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Your runs stay yours

Privacy Policy

Effective

Waybound was built so your runs never have to leave your phone. This policy explains exactly what the app keeps, where it lives, and the few times anything is sent anywhere.

01The short version

  • Your data stays on your iPhone. There is no Waybound account and no Waybound server that stores your runs, routes, heart rate or progress.
  • We do not track you. The app contains no advertising, analytics or tracking SDKs, and we do not sell your personal information or share it for advertising.
  • You decide what leaves your phone. A share link carries only the run or find you chose, inside the link itself, with the start and end of your route trimmed away.
  • Deleting is simple. Waybound has no online account. The Delete account button in Settings erases your runs, Journal and progress, and deleting the app removes everything else it stored.

02Who we are

Waybound is made by DesignX LLC (“we”, “us”), a company based in the United States. DesignX LLC is responsible for (the “controller” of) the personal information described in this policy. This policy covers the Waybound app for iPhone, its iMessage sticker pack, and this website, including the pages that open when someone shares a run or a find.

If you have a question about this policy or your data, email support@waybound.app.

03Information the app keeps on your device

Waybound stores the following on your iPhone, in the app's own private storage. We do not receive a copy.

Activities
For each run or walk: the GPS route (a series of locations with timestamps), distance, duration, pace, splits, elevation, best efforts, an estimated calorie count and, if you use one, heart rate readings from your monitor. The name you give an activity.
Profile
Your display name, an optional profile photo you choose from your library, and an optional short bio. A standard body weight is used on device to estimate calories.
Setup answers
What you tell Waybound when you first open it: whether you run or walk, how many days a week you are active, your usual distance and what motivates you. These size your first expedition.
Game progress
Your expeditions, discoveries, Journal, companion, XP, levels, goals and streaks.
Settings
Units, display and sound preferences, your maximum heart rate, and the identifier of the heart-rate monitor you paired so it can reconnect.
Stickers
A list of the creatures you have unlocked, kept in storage shared only with Waybound's own iMessage sticker pack on the same device.

04Permissions and how they are used

iOS asks for your permission before Waybound can use any of these. You can change your choices at any time in the iPhone Settings app.

Location
Used to show where you are on the Record tab, to measure distance and draw your route while you record a run or walk, and in the background during a recording so a run is not cut short when your screen is off. iOS shows a location indicator while this happens. Waybound does not use your location in the background when you are not recording.
Bluetooth
Used to connect to a heart-rate monitor, such as a chest strap or armband, so your runs record heart rate, including in the background while you record so heart rate keeps logging with your screen off. It is not used to find your location.
Photos
Used when you choose a profile picture, and when you ask Waybound to save a share image or flyover video to your library.

Waybound does not use motion data, does not ask for access to your camera, microphone, contacts or Apple Health data, and does not send notifications.

Your precise location and heart rate are sensitive. They are processed only on your iPhone to provide the features you use, and we do not use or disclose them to infer characteristics about you.

05Services your device contacts

Some features need to load content from outside providers. When that happens, the provider receives the technical information any web request carries, such as your IP address and device type, plus what is being asked for.

OpenFreeMap
Serves the map tiles the app draws its maps from. To show a map, your device requests the tiles for the area on screen, which on the Record tab and while you record is the area around your current location; the small route thumbnails in your activity list are drawn on your device from the same tiles. OpenFreeMap receives your IP address and the tiles requested, and no account or identifier of ours. See the OpenFreeMap website.
Email
If you email us, the message is stored with our email provider, which processes it on our behalf to deliver and store messages.
Apple
Apple distributes the app through the App Store and runs the services iOS provides. If you have chosen to share analytics with app developers in iOS settings, Apple may give us aggregated, anonymous usage and crash statistics. See Apple's Privacy Policy.

We do not control these providers, and their use of the information is governed by their own policies.

06When you share

Sharing is always your choice, one run or one find at a time.

  • Share links. A link to a run carries its name, the exact start date and time, distance, duration, elevation gain, your average heart rate if the run recorded one, your units, the place name shown on the activity if it has one, and a simplified route. The first and last 200 m of the route are removed so the link does not point to where you started or finished, and routes shorter than 600 m are not included at all. A link to a find carries the creature, its rarity and whether it is Fabled, when you found it, and the world and terrain it was found in. Both carry only the first word of your display name.
  • Heart rate. Heart rate is health information. If a run recorded heart rate, its average is part of that run's link, so by sharing the link you choose to make that figure visible to anyone who has it. When the link is opened, our host processes it only to draw the page, and request logs that contain it are deleted within 30 days. See Consumer health data. We do not use it for any other purpose. If you would rather not share it, share an image instead of a link. We cannot recall links already sent.
  • Precise location. A run link contains a simplified version of your route, which is precise location information. It is included only when you choose to share that run as a link, and that choice is your consent to include it. Our host processes it only to draw the page. To keep your route off our host entirely, share an image instead.
  • Think before you share a route. Even with the ends trimmed, a route, its place name and start time can suggest where you regularly run. Take care when a run starts near your home.
  • The data is inside the link. It is encoded into the web address itself. We do not store it on a server, which also means we cannot edit or withdraw a link after you send it. Anyone who has the link can open it.
  • Images, videos and stickers. Share images and flyover videos are made on your device and go wherever you send them through the iOS share sheet, or into your Photos library if you save them. Stickers are sent through Messages like any other sticker.

07This website

This website is hosted by Vercel. Like any web host, Vercel receives standard request information when you visit, including your IP address, browser type and the address requested, which for a share link includes the shared data. When a share link is opened, or when a messaging app fetches it to draw a preview, our host decodes the link to draw the page and its preview image on request. Nothing is saved from it beyond the host's request logs, which are used to deliver and secure the site and are kept for no more than 30 days.

The site sets no cookies and runs no analytics or advertising scripts. Because we do not track you across sites or apps, there is nothing for Do Not Track or Global Privacy Control signals to switch off, and we treat every visitor as having opted out. Some messaging and social apps fetch a shared link on their own servers to build a preview and may keep a copy under their own policies; we do not control that. A shared run page loads its interactive map from OpenFreeMap (map data © OpenStreetMap contributors), terrain from the AWS Open Data terrain tiles, and the MapLibre map library from jsDelivr. Those services receive your IP address and the map area being viewed.

08Consumer health data

This section is our consumer health data privacy policy for the purposes of laws such as Washington's My Health My Data Act, Nevada's SB 370 and Connecticut's consumer health data provisions.

  • What it is. Heart-rate readings from a monitor you pair, and figures derived from them such as average heart rate, heart-rate zones and estimated calories.
  • Where it lives. On your iPhone. We do not receive it when you record.
  • The one time it reaches us. When you share a link to a run that recorded heart rate, that run's average heart rate is inside the link. When someone opens the link, our host, Vercel, processes it on our behalf to draw the page, and request logs containing it are deleted within 30 days.
  • How it is used. Only to show the page you chose to share. We do not sell it, use it for advertising, or share it with anyone except our host.
  • Your choices. Share an image instead of a link to keep heart rate out of it. To ask about or delete health data we hold (normally there is none), email support@waybound.app. If we decline your request, you may appeal as described in Your rights.

09How information is used

The information Waybound keeps is used only to run the app for you: recording and showing your activities, moving you along your expedition, choosing discoveries, tracking goals and progress, and making the things you choose to share.

We do not use your information for advertising, we do not build profiles about you, and we do not track you across other companies' apps or websites. We do not sell or share personal information, or use sensitive personal information to infer characteristics about you, as those terms are defined under California law. Waybound makes no automated decisions about you.

We may disclose information we hold, which is limited to support email and short-lived website request logs, if the law requires it, to protect the rights, safety or security of our users or others, or as part of a merger, acquisition or sale of assets, in which case this policy continues to apply to it.

10If you contact us

If you email us, we receive your email address and whatever you include in your message. We use it only to reply and to help you, and we delete the conversation when it is no longer needed for that, normally within 24 months of our last reply.

11Retention and deletion

Data in the app stays on your device until you delete it. You can remove a single activity from its detail screen, or erase everything:

  1. Open Waybound and go to the Profile tab.
  2. Tap the settings button in the top corner.
  3. Scroll to the bottom, tap Delete account and confirm.

Waybound has no online account; the button labeled Delete account is how you erase the app's data. It erases your profile, activities, expedition, Journal and progress. Your profile photo file and the list of unlocked stickers stay on the device until you delete the app. Deleting the Waybound app from your iPhone removes everything the app stored, including those. Images or videos you saved to Photos stay in your library until you delete them there. If your iPhone is backed up to iCloud or a computer, app data can remain in those backups until they are replaced. There is more help on the Delete your data page.

12Your rights

Depending on where you live, you may have rights to access, correct, delete or port your personal information, to object to or restrict processing, and to complain to a data protection authority. Because Waybound keeps your data on your device rather than with us, you can see, change and delete it directly in the app. If you want help exercising any right, email support@waybound.app and we will respond within 30 days.

If you live in a US state with a consumer privacy law and we decline a request, you may appeal by replying to our answer with the word “Appeal”. We will respond within 45 days. If you disagree with the outcome, you may contact your state attorney general.

Where the EU or UK GDPR applies, DesignX LLC is the controller. We rely on our legitimate interests to answer support email, to keep this website secure through request logs, and to load maps from the providers named above so the app and share pages can show them. Heart rate in a share link is the exception: it is processed on the basis of your explicit consent (GDPR Article 9(2)(a)), given when you choose to share a link that includes it. You can withdraw consent for future sharing at any time by sharing images instead of links; links already sent cannot be recalled.

Your route and other run details in a share link are processed on the basis of your consent (GDPR Article 6(1)(a)), given when you choose to share a link.

We have not appointed a representative in the EU or UK, because the processing we do ourselves is occasional, does not include large-scale processing of special category data, and is unlikely to result in a risk to your rights and freedoms.

13Children

Waybound is not directed to children under 13, or under the age of digital consent where they live (up to 16 in some countries of the European Economic Area), and we do not knowingly collect personal information from them. If you believe a child has sent us personal information, contact us and we will delete it.

14Security

Your Waybound data is protected by your iPhone's own security, including your passcode and the device encryption iOS applies to app data. Because we do not keep your runs on a server, we do not keep a database of your activities. The only data we hold is support email and short-lived website request logs. Keep your device up to date and protected with a passcode.

15International transfers

DesignX LLC is based in the United States. The providers described above may process request information in the United States and other countries. Where information is transferred out of the EEA or UK, our providers rely on the EU–US Data Privacy Framework or Standard Contractual Clauses.

16Changes to this policy

If Waybound changes in a way that affects your privacy, for example by adding an account or a new service, we will update this policy and the date at the top before that version of the app is released, and for significant changes we will say so on this website and in the app's release notes.

17Contact

DesignX LLC
Email: support@waybound.app