Privacy Policy

GraphNotes keeps your library on your iPad and in your own iCloud. It has no account, no analytics, no ads and no tracking, and the app sends nothing to its developer.

Effective October 19, 2026. This policy covers the GraphNotes app for iPad, including the TestFlight beta, and the website graphnotes.app. GraphNotes is made by Nathan Rischling (“the developer”).

1. What GraphNotes stores
2. iCloud sync
3. PDFs and iCloud Drive
4. Processing on your iPad
5. Apple Intelligence
6. Activity history
7. Sharing a board
8. What GraphNotes does not do
9. Siri, the clipboard and files
10. Deleting your data
11. The TestFlight beta
12. This website
13. Changes and contact

What GraphNotes stores

GraphNotes stores what you create: typed text, your handwriting as the strokes you drew (their shape, timing, pressure and tilt), titles, boards and where things sit on them, sticky notes, connectors and links (with their reasons, labels and properties), tags, stars, the sources you pin and cite, PDFs you import and their highlights, and transcripts you import.

It also keeps the text it recognizes in your handwriting, as a search aid, and indexes that are built on the device to make search and suggestions fast.

The library is a database file inside the app’s own storage on your iPad, protected by iPadOS Data Protection until you first unlock the device after a restart. Like other app data, it is included in your device backups.

iCloud sync

If you are signed in to iCloud, GraphNotes syncs your library between your devices through your own private iCloud database, using Apple’s CloudKit. Only your Apple Account can read that database; the developer cannot. You control iCloud for GraphNotes in your device’s iCloud settings.

The text fields GraphNotes syncs, including recognized handwriting text, are encrypted on your device before upload. Handwriting drawings and other large items are stored as iCloud file attachments with Apple’s standard iCloud protection. Some information is visible to CloudKit itself for sync to work, such as when a record was changed and how large it is. Apple describes how it protects iCloud data, including with Advanced Data Protection, in its iCloud security documentation.

Each installation creates a random identifier so your devices can merge their changes. It is not tied to you or to your device’s hardware. GraphNotes does not read your device name, a hardware identifier or your iCloud user ID.

If you sign out of iCloud, your library stays on the device. If you then sign in with a different Apple Account, GraphNotes uploads the library on that device into the new account.

PDFs and iCloud Drive

PDFs you import are copied into a GraphNotes folder in your iCloud Drive, so they are available on your other devices, or into the app’s storage if iCloud Drive is off. The original file is never changed. Your highlights and notes are stored with the rest of your library, not in the PDF.

Processing on your iPad

GraphNotes reads your handwriting on your iPad with Apple’s on-device recognition (PencilKit, and Vision for ink written directly on a board), so you can search it. The recognized text is kept with your note, and synced with it, as a hidden search aid. Your ink stays ink: the text appears only when you ask for it, with Copy as Text, Use as Text, Type Title, or a Markdown export.

Suggested connections are worked out on your iPad from your own notes. Nothing is linked until you choose Keep, and dismissing a suggestion is remembered on that device only.

Apple Intelligence

GraphNotes uses Apple Intelligence only when you choose Reflect on Connection. It then gives Apple’s on-device model the two doc titles, short excerpts of the two notes and the reasons they were matched. The result is labelled “Generated by Apple Intelligence”, is not saved, and is not sent anywhere. GraphNotes does not use Private Cloud Compute.

System features such as Writing Tools, Look Up and Translate are provided by Apple and work under Apple’s privacy policy when you use them on text in GraphNotes.

Activity history

GraphNotes keeps a history of activity in your library, used for features such as connections and source history. It records when docs are created, edited, deleted and restored, with their titles; what you search for in GraphNotes, including searches from Siri and Shortcuts; when cards are added, moved or removed; transcripts you import; and copies of the words and ink you cite.

This history stays on your device and in your private iCloud, is never shared on a board and is never sent to the developer. It is kept until you delete GraphNotes and its iCloud data.

Sharing a board

You can share a board with people you invite through iCloud. They can see the board and every doc on it, including your handwriting and the text recognized from it, the highlights and notes on shared PDFs, the titles a shared doc has had, and when docs on the board were starred or opened. People you give edit access can change them. Docs placed on the board later are shared too. Docs that are not on the board stay private, and your activity history, tags and pinned sources are never shared.

The PDF files themselves are not shared; collaborators see their titles, highlights and notes. When you share, Apple shows the people involved each other’s names or the address used to invite them, and GraphNotes keeps that share information on your devices to show who has access. The board’s title appears in the invitation.

Anything a collaborator adds to your board is stored in your iCloud. If you stop sharing, the people you shared with lose access to the board, but copies they made, exports and docs they placed on their own boards stay with them.

What GraphNotes does not do

• It has no account and no sign-in, and the developer runs no server for the app.
• It contains no analytics, advertising, tracking or third-party code that collects data. It is built to carry the App Store privacy label “Data Not Collected”.
• Apart from iCloud, it does not connect to the internet. Tapping a web link opens it in your browser.
• It does not ask for access to your camera, microphone, photos, contacts, calendar or location, and it sends no notifications.
• It does not record audio.

Siri, the clipboard and files

If you search GraphNotes with Siri or Shortcuts, your search words are passed to the app, which opens the results. No note content is returned to Siri, and GraphNotes does not add your notes to Spotlight.

GraphNotes puts text or links on your clipboard only when you choose a Copy command, and it never reads your clipboard on its own. With Universal Clipboard, Apple may make copied text available on your other devices.

When you import, export or share, you choose the files and where they go. Exports are plain text and links, and they include the recognized text of your handwriting. A file of your personal tags is added only if you choose to include it.

Deleting your data

Items you move to Trash stay there for at least 30 days so you can restore them. They are removed the next time GraphNotes opens after that and has finished updating from iCloud, or right away when you choose Delete Permanently. A permanent delete removes the item from your other devices and iCloud at their next sync. Copies of sources you cited, and your activity history, are kept.

To erase everything, delete GraphNotes from all your devices, then delete its data in Settings › [your name] › iCloud › Manage Account Storage. If GraphNotes is still installed and syncing on a device when you delete its iCloud data, that device uploads its copy again. Deleted data can remain in device backups until those backups are replaced.

The TestFlight beta

If you join the beta, Apple’s TestFlight shares with the developer your name and email address if you were invited by email, the feedback and screenshots you send, crash reports, and basic device and usage information. The developer uses them only to fix and improve GraphNotes. Apple handles TestFlight, iCloud and the App Store under its own privacy policy.

Anything you create during the beta stays in your iCloud and carries over to later versions.

This website

graphnotes.app is hosted by Netlify, which keeps standard server logs such as IP addresses, browser types and the pages requested, to run and secure the site. The site uses no cookies, analytics or trackers.

If you join the beta waitlist, your email address and your answer about what you read are stored with Netlify Forms. They are used only to invite you to the beta and to tell you when GraphNotes launches, and are never sold or shared. To have them removed, email support@graphnotes.app.

Changes and contact

If GraphNotes ever adds anything that sends data somewhere other than your iCloud, this policy will be updated first, and the app will tell you before it happens. Questions about privacy go to support@graphnotes.app.

Change log

• October 19, 2026: first version.