Legal

Privacy Policy

Last updated: July 18, 2026

The short version

Your music never touches our servers.Songstress is self-hosted: your library, your accounts, your playlists, and your listening history live on hardware you control. We couldn't read them if we wanted to.

What we do collect: basic analytics on this website, optional usage statistics from the apps — one switch in Settings turns those off entirely — and the purchase records needed to run Songstress Pro. This page lists all of it, plainly.

1. Who we are

Songstress is built and operated by Pacholo Amit, an independent software developer based in the Philippines ("Songstress", "we", "us"). For anything in this policy, contact pacholoamit.tech@gmail.com.

We process personal data in accordance with the Philippine Data Privacy Act of 2012 (Republic Act No. 10173) and, where it applies to you, the EU/UK General Data Protection Regulation and similar laws.

2. What this policy covers

This policy covers the things we actually operate:

  • This website (songstress.app), including the download service at /download.
  • The official Songstress apps for desktop, iPhone, and Android, as distributed by us.
  • Songstress Pro, the paid subscription for the mobile apps.

It does notcover your self-hosted Songstress server — because we don't operate it. You do. See the next section, which is the most important one on this page.

3. Your server, your data

Songstress is self-hosted software. When you run a Songstress server, everything the product is actually about stays on that server, under your control:

  • Your music files and library metadata.
  • Your playlists, favorites, ratings, and settings.
  • Your listening history, statistics, and Wrapped.
  • User accounts on your instance, including the email addresses of people you invite.

We have no access to any of it. There is no Songstress cloud account, no sync service, and no copy of your library on our side. If you invite family or friends to your instance, you are the operator of that instance and responsible for handling their data lawfully.

Your server makes outbound connections only for features you configure — for example fetching album art, lyrics, or metadata from providers, or importing playlists from streaming services you connect. Those requests go directly from your server to those providers under their own privacy policies; they are your integrations, not ours.

4. Data from the website

songstress.app uses PostHog for product analytics. When you browse the site we record page views and interactions (for example, clicking a download button), together with the usual technical context: browser and device type, operating system, referrer, and an approximate location derived from your IP address. PostHog stores a random identifier in your browser to tell visitors apart; we do not use advertising cookies or sell data to anyone.

When you download the desktop app, our download service records that a download happened (which platform and version — not who you are), then redirects you to GitHub, which serves the actual file and sees your IP address like any file host would.

5. Data from the apps

The Songstress apps send optional usage statistics so we can fix crashes and understand which features matter. This includes:

  • Feature-usage events (for example, "a playlist was created" or "EQ was enabled").
  • Crash reports and error diagnostics, including stack traces.
  • App version, device model, and operating system version.

When you sign in to your instance, these events are associated with your account identifier, email address, and display name so we can count real users rather than random installs, and so purchase support is possible. Telemetry is never used for advertising.

You can turn all of this off. There is a single telemetry switch in Settings; disabling it stops usage statistics, crash reporting, and performance metrics entirely. The apps keep working exactly the same.

One deliberate design note: the free-play meter in the mobile apps is counted on your device itself — metering never reports your listening to us.

6. Purchases and Songstress Pro

Songstress Pro is sold through the Apple App Store and Google Play. Payment is handled entirely by Apple or Google — we never see your card number or billing address.

To recognize your purchase across your devices we use RevenueCat, which receives the store's purchase receipt together with your account identifier, email address, and display name. Subscription lifecycle records (trial started, renewed, cancelled, refunded) flow from the stores to RevenueCat to our analytics server-to-server; because they are the accounting backbone of Pro, these records are kept even if you switch app telemetry off. They contain purchase state — never your music or listening.

7. What we never collect

  • Your music files, or anything about which songs, artists, or albums are in your library.
  • Your listening history, play counts, statistics, or Wrapped contents.
  • Your playlists, favorites, or ratings.
  • Your server's address or credentials, or the passwords of any account on your instance.
  • Payment card details (Apple and Google keep those).
  • Anything for the purpose of advertising. We have no ad partners and sell data to no one.

8. Services we rely on

We keep the list of third parties short. Each one processes data only so the product can work:

  • PostHog, Inc. (US) — analytics for the website and apps, and crash/error reporting.
  • RevenueCat, Inc. (US) — purchase validation and subscription state for Songstress Pro.
  • Apple and Google — app distribution, payment processing, and their own store analytics under their own policies.
  • Vercel, Inc. (US) — hosting for this website, which processes request logs (including IP addresses) to serve it.
  • GitHub, Inc. (US) — hosts the source code and serves desktop app downloads and updates.
  • Expo (650 Industries, Inc.) (US) — delivers over-the-air updates to the mobile apps; update checks include app version and basic device information.

10. How long we keep data

Analytics events are retained only as long as they are useful for product decisions and then deleted or aggregated. Purchase and subscription records are kept for as long as your entitlement exists, plus any period required for tax, accounting, or fraud-prevention purposes. Data on your own server is retained for exactly as long as you decide — it's yours.

11. Your rights

You can request access to, correction of, or deletion of the personal data we hold about you, object to or restrict our processing, and ask for a portable copy. Email pacholoamit.tech@gmail.com and we will respond within 30 days. You can also:

  • Turn off app telemetry any time in Settings (takes effect immediately).
  • Manage or cancel subscriptions, and request refunds, through Apple or Google.
  • Lodge a complaint with the Philippine National Privacy Commission or your local data-protection authority if you believe we've mishandled your data.

Data on your self-hosted server isn't something we can access, export, or delete for you — you (or your instance's operator) already have full control of it.

12. International transfers

The processors listed above operate primarily in the United States, so the limited data we collect is transferred there. Where required, transfers are protected by standard contractual clauses or equivalent safeguards offered by each provider.

13. Children

Songstress and songstress.app are not directed at children under 13 (or the higher minimum age your local law sets), and we do not knowingly collect their data. If you believe a child has provided us personal data, contact us and we will delete it.

14. Changes to this policy

If we change this policy, we'll update the date at the top and, for material changes, say so plainly on this website or in the apps. We won't quietly start collecting things this page says we don't.

15. Contact

Pacholo Amit — pacholoamit.tech@gmail.com. We're one person, not a legal department, but privacy mail gets read and answered.