Privacy Policy

Effective date: September 10, 2026 Last updated: September 10, 2026

This Privacy Policy explains how Andrew Pierce (“we,” “us,” “our”) handles information in connection with the FreeCal mobile application (“FreeCal,” the “App”) and the website at getfreecal.com (the “Site”).

FreeCal does not require an account. Your food diary and your weigh-ins are stored on your device. The free tier is supported by advertising, which means an advertising SDK runs inside the App and, if you allow it, may collect a device advertising identifier to target ads. We do not sell your data, and we never send your food log, your weight, your targets, or your photos to an advertiser.

1. Information we collect

Information you provide or generate in the App

Nutrition and body data — weigh-ins, calories and macros, food logs, and the targets you set or accept.
Apple Health (HealthKit) data — with your permission, FreeCal reads and writes body weight and nutrition. Data obtained from HealthKit is used only to provide the App’s features, is never used for advertising and never sold, and is handled in accordance with Apple’s HealthKit requirements.
Meal photos — photos you take for calorie estimation. They are sent to our server, relayed to an AI provider for analysis, and not stored by us.
Barcodes — the barcode numbers of products you scan.

FreeCal has no chat, no progress photos, and does not read sleep, heart, workout, or step data.

Information collected automatically

Install identifier — a randomly generated identifier stored on your device and sent to our server only to enforce the per-install photo-scan cap. It is not your name, it is not Apple’s advertising identifier, and it is regenerated if you delete and reinstall the App.
Server log data — our server records basic request metadata (timestamps, the install identifier above, coarse technical data) for security, rate limiting, and reliability.
Advertising data — see Section 3.

The App contains no analytics SDK. We do not collect usage events, screen views, or behavioural analytics of any kind.

Purchases

Purchases are processed by Apple through the App Store. We do not receive or store your payment card details; we receive only whether the No Ads entitlement is active.

On the Site (getfreecal.com)

The Site is a set of static pages. It sets no cookies, runs no analytics, and has no sign-up form. Nothing you do on it is recorded by us.

2. How we use your information

To track what you log and show your totals against your targets.
To estimate your energy expenditure and revise your targets from your weigh-ins and your diary.
To look up the foods and products you search for or scan.
To estimate calories from meal photos.
To enforce the photo-scan cap, rate limits, and prevent abuse.
To operate, secure, and debug the App.
To serve advertising in the free tier, as described below.
To comply with law.

3. Advertising

This is the section that differs most from an app you pay for, so it is set out in full.

The free tier shows advertising supplied by a third-party ad network. That network’s SDK runs inside the App and may collect a device advertising identifier, coarse device and locale information, and the fact that an ad was shown, clicked, or watched to completion.
iOS will ask you once whether FreeCal may track you across other apps and websites (Apple’s App Tracking Transparency prompt). Declining changes nothing about the app: you see the same number of ads, in the same places, less relevant to you. There is also an “Ad personalisation” switch in Settings with the same effect.
Watching a rewarded video grants one photo scan. The reward is recorded against your install identifier on our server so it can be spent once.
We never share your food diary, weigh-ins, targets, meal photos, or Apple Health data with the ad network or any advertiser. The network receives no nutrition or body data.
We maintain a blocklist covering weight-loss, diet-pill, supplement, detox, and before-and-after body advertising. Blocklists are imperfect; every ad has a report path.
The ad network has not been finalised. This section will name the provider, and link its own privacy policy, before the App is released. Until then the App is not published and no advertising SDK is running anywhere.

4. Where your data is stored

On your device. Your diary, weigh-ins and targets live in the App’s local database. FreeCal does not sync them to iCloud or to any server of ours.
In Apple Health, if you grant permission, under Apple’s control and privacy policy.
Data sent to the service providers in Section 5 is processed on their systems under their terms.

We share only what is needed, and none of these providers are permitted to use your data for their own advertising.

Provider	What is shared	Why
AI provider for photo scan	The meal photo you took, and nothing else — no name, no diary, no context	To identify foods and estimate portion weights. Photos are processed and not stored by us. The provider has not been finalised; it will be named here before release.
FatSecret	Food search terms	To look up foods and nutrition information. See FatSecret’s privacy policy.
Open Food Facts	Barcode numbers you scan	To look up packaged foods by barcode. Read-only — FreeCal does not contribute anything back to that database. See the Open Food Facts privacy policy.
Our server host	Request metadata and the content being relayed to the providers above	Search, barcode and scan requests are routed through our own server so third-party API keys stay off your device, and results are cached so repeat lookups are fast.
Advertising network	A device advertising identifier (if you allow tracking) and coarse device data — never nutrition or body data	To serve and measure ads in the free tier. To be named before release.
Apple	Purchase and entitlement status; HealthKit data you permit	Payments and Health integration. See Apple’s privacy policy.

6. Data retention

On-device data persists until you delete it — delete entries in the App, or delete the App.
Meal photos are processed for estimation and discarded. We do not retain them.
Server logs (install identifier, timestamps) are retained for approximately 30 days for security and rate limiting, then deleted.
Cached food and barcode lookups on our server contain product nutrition data only — nothing about you.
Scan-cap records keep only a count against an install identifier, and roll over daily.
Data processed by the providers in Section 5 is retained according to their own policies.

7. Your choices and rights

Tracking — decline the App Tracking Transparency prompt, or turn off “Ad personalisation” in Settings, at any time. You can also change it in iOS Settings → Privacy & Security → Tracking.
Remove ads entirely — the No Ads purchase stops all advertising, and the ad SDK is not asked for an ad at all.
Health permissions — you control Apple Health access in iOS Settings → Privacy & Security → Health, and can revoke it at any time.
Camera and photos — you control these permissions in iOS Settings.
Export your data — Settings → Export my data gives you everything you have logged as a CSV file.
Delete your data — deleting the App removes the local database and everything in it.
Regional rights — depending on where you live (for example the EEA/UK under GDPR, or California under CCPA/CPRA), you may have rights to access, correct, delete, or port your data, and to object to or restrict certain processing. For data handled by us, the data controller is Andrew Pierce (contact below). To exercise these rights, email andrew@getfreecal.com; if you are in the EEA/UK you also have the right to lodge a complaint with your supervisory authority. We do not sell your personal information. If you allow tracking, the advertising identifier may be used for cross-context behavioural advertising by the ad network; declining the prompt, or turning off “Ad personalisation,” stops that.

8. Children’s privacy

FreeCal is not directed to children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from them. If you believe a child has provided us information, contact andrew@getfreecal.com and we will delete it.

9. Security

We use reasonable technical and organisational measures to protect your information, including keeping third-party API keys on our servers rather than in the App, and transmitting data over encrypted connections (HTTPS/TLS). No method of transmission or storage is completely secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.

10. International data transfers

Your information may be processed in countries other than where you live, including the United States, where our service providers operate. Where required, we rely on appropriate safeguards for such transfers.

11. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy from time to time. Material changes will be reflected by updating the “Last updated” date above and, where appropriate, by notice in the App. Your continued use after an update means you accept the revised policy.

12. Contact us

Questions about this policy or your data: Andrew Pierce Email: andrew@getfreecal.com