Last updated: August 16, 2026
Kitchen Companion ("we," "our," or "us") is committed to protecting your privacy. This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, and safeguard your information when you use our mobile application and related services (collectively, the "Service").
When you create an account, we collect:
If you tell us about food allergies during onboarding or in Settings, we collect which allergens you selected from the fixed list the app offers — or, if you answer that you have no food allergies, that answer. This is health information, not a dietary preference, and under UK and EU data protection law it is a special category of personal data. We ask for it, and you provide it, so that we can try to take it into account in your recipe suggestions and flag allergens we have found in a recipe.
Providing it is optional — you can skip the step, or clear your selections in Settings at any time, and the rest of the app works normally.
We store the allergens you selected on our servers. We also send them to our analytics provider, PostHog, as described under “Analytics Data” below. We do not use this information for advertising, and we do not sell it.
If you choose to use the "Use My Current Location" option during onboarding, we request your device's approximate (city-level) location once, convert it to a city and region name, and store only that text. We do not request precise location, do not store coordinates, and do not track your location in the background or while the app is closed.
We use it to look up your local weather forecast and growing season so meal suggestions fit your week — warming meals when it is cold, lighter meals when it is hot, and ingredients that are in season near you. This is entirely optional: you can type your city in manually, or skip it, and the rest of the app works normally.
If you use the recipe import feature, we collect the photo you take or select so we can read the recipe text from it. Images are uploaded to our storage provider and processed by an optical character recognition service to extract ingredients and instructions. We access your camera and photo library only when you actively choose to add a recipe photo.
We use PostHog (hosted in the European Union) for product analytics to understand how the app is used and improve the experience. PostHog receives:
PostHog acts as a processor on our behalf under a signed Data Processing Addendum. Analytics data is hosted on PostHog's EU infrastructure (eu.posthog.com). You can disable analytics collection at any time from Profile → Privacy → "Help improve the app" inside the app, and you can request deletion of your analytics data using the contact information in Section 10. Turning analytics off stops all of the above, including the food allergy information, from being sent to PostHog; it does not remove the allergens you selected from your account, which you can clear in Settings.
Subscription purchases are processed through Apple App Store or Google Play Store via RevenueCat. We do not collect or store your payment information (credit card numbers, billing address). We receive only:
If you opt in to push notifications, we collect your device push token to send you meal plan reminders, grocery day alerts, and app updates. You can disable notifications at any time in your device settings or within the app.
We use the information we collect to:
We do not sell your personal data. We share information only with the following sub-processors, who process data on our behalf under signed Data Processing Addenda:
The AI providers above process data only to serve your request. We do not send them your email address, name, or account identifiers, and their terms prohibit using data submitted through their business APIs to train their models.
For users in the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom, and Switzerland, transfers to the United States rely on the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework, the UK Extension to the DPF, and the Swiss-U.S. DPF, or on Standard Contractual Clauses where DPF is unavailable.
We may also disclose information if required by law, regulation, or legal process.
If you join or create a household, other members of your household will be able to see:
Your email address, dietary preferences, and account settings are not visible to other household members.
Your data is stored on secure servers hosted by Heroku (Salesforce) with PostgreSQL databases. We use industry-standard security measures including:
The app also keeps a copy of some data on your device: your account details, your preferences and dietary information, your saved recipes, and cached meal plans and grocery lists. This is stored in the app's private storage area, which other apps on your device cannot read. We do not store your account password on the device, and sign-in tokens are held by the Firebase Authentication SDK rather than written into this local store.
On Android, the app is excluded from cloud backup and device-to-device transfer, so Android's backup system does not copy this local data to Google's servers or onto a new device.
On iOS, this local data is currently included in your device's backups. iCloud backups are encrypted on Apple's servers, though Apple holds the decryption keys unless you have turned on Advanced Data Protection. Backups you make to your own computer are not encrypted unless you choose “Encrypt local backup” in Finder or iTunes. We are changing the app so that this data is excluded from device backups, keeping this local copy only on your device.
Kitchen Companion does not store recipe content from third-party websites. When you view a recipe, you are directed to the original creator's website. We respect content creators and do not scrape, copy, or redistribute their recipes.
You have the right to:
When you delete your account, all personal data is permanently removed from our servers within 30 days.
Kitchen Companion is not intended for children under 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If you believe we have collected information from a child under 13, please contact us immediately at support@kitchencompanion.app.
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. We will notify you of material changes through the app or by email. Your continued use of the Service after changes are posted constitutes your acceptance of the updated policy.
If you have questions about this Privacy Policy or your data, please contact us: