Privacy Policy

Last updated: 26 October 2026

The short version: your health and personal data stay on your device. Step Step has no accounts, advertising or cross-app tracking. Version 1.5 sends limited anonymous usage analytics by default to help improve the app, and you can turn this off at any time in Settings.

What Step Step reads

With your permission, Step Step reads from Apple Health on your device:

• Steps, walking/running distance, flights climbed, exercise minutes and active energy
• Workouts (including routes recorded by other apps or Apple Watch)
• Heart rate, resting heart rate and workout effort
• Body weight, body fat percentage, waist circumference and height
• State of Mind entries you create in Step Step
• Water you've logged, in Step Step or another app, to show your daily water total and past days

During a workout you record with Step Step, the app may also use (with permission):

• Location: to show the workout setup map and record outdoor routes and distance. During an outdoor workout you start, route recording continues while your phone is locked, and iOS shows the location indicator. Location use stops when you end the workout.
• Motion & fitness: to count steps and estimate indoor distance.
• Bluetooth: only if you connect a heart-rate monitor.

What Step Step writes

With your permission, Step Step saves to Apple Health: workouts you record, missing steps and workouts you enter manually (including any distance, active energy, elevation and effort you choose to provide), weight, body fat, waist and workout-effort entries you log, water you log, and State of Mind entries. Apple Health is the single source of truth, so deleting data there deletes it for Step Step too.

Where your data lives

• Health data never leaves Apple Health. Step Step reads it live and never copies it to any server. Small derived summaries (for example, today's step count for your home-screen widget, or your streak length) are stored on-device only.
• App data (goals, medals, streak shields, fasts, preferences) is stored on your device. iCloud Backup (Settings → Apple Health, on by default, can be turned off) copies the app's own records to your personal iCloud account so they survive a reinstall or a new phone: which medals you have earned and when, your streak shield state, the date you started using the app, your goals and step goal history, and the start and end times of your fasts. It goes through Apple's iCloud infrastructure to your account only; we have no server and can't see it. It never uploads measurements from Apple Health, workout details, fasting notes, weight goals or your profile.
• Manual workout names and notes stay in Step Step on your device. Step estimates are calculated on-device, are editable, and are saved to Apple Health as manually entered data.
• Photos you attach to workouts stay in the app's on-device storage.
• Free route flyovers: if you don't have Pro, Step Step remembers which workouts have used a free flyover, so the free allowance isn't reset. This is stored on your device. Only while iCloud Backup is on, it may also sync through iCloud key-value storage to your personal iCloud account, as a non-reversible digest rather than workout identifiers, routes or any Health data.
• Activity status choices such as Sick, Injured or On a Break, including their dates and history, are stored on your phone. If you use the Step Step Apple Watch app, the selected status and protected dates are sent directly to your paired Watch so its icons match the phone. They are not written to Apple Health or included in analytics, purchase-service attributes, or the app's iCloud backup.
• Diagnostics record app lifecycle events and errors. In App Store versions they never include health measurements, workout identifiers or health-history dates. TestFlight beta versions may also record step counts, workout distances and workout types to help diagnose problems. They are stored on your devices. Apple Watch diagnostics are periodically copied to your paired iPhone so you can review them. Available logs may be attached when you prepare a support email, or shared from Settings → About → Device Logs; you choose whether to send them.

Anonymous usage analytics

From version 1.5, anonymous analytics are on by default. You can turn them off at any time with the Help Improve the App switch in Step Step's Settings → Privacy. From version 1.8, Step Step uses PostHog's EU cloud (data stored in Frankfurt, Germany) to process:

• Which Step Step screens are viewed, which selected features are opened (such as the Pro plans page or a share screen), and how far setup gets (which setup page was reached: started, the Apple Health page, calibration, the step-goal page, the notifications page, finished; reaching a page says nothing about what you chose there, including whether you allowed Apple Health access or notifications)
• Which features are used, recorded as simple events, counts and option choices. For example: whether What's New was read to the end or its review button tapped; whether an Activity Status change, manual entry, or a shield you protected or reclaimed by hand was saved; whether water was logged (and from which tile or sheet) or the day's water goal was reached; whether a fast was started or ended, a fasting challenge joined (which one) or a workout planned; whether Map Privacy settings were changed (how many hidden places, counted as 0, 1, 2 or 3 or more, and whether every route's start and finish are trimmed); which workout share card and size were used, and whether the route's start and finish were hidden; and, for route flyovers, whether one was played (as the tutorial, a free one, an already unlocked one or with Pro, plus how many free flyovers are left), whether the Pro preview was shown, whether the flyover tip was closed, and which options a flyover video was exported with (camera, height, map style, terrain and speed). These events never contain an amount of water, a time or date, a fast's length, a distance, a route, a place, a status choice, an entry value, or anything you type or share.
• The current Off, Gentle or Strict streak preference when you use the app, and changes between these preferences
• When you use the app, two yes/no facts about Step Step on your active Apple Watch: whether the Step Step watch app is installed, and whether a Step Step complication is on the current watch face. No readings, identifiers or Health data from the watch are included.
• The time of each event and a random session identifier
• App version and build, operating-system version, device model, and whether the app came from the App Store or TestFlight
• App language, locale, time zone and screen size
• A random identifier created on your device when analytics first starts, which helps count distinct installations without identifying you

We never include Apple Health data, step counts, workouts, routes, location, body measurements, goals, profile details, photos, notes or anything you enter. We do not send your name, email address, Apple ID or advertising identifier. Analytics are not used for advertising or tracking you across apps or websites, and they are not linked to your identity.

PostHog is set to discard IP addresses, and Step Step turns off PostHog's automatic capture, screen recording, surveys, push-notification tracking and user profiles, so it receives only the events above. You can read PostHog's privacy policy. Versions 1.5 to 1.7 used TelemetryDeck GmbH for the same purpose; it no longer receives data from Step Step 1.8 or later. Turning Help Improve the App off stops future analytics collection from Step Step.

On-device AI

Any AI-generated insight (the "coach") runs on-device using Apple's Foundation Models. Your health data is not sent to any external AI service.

Purchases

Subscriptions and in-app purchases are processed by Apple. We receive no payment details. Step Step uses RevenueCat, Inc. to validate purchase receipts, maintain subscription and entitlement status, and provide purchase analytics. RevenueCat receives App Store purchase history, product and subscription status, storefront information, and a randomly generated anonymous app-user identifier. Step Step does not send RevenueCat your name, email address, Apple ID, advertising identifier, Health data, profile details, photos, notes or location. Purchase information is used for app functionality and analytics, is not linked to your identity, and is not used to track you across apps or websites. You can read RevenueCat's privacy policy.

From version 1.8, RevenueCat also sends purchase events, such as a trial starting, a purchase, a renewal or a cancellation, with the product, price, currency and storefront, to Step Step's PostHog project (EU), so we can see how purchases relate to the app. If Help Improve the App is on, these events carry the same random analytics identifier as your app usage. If it is off, they still arrive, but only under RevenueCat's anonymous identifier, so they are not linked to how you use the app. They never include Health data or anything that identifies you.

Notifications

All notifications are scheduled locally on your device (goal reached, streak reminders, weigh-in reminders you enable). There is no push server.

Your choices

• Grant or revoke Health, location, motion and Bluetooth access any time in iOS Settings.
• Turn any notification off in Step Step's Settings → Notifications.
• Turn anonymous analytics on or off in Step Step's Settings → Privacy. It is on by default from version 1.5. Turning it off stops app analytics; purchase events from RevenueCat are then no longer linked to your app usage.
• Delete the app to delete all app data. Your Apple Health data remains yours, in Apple Health.

This website

step-step.app uses Vercel Web Analytics and PostHog (EU cloud, data stored in Frankfurt, Germany) to count page views and clicks on the App Store button. Neither sets cookies or stores anything on your device. They record the page, the referring site, and your approximate country, browser, operating system and device type. Vercel identifies a visit only by a hash that resets every day. PostHog gives each page view a random identifier that is not kept, discards IP addresses and builds no visitor profiles. App Store links on this site may carry a campaign tag naming the page, so Apple can tell us how many downloads came from the website, without identifying you. Read Vercel's analytics privacy information and PostHog's privacy policy.

Children

Step Step is not directed at children under 13 and does not knowingly collect personal information from anyone.

Changes

If this policy changes, the updated version will be posted at this address with a new date. Material changes will be highlighted in the app's release notes.

Contact

Questions? Email support@step-step.app.