PRIVACY POLICY

Last updated: 2026-05-14

Softly is designed to collect as little data as possible. This page explains exactly what happens when you use the app.

Short version

  • The app works fully without an account. Sign In with Apple is optional — only used to remember your free-forever early-member status across reinstalls.
  • No analytics, no advertising SDKs, no tracking pixels.
  • Your preferences, downloads, and playback state live only on your device.
  • When you press play, your device streams audio from our content delivery network (Cloudflare R2). Cloudflare may log the IP address of the request for abuse prevention per its own policy.
  • We don't sell anything to anyone.

What the app stores on your device

  • Playback preferences: your last-selected sound, volume, and sleep-timer choice. Stored in Expo's on-device key-value store.
  • Downloaded audio files: when you tap Download on a variant, the MP3 is saved to your app's private Documents directory so the sound works offline. Delete individual downloads from the player, or all downloads from Settings → Downloads → Clear all downloads.
  • Locale: the app reads your device's language setting to show the right translated text. This value never leaves your device.

None of the above is ever transmitted to us.

If you choose to Sign In with Apple

Softly offers an optional Sign In with Apple step during onboarding. Signing in locks in your "free forever" early-member status — when we add a paid tier in the future, members who signed in before the cutoff keep full access at no cost. Signing in is not required to use the app.

When you sign in we receive, from Apple:

  • An Apple-generated user ID — a stable identifier unique to your Apple account and to Softly. It is not your Apple ID email or name; it's an opaque token.
  • Your name, if you choose to share it — Apple shows you a one-time prompt where you can edit, anonymise, or omit the name. Stored only to address you by name later (e.g. a welcome email).
  • Your email, if you choose to share it — you can use Apple's Hide My Email relay, in which case we never see your real address. Stored so we can email you (very rarely) about your membership status.

The record lives in a Cloudflare D1 database on our Cloudflare account, restricted to the Apple user ID plus the optional name/email above plus the timestamp of when you signed up. There is no behavioural data, no playback data, and no device identifiers in this record.

You can request deletion of this record at any time — email [email protected] from the address you used to sign in (or any address, if you'll include the name we have on file). We aim to delete within 7 days.

What we receive when you stream audio

When the app needs to play a sound it hasn't downloaded yet, it requests the audio file from our CDN. That request goes through Cloudflare's network. Cloudflare sees:

  • The URL of the requested audio file
  • Your IP address
  • Standard HTTP request headers (User-Agent, etc.)

We do not run our own analytics or tracking on top of this traffic. Cloudflare's own logging and data-handling practices are governed by Cloudflare's Privacy Policy .

What we do not collect

  • Phone number, address, date of birth
  • Age, gender, or other demographic information
  • Device identifiers (advertising ID, UDID, IDFA)
  • Location
  • Contacts, photos, microphone
  • Usage analytics (no event tracking, no session recording)
  • Playback history or sound preferences (these stay on your device)
  • Crash reports (at launch; we may add opt-in crash reporting in a future version — we'll update this policy before doing so)

The only personal data we ever receive is the optional Apple-generated user ID plus optional name/email if you choose to Sign In with Apple — see the section above.

The softly.cc website

softly.cc loads two analytics tools to help us understand which articles and sounds people find most useful so we can build more of what works:

  • PostHog — aggregate, pseudonymous page-view and event analytics. No personally identifying information is sent.
  • Google Tag Manager (GTM) — a tag-loading container we use to deploy and configure measurement tags. GTM itself does not collect personal data, but the tags it loads may (for example, Google Analytics for aggregate traffic measurement). GTM runs inside a sandboxed web worker via Partytown so it cannot block the main thread or read sensitive page state.

To opt out, enable your browser's "Do Not Track" or "Global Privacy Control" signal, or use a content blocker — both PostHog and the GTM container honour those signals. The mobile app does not load PostHog or GTM and has no analytics whatsoever.

Children's privacy

Softly is rated 4+ and is appropriate for all ages. Because we don't collect any personal information from any user, we don't collect personal information from children.

Background audio

iOS grants Softly the audio background mode so playback can continue when the screen is locked. This permission is only used to keep audio going; it does not grant the app any ability to record, transmit, or process audio.

Third-party services

  • Cloudflare R2 — stores and serves the audio files consumed by the mobile app.
  • Cloudflare Pages — hosts the softly.cc website.
  • Cloudflare Workers + D1 — handles the optional Sign In with Apple membership ledger described above.
  • Apple — Sign In with Apple — only if you choose to sign in. Subject to Apple's Privacy Policy.
  • PostHog — aggregate, pseudonymous analytics for softly.cc (not the mobile app).
  • Google Tag Manager — tag-loading container for softly.cc only (not the mobile app). Subject to Google's Privacy Policy.

No ad networks, no payment processors.

Your rights

If you have not signed in with Apple, the mobile app collects no personal data — there's nothing to request, export, correct, or delete. If you'd like to remove everything Softly has stored on your device, uninstall the app — iOS will delete all of the app's sandboxed storage.

If you have signed in with Apple, you can email [email protected] to request export or deletion of your membership record. You can also revoke Softly's access to your Apple ID at any time from Settings → [Your name] → Sign-In & Security → Sign in with Apple → Softly on your iPhone — that revocation is independent of any request to us.

For the website, PostHog offers a way to reset the pseudonymous ID at any time by clearing your cookies for softly.cc.

Changes to this policy

If we materially change this policy — for example, if we ever add opt-in crash reporting or analytics to the mobile app — we'll update the date at the top, note the change in the app's release notes, and leave a one-line summary of what changed at the top of this page.

Contact

Questions, concerns, or requests? Email [email protected], or write to:

Apostle Digital — Softly Privacy
6 Middlemiss Street
Lavender Bay NSW 2060
Australia

We read everything and aim to respond within 7 days.