Merorme — Privacy Policy

Version 2026-10-07. This describes what happens to your writing.

The short version

Merorme has no server, no analytics and no account of its own: if you sign in with Apple, all the app keeps from it is an anonymous identifier, on your iPhone. Your journal is stored on your iPhone and, if you use iCloud, in your own iCloud account. We never receive a copy of it. There is nothing on our side to read, to sell, to hand over, or to lose. Four things can leave your iPhone, none of them to us, and each is described below: where a photograph was taken, to Apple's map, to learn the place's name (a switch you can turn off); the area on screen, to Apple's map, while you look at the map of your photographs' places; where you are, to Apple's weather service, to show the weather under the journal's date, when you ask the journal about the weather and, if you turn on the morning weather note, each time you open the app; and the words of an entry you have not sent yet, to your own other devices through Apple's Handoff. A fifth leaves only if you turn it on: what you write, to Apple's Private Cloud Compute, while Apple's cloud model writes the replies (You → Replies). A sixth leaves only while you are signed in to Game Center: a won round's result — a time, a score, a run of words found — to Apple's Game Center leaderboards, and the achievements your rounds earn, to your Game Center profile. A seventh leaves only while replies are on: a question about the world that the model on your iPhone cannot answer, alone, to Apple's Private Cloud Compute — and that reply says so.

What we collect

Nothing. We do not collect your name, your email address, your location, your contacts, your device identifiers or your usage. There is no sign-up form and no account with us to attach anything to.

Signing in with Apple

Merorme does not ask you to sign in, and works the same without it. If you sign in with Apple in You › Apple Account, it asks Apple for nothing — not your name and not your email address — and of what Apple returns it keeps one anonymous identifier, on your iPhone, to check that you are still signed in. We never receive it. Delete everything removes it, and you can stop using Sign in with Apple for Merorme in your Apple Account's settings at any time.

What stays on your iPhone

Everything you write, every photograph you attach, every word you speak to it, every mood you set, and everything the app works out from them — the search index, the memory of what keeps coming up, the replies. All of it lives in the app's own storage on your device. The sound of your voice is never kept: it is turned into words on your iPhone and released.

iCloud

If iCloud is on for Merorme, your journal syncs through your iCloud account so your own devices agree with each other — and so do the games' rounds of the day and your scores in them. That is between you and Apple; we have no access to it and no way to read it. Turning iCloud off for Merorme stops the sync and leaves the journal on the device.

Game Center

If you are signed in to Game Center on your iPhone, a won round's result — Nines' time, a Doubles or Tempo score, Letters' run of words found — goes to that game's leaderboard in Apple's Game Center, under your Game Center name, for other players to see as Game Center shows them; and an achievement your rounds have earned — a game's first win, a clean win, five wins in a row, every game won — goes to your Game Center profile. Nothing you write goes with either, and nothing else of the games. Sign out of Game Center in Settings and nothing more goes.

A word about iCloud Backup

Your iCloud backup is encrypted, but unless you turn on Advanced Data Protection in your iPhone's settings, Apple holds a key to it. We cannot turn that on for you, and we will not claim a protection you have not enabled. Settings → your name → iCloud → Advanced Data Protection. We recommend it.

The replies

Mero's replies are written by Apple's model on your iPhone unless you turn on Apple's cloud model (below). With it off, your writing is not sent to us, to Apple, or to anyone else to produce them, and if your phone is in aeroplane mode the model still works — with one exception, written on the reply itself (Answered by Apple's cloud model · only your question was sent): when you ask about the world, such as who sang a song or what happened on a date, and the question holds nothing of your journal and the model on your iPhone does not know, that question alone, with today's date, is sent to Apple's cloud model (Private Cloud Compute) to be answered. Nothing else of your journal goes with it. Replies are off until you turn them on, and you can turn them off again at any time.

Apple's cloud model

Off until you turn it on (You → Replies). When it is on, the replies — and what the journal picks from an entry to keep or to follow up — are written by Apple's larger model on Apple's servers, Private Cloud Compute: your entry's words, what the journal gives the reply with them and the photograph the reply looks at are sent there for that request, and nothing is sent to us. Apple states that Private Cloud Compute uses that data only to do what was asked, keeps it only until the answer is returned, and never makes it available to Apple, its staff included. With it off, every reply is written on your iPhone, but for the question about the world above.

Replies read aloud, and talking with the journal

A reply can be read aloud in one of the voices on your iPhone, and you can talk with the journal instead of typing. What you say is turned into words on your iPhone and the reply is spoken on your iPhone; nothing you say or hear is recorded or sent. If you allow it, a reply can be read in your own Personal Voice; iOS asks you first, and it is spoken on your iPhone like any other voice.

Health data

If you allow it, Merorme reads a few figures from the Health app — steps, exercise minutes, time in daylight, resting heart rate, heart rate variability and hours asleep — and shows them to you. They are read fresh each time and never stored by Merorme, never synced, never included in an export, and never given to the model. Not even a summary of them. Merorme never writes anything to Health. You can withdraw that permission in the Health app at any time.

Photographs

A photograph you attach, or take with the camera, is stored with the entry on your device. If the photograph carries the coordinates of where it was taken, those are kept with it in your own storage so a place can be part of your own record. A photograph you take with Take a photo is also added to your Photos library, as the Camera app would add it: iOS asks you once before Merorme adds anything, and Merorme never reads your library. If you have allowed Merorme your location, the place where you took it is written into it, as the Camera app writes one, and it is treated like any photograph's place (below). Taking a photograph never brings up iOS's location question: without that permission, the photograph is kept with no place.

Who is in a photograph

Apple's face grouping, on your iPhone, tells Merorme when the same person appears in more than one photograph you attach, so the journal can ask you who they are and remember the name you give. Merorme receives no image of a face and no measurement of one — only a label Apple makes — and it never puts a name on someone you have not named.

Naming a place from a photograph

This is the one thing in Merorme that sends anything about a photograph off your iPhone, and it is a switch you can turn off: You → Naming places from photographs. While it is on, and only when a photograph's own file records where it was taken, the app sends that coordinate to Apple's map and asks what the place is called. It asks once for each place rather than once for each photograph, it keeps only the name, and it never asks for or keeps a street address, a phone number or a business. With no signal it does not try and nothing is sent. Turn it off and nothing about where your photographs were taken leaves this iPhone; the journal asks you what a place is called instead, and a name you give it yourself is always the one it uses.

The map of your places

Timeline → Places shows your photographs where their own files say they were taken. To draw it, your iPhone loads Apple's map for the area on screen, from Apple, as any map does, and only while you are looking at it. Apple receives that area; it does not receive your photographs, which of them are where, or their coordinates. A photograph whose file says nothing about where it was taken is not on the map.

The weather

To show the weather under the journal's date, Merorme asks iOS for your location — only while you are using the app — when the journal opens, and again once Apple's reading has expired, and sends it to Apple's weather service to read the weather where you are now. When an entry asks about the weather, that reading, or a new one, goes into what the journal is given for that reply, on your iPhone. The location is kept nowhere and no place name is worked out from it. If you decline, nothing is read and nothing is sent; the weather under the date can be turned off (You → Notifications → Morning weather). Apple's weather data is credited in the app.

The morning weather note

Off until you turn it on (You → Notifications → Morning weather). While it is on, each time you open Merorme it asks iOS for your location and sends it to Apple's weather service to read the coming days' forecast; the note is written on your iPhone from that forecast and the name you gave, with no model involved, and shown as a notification at the time you chose. The location is kept nowhere. Turn it off and nothing is read or sent for it.

Follow-ups

When an entry says what you will do, whom you will call or see, where you are going or how you feel, the model that writes the replies picks those sentences, and your iPhone keeps them as you wrote them, with the moment to ask about them — in the app's own storage on this device, never in iCloud. At that moment the journal asks how it went, in the journal and in a notification from your iPhone. The notification shows your words only if you turn on Show what it asks about; follow-ups can be turned off (You → Notifications → Follow-ups), and one can be set aside from its menu in the journal (Stop asking about this).

Your calendar

Off until you turn it on (You → Calendar). When it is on and an entry asks about your calendar or your plans, or names a meeting or an appointment beside a day, Merorme reads the events of the days it names — their titles, times and places — from the calendars on your iPhone, and gives them to the journal's reply with your entry. With follow-ups on too, up to three of the day's events are asked about, each once, an hour after it ends: the title and the time are kept with the follow-ups, on this device only. Merorme keeps no other copy of your calendar: the events are read fresh for each reply, and a reply that mentions one is kept like any other reply. Merorme never adds, changes or deletes an event. iOS asks you once, when you turn it on, and you can change your answer in Settings.

Carrying on from another device

If you use Merorme on more than one of your own devices signed in to the same Apple Account, the words of an entry you have not sent yet are offered to your other device through Apple's Handoff, so you can finish it there. They travel between your own devices over Apple's encrypted connection, never through us, and the offer is withdrawn the moment you send the entry. Handoff can be turned off in your iPhone's Settings, under General.

Journaling suggestions

If you open Apple's journaling suggestions, Merorme receives only the suggestion you pick, as lines in your draft.

Your writing is yours

You own everything you write. We claim no rights over it and we do not use it to train anything. You can export all of it at any time, in a format you can read without this app.

Deleting it

Deleting the app removes the journal from that iPhone. If iCloud sync is on, deleting the app on every device and removing Merorme's data in your iCloud settings removes it from your iCloud account. Because we never held a copy, there is nothing for us to delete and no request for us to fulfil. Export first if you want to keep it.

Children

Merorme is not for people under 16 and is not directed at children. We ask for your date of birth on the first screen for that reason and no other; the date stays on your device.

Changes

If this policy changes, the new version ships with an app update and carries a new version number, so what you agreed to is always the text you can read here.

Contact

Questions about this policy go to the support address on the App Store listing.