Know which subscription you have.
• Send sign-in codes and the notifications you've switched on.
• Keep Solmate safe: enforce our terms, review reports and prevent abuse.
• Answer support messages and fix problems.
• Understand, in aggregate, how Solmate is used so we can improve it.

We don't sell personal data, share it for advertising, or use it to build advertising profiles.

Who handles it for us

These providers process information on our behalf to run Solmate. They may process it in the United States and other countries.

• Supabase hosts our database, file storage, sign-in and server functions.
• OpenAI writes Ask Sol's answers, checks messages with its moderation service, and estimates the shade in photos you choose to analyze. Our requests turn off OpenAI's response storage, but that isn't a promise of zero retention: OpenAI handles API data under its data controls.
• RevenueCat keeps track of your subscription status.
• PostHog (United States) counts how the app is used, as described in How Solmate is used.
• Apple handles App Store payments, Sign in with Apple, push notifications, WeatherKit forecasts for the coordinates our server sends, Apple Music if you connect it, and place-name lookups on your phone.
• Resend delivers the emails with your sign-in codes.
• Vercel hosts this website and processes technical data such as IP addresses to deliver it.

What other people can see

• People who find you by your exact username or friend code see your name, username, profile photo and cover photo, so they can send a request.
• Friends also see your streak and, with Premium, your badge.
• Friends see that you're out in the sun, and when you started, if Show friends when I'm tanning is on. They get a notification when you start a session if Notify friends when I start a session is on. Both start on for adults and off for ages 13–17, and both are in Profile → Privacy.
• Your Tan Passport (the cities you've tanned in, each with its first visit and tallies of sessions, minutes and UV, plus your streak) is shown to people who follow it. Adults can be followed without approval; ages 13–17 can be followed only by accepted friends.
• People in a group room with you see your name and photo and, while you're both in the room, the timing of your timer: not your dose, location, notes or photos.
• Never your coordinates, session history, diary, progress or session photos, or conversations with Sol.

Age

Solmate is for people 13 and older, and we don't knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. From 13 you can use guided plans and timers (sized gentler under 18), logs, Quick start, friends and the Tan Passport. Tan anyway, Ask Sol and photo analysis are for adults 18 and over. For ages 13–17, sharing that you're out in the sun and notifying friends start off, only accepted friends can follow your Passport, and your account isn't suggested to others through contacts.

If you believe someone under 13 is using Solmate, email support@usesolmate.app so we can review and delete the account. Please don't send a child's photo or documents with a first message.

How long we keep it

• Your account data stays until you delete your account, and is then deleted as described below.
• If you start setup and stop before adding an email, the username you chose is released after 48 hours. The answers saved during that setup stay on our servers until the unfinished account is deleted; email us and we'll delete it.
• Usage analytics are kept in PostHog for up to a year, then deleted.
• Bug reports and suggestions you send from the app are deleted with your account. Messages sent through this website's contact form aren't linked to an account, so they stay in our support inbox until we delete them; email us and we'll delete yours.
• Reports, and the records of our safety and moderation decisions, are kept to keep Solmate safe, as described below.
• Records of whether our emails were delivered, bounced or marked as spam are deleted after 90 days.

Deleting your account

In the app, open Profile → Delete Account. You can also email support@usesolmate.app from the address on your account.

Deleting your account removes from our servers your profile (name, username, age, skin and sun answers and settings), your profile photo and cover photo, your sessions, plans, trips and Passport stamps, your Tan Diary, your conversations with Sol, your friends, follows, requests, nudges and blocks, the rooms you host and your place in others' rooms, the songs you added to room queues, your saved playlists, your push tokens, the bug reports and suggestions you sent, notifications about you waiting in other people's history, and your sign-in account. Your username is released straight away. On your phone, Solmate deletes its own copies of your photos and account data; photos you saved to your camera roll stay there.

Some records stay after deletion:

• Reports made by or about you and our review notes, with the link to your account removed. Details typed into a report may still identify someone.
• Records of moderation and staff-access decisions, with the link to your account removed. Their written reasons may mention you.
• Messages you sent through this website's contact form.
• Counts of AI requests and records of notification deliveries, without their content and with the link to your account removed.
• Notifications that already reached other people's phones, which can include your name. We delete them from our servers, but we can't take back one that has already arrived.
• Subscription event records, with your account ID replaced by a random placeholder that can't be traced back to you. RevenueCat and Apple keep their own purchase records.
• Usage analytics already sent, under your former account ID, which no longer leads to an account, until PostHog deletes them after a year. Email us and we'll delete them sooner.
• Copies of your profile and cover photos can stay in web caches for about an hour.
• If Sign in with Apple can't be disconnected straight away, the encrypted authorization stays for up to 30 days while we retry, and is removed once it succeeds or that time is up.

Deleting your account doesn't cancel an App Store subscription. Cancel it in your Apple Account settings.

Your choices

• Change location, contacts, camera, photos, notifications and Apple Music permissions in iOS Settings at any time.
• In Profile → Privacy, choose whether friends see you're out, whether they're notified when you start, whether people can send you friend requests, whether that phone shares usage analytics, and, for adults, whether Ask Sol is on.
• Edit your profile and setup answers in the app, or delete your account there.
• Email us to ask for a copy of your information or to have it corrected or deleted. Depending on where you live, you may have further rights over your information; we'll respond as the law where you live requires.

Security

Information travels to our servers over encrypted connections, and access rules in our database keep each account's data to that account and the people it chooses to share with. Authorized Solmate staff can see account and support information when they need to, for support and safety. No system is perfectly secure, so please tell us at support@usesolmate.app if you find a problem.

Changes to this policy

When this policy changes, we'll update the date at the top. If a change is significant, we'll also tell you in the app or by email before it takes effect.

Contact

Master Software Solutions LLC operates Solmate. Write to support@usesolmate.app or use the contact form.