1. The short version
- Your garden lives on your device. With BeeWise Member+ it is also stored on our servers, so it syncs between your devices.
- When you use an AI feature, the information that feature needs is sent to an AI provider to produce the answer. No provider we use may train on it.
- We use analytics to see how BeeWise is used and to improve it. You can switch this off in the app.
- We don't show ads or sell your data. The only marketing email we send is the beta invitation and launch news you ask for by joining the waitlist.
- You can delete your account and its data at any time in Profile → Account Settings.
2. Who we are
BeeWise Gardener ("BeeWise", "we", "us") is responsible for your personal data under UK data protection law (the UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018). Contact us at privacy@beewisegardener.com.
3. What we collect
- Account: your email address and, optionally, your name. If you sign in with Apple or Google, we receive the name and email they share (Apple may give us a private relay address).
- Your garden: gardens, beds, plants, tasks, notes, projects, preferences, and what you've done in your garden over time.
- Photos of plants and beds, including photos you share in chats with Bea.
- Location (optional): a place you type, or your device's location. Device location can be accurate to a few metres, which may reveal where you live. We use it for weather, frost and climate information.
- Chats with Bea: your questions and the answers.
- Voice (Member+): your recording is turned into text. We don't keep the recording.
- Usage: the screens and features you use, your device type and app version, and errors.
- Help and purchases: how much help you have left, subscription status and purchase history. We never see your card details.
- Feedback you send in the app, and emails you send us.
- Waitlist (this website): your email address, the page you joined from and the website that sent you there, and, if you choose to answer, what you'd like help with, what you grow in, and whether we may contact you about a short chat.
4. Where it's kept
- Everyone: your garden records, photos and chats are stored on your device and work offline.
- Guests and free accounts: garden records and photos stay on your device. We hold your account details, a guest or account ID, how much help you have left, and your garden's location and climate details if you set a location.
- Member+: your garden records, photos and chats with Bea are also stored on our servers so they sync.
- Shared gardens: members of a garden you share can see and edit what's in it, including its location and photos.
Our servers are provided by Supabase, in London.
5. How we use AI
Plant identification, Bea (the gardening companion), suggested tasks, garden insights, plant research and inspiration use AI models. Each one is sent only what it needs, such as the photo, your question, and the relevant details of your garden.
Our main models are Google's Gemini, reached through OpenRouter or directly from Google, with OpenAI as a backup. OpenRouter passes each request to a company that runs the chosen model, and we only allow it to use companies that neither store nor train on requests. Voice input is transcribed by Deepgram, and spoken replies are produced by ElevenLabs or through OpenRouter. None of these providers may use your content to train their models. Some may keep a request for a short time, typically up to 30 days, to detect abuse.
AI can be wrong. Always check before eating a plant or handling one that may be harmful. We don't make decisions about you by automated means that have legal or similarly significant effects.
6. Analytics, and your choices
We use PostHog, hosted in the EU, to count how features are used, measure performance and catch errors. It keeps an identifier in a cookie and in your device's storage, and records are linked to your account or guest ID, not your name or email. We have set it not to store IP addresses.
On this website, PostHog counts page visits and beta sign-ups by page. It uses no cookies and stores nothing on your device, and a sign-up is recorded without your email address.
We also keep a record of each AI request in PostHog, including the text of your Head Gardener questions and the answers, so we can check and improve the quality of BeeWise's advice.
You can switch analytics off in the app, in Profile → Legal → Privacy Policy.
Turning this off stops usage analytics from your device. To also stop AI request records being kept, or to have your existing analytics data deleted, email privacy@beewisegardener.com.
Everything else BeeWise stores on your device is essential: your sign-in, guest and device IDs, your garden data, and cached images and app files for offline use.
7. Our legal reasons
- To run BeeWise for you (your account, garden, sync, AI features, weather and your help allowance): to perform our contract with you.
- Device location, camera, microphone and task reminders: with your consent, given in your device's permission settings and withdrawable there at any time.
- Analytics, AI request records, error reports and security: our legitimate interest in running and improving BeeWise. You can object at any time.
- Purchase and tax records: legal obligation.
- Waitlist: your consent. We use it only to invite you to the beta, tell you when BeeWise launches and, if you ticked the box, to ask about a chat. Every email lets you unsubscribe.
8. Who we share it with
These providers process data for us, only as described here:
- Supabase: servers, sign-in and storage (UK)
- Google: Gemini AI models, and Google Maps to suggest and look up places you type
- OpenRouter: routes AI requests, as described in section 5
- OpenAI: backup AI models
- Deepgram and ElevenLabs: voice input and spoken replies
- PostHog: analytics and error tracking (EU)
- RevenueCat: subscriptions and extra help packs
- Open-Meteo and OpenStreetMap: weather, climate and place names, from coordinates or place names only
Apple and Google handle app store payments under their own privacy policies. Plant reference images load from sources such as GBIF and iNaturalist, and garden photos from Unsplash and Pexels. They see your device's IP address, as any website would, and Unsplash counts how often its photos are viewed (Unsplash's privacy policy). We may disclose data where the law requires, or to a buyer if BeeWise is ever sold, and this policy would still apply.
9. Outside the UK
Some providers process data in the US or elsewhere. Where they do, we rely on the protections UK law requires, such as the UK–US Data Bridge or the ICO's International Data Transfer Agreement. Ask us for details.
10. How long we keep it
- Account and garden data on our servers: until you delete your account. We then delete your account, garden data, photos and chats straight away, and they leave our backups within 30 days. Plants, beds and tasks you added to someone else's shared garden are deleted too, with their photos.
- On your device: until you sign out, reset the app's data, or uninstall it.
- Voice recordings: not kept.
- Analytics and AI request records: kept while they help us improve BeeWise. They aren't deleted automatically with your account; email us and we'll delete them.
- Purchase records: as long as tax law requires.
- Waitlist: until six months after the app launches, or sooner if you unsubscribe or ask us to remove you.
11. Your rights
You can ask to access, correct, delete or receive a copy of your data, to restrict how we use it, or object to our use of it. You can also withdraw consent at any time. Most changes you can make in the app. For everything else, email privacy@beewisegardener.com, and we'll reply within a month. You can also complain to the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk (0303 123 1113), though we'd welcome the chance to help first.
12. Security, children and changes
Data is encrypted in transit and at rest, and access controls mean other users can reach your data only in gardens you share with them. If a breach affects you, we'll tell you where the law requires.
BeeWise is for adults (18+), and we don't knowingly collect children's data.
If we change this policy, we'll update it here and change the date at the top. For significant changes, we'll tell you in the app first.
If you test pre-release versions through Apple's TestFlight, feedback you send there, with the name and email Apple provides, goes to our issue tracker, Linear.