Spurgeon Devotional
Privacy Policy
Effective: September 11, 2026
Last updated: September 11, 2026
This app collects nothing about you. It has no accounts, no analytics, no advertising, and no way of sending your reading, your questions or your identity to anyone.
This policy explains how the iOS app Spurgeon Devotional (“the app”) handles information. The app is published by 43rd Element, LLC (“we”, “us”). It is written plainly and in full — there is not much to describe, because the app is built so that there is not much to describe.
What the app stores, and where
The app keeps a small amount of information so that it can do its job across launches:
- Entries you star — which readings you saved, and when.
- Passages you highlight — the sentence you kept, which entry it came from, and when.
- Questions you have asked — the words you typed into Explore, and when.
- App settings — such as whether you have seen the first-run screens, and the date you installed the app, which is what the free trial window is measured from.
All of this is stored on your device. None of it is sent to us. We operate no server that receives it, and we have no way to read it.
iCloud sync
If you are signed in to iCloud on your device, the app uses Apple’s CloudKit private database so that a star made on your iPhone appears on your iPad. This is the only network activity the app performs.
A CloudKit private database belongs to you, not to the app’s developer. The data lives in your personal iCloud account, under Apple’s encryption and Apple’s privacy terms. We cannot see it, list it, export it, or recover it for you. From our side it does not exist.
You can turn this off at any time on your device: Settings → [your name] → iCloud → Saved to iCloud, and switching Spurgeon off. With sync off, the app continues to work; your stars, highlights and questions simply stay on that one device.
Apple’s handling of iCloud data is governed by the Apple Privacy Policy.
Search happens on your device
When you ask a question in Explore, the app searches a copy of Spurgeon’s Morning and Evening that is bundled inside the app itself, using a search model that also runs on your device. Your question is never transmitted anywhere. There is no search server, no API call, and no third-party language model involved. If your device is in airplane mode, search works exactly as it always does.
Purchases
The full version is a one-time purchase, handled entirely by Apple through the App Store using your Apple Account. We never see your payment details, card number, billing address or Apple Account. The app asks Apple a single question — whether this Apple Account has bought the full version — and receives yes or no. Nothing else.
Purchases are subject to the Apple Standard End User License Agreement and Apple’s media services terms.
What the app does not do
- It has no user accounts and asks for no email address, name or password.
- It contains no analytics or crash-reporting SDK, and no third-party software development kits of any kind.
- It shows no advertising and contains no ad networks or tracking pixels.
- It does not track you across apps or websites, and requests no tracking permission.
- It does not access your location, contacts, photos, camera, microphone, calendar, or health data.
- It sends you no push notifications. (The app does use Apple’s silent background notifications — this is how iCloud tells the app that a star made elsewhere has arrived. Nothing is ever displayed, and no notification content leaves or enters your Apple ecosystem.)
- It sells nothing and shares nothing with anyone, because it holds nothing to sell or share.
Accordingly, the app’s App Store privacy label is “Data Not Collected.”
Information Apple may give us
Independently of the app, Apple provides developers with aggregated App Store statistics — downloads, crash counts, territory-level figures — and, if you have chosen to share analytics with developers in Settings → Privacy & Security → Analytics & Improvements, anonymised crash logs. This data comes from Apple, not from anything the app does, it is not personally identifying, and we cannot connect it to you or to anything you have read, saved or asked. You control it entirely through that iOS setting.
Children
The app is suitable for all ages and collects no personal information from anyone, including children under 13. Because nothing is collected, there is nothing that could be collected from a child.
Deleting your data
Deleting the app removes everything it stored on that device. To remove the synced copy from iCloud as well, use Settings → [your name] → iCloud → Manage Account Storage → Spurgeon → Delete Data on any device signed in to your Apple Account. Because we hold no copy of your data, there is no deletion request to send us — and no request we could usefully act on.
Your rights
Privacy laws such as the GDPR and the CCPA give you rights to access, correct, export and delete the personal data a company holds about you. We hold none. We are not a controller or processor of any personal data belonging to app users, we sell no personal information, and we share none with third parties. Data stored on your device or in your own iCloud account is under your direct control, as described above.
About the text
The devotional readings in the app are drawn from Charles Haddon Spurgeon’s Morning and Evening (1866), and the scripture from the King James Version. Both are in the public domain. The app’s own writing — its labels, notes and screens — is ours, and is always visually distinguished from Spurgeon’s prose so that you can tell at a glance who is speaking.
Changes to this policy
If the app ever changes in a way that affects this policy, we will update this page and change the “Last updated” date above. Material changes will also be noted in the app’s release notes on the App Store. Continuing to use the app after a change means you accept the updated policy.
Contact
Questions about this policy or about privacy in the app:
support@43rdelement.com