Last updated: 5 November 2026
Fonn collects nothing.
That is the whole policy, but the App Store requires it spelled out, and a one-line answer to a serious question deserves the detail behind it.
Your tunes, settings of them, sets, collections, notes, ratings, tags, links, practice tempos and practice loops are kept in a database inside the app’s own container on your device. Recordings you make and files you import — audio, video, PDFs, photos of sheet music — are kept as files in that same container.
There is no Fonn account, no Fonn server and no Fonn sign-in, and there never will be. Nobody, including the developer, can see your library.
If you switch on iCloud sync in Settings, your library is also kept in your own iCloud account, so the same tunes are on your iPhone, your iPad and your Mac. It goes into your account’s private database. Apple encrypts it, the developer has no access to it and no way to ask for access, and no other user of Fonn can reach it. The syncing is between your devices and your iCloud; nobody else is party to it. Switch it off and the copy on the device stays, and simply stops syncing.
If you have iCloud Backup switched on, your device may also include the app’s data in your own encrypted backup. Both that and the sync above are Apple’s services under your own Apple Account, covered by Apple’s privacy policy rather than this one.
Fonn works with no signal at all, and most of what it does never touches the network. But it is a tool for finding and hearing tunes as well as keeping them, so some things do reach out. Each happens only because you asked for it.
Searching thesession.org. When you search or open a tune there, your device contacts thesession.org exactly as a browser would. Nothing identifying you or Fonn is sent — no account, no identifier — and only your search terms and the tune you chose travel. What that site logs is governed by their privacy policy, not this one.
Finding tunes elsewhere. When you add a tune from a website or the FluteFling catalogue, your device contacts the site you chose: abcnotation.com, tunearch.org, nigelgatherer.com, norbeck.nu, flutefling.scot, or any address you type. Importing from a YouTube link asks YouTube for the video’s title. Where a site has no search of its own, and when you search the whole web, your search words go to DuckDuckGo. Searching Spotify or Bandcamp sends them to that service. What those services log is governed by their own policies.
Apple Music. If you search Apple Music or play an Apple Music link, Fonn uses Apple’s MusicKit, and your Apple device asks your permission the first time. Your searches and what you play go to Apple under your own Apple Account, as they would in the Music app, and are covered by Apple’s privacy policy. Fonn keeps only what you chose to attach: the link, its name and any practice loop. You can withdraw permission in Settings, under Privacy & Security → Media & Apple Music.
Spotify and Bandcamp. When you play one of these links under the music, Fonn shows that service’s own player, so your device contacts the service as your browser would. For Bandcamp, Fonn also reads the public page you linked to, to find the right player. These services may set cookies, which stay in Fonn’s web storage on your device.
If you choose Sign in to Spotify, you type your details into Spotify’s own page. Fonn does not read or keep your password, and the developer receives nothing. Spotify’s sign-in stays in Fonn’s web storage on your device, and Spotify can see what you play. Sign out of Spotify, on the player’s menu or in Fonn’s Settings, removes it from that device. What Spotify and Bandcamp collect is theirs to describe, not mine.
Fetching instrument sounds. Four instruments are carried inside the app so
it plays with no signal. The rest are downloaded once, from
paulrosen.github.io, the first time you choose them, and kept on your device
afterwards. You can delete them again in Settings.
Opening a web page you asked for. Fonn can show a page — a tune archive, a YouTube or Vimeo video attached to a tune — in a web view inside the app. At that moment your device contacts that site as your browser would, and what they collect is theirs to describe, not mine. Nothing about Fonn or you is added to the request.
A tune you already have, played from its notation or your own recordings, contacts nothing, apart from iCloud fetching a recording if you use iCloud sync.
If you record yourself playing, or use the tuner, iOS asks your permission for the microphone the first time. A recording is written straight to a file in the app’s own container. The tuner listens and shows you a pitch, and keeps nothing. Neither is transmitted, processed elsewhere, or transcribed.
You can withdraw the permission at any time in Settings, under Privacy & Security → Microphone, or under Fonn’s own entry in Settings.
Photographing printed music uses the camera, and attaching an existing picture uses your photo library — both only when you choose them, and both stay in the app’s own container. Photographs are never uploaded.
Reading the notes off a photograph happens on your device, using Apple’s own text recognition. The image does not leave the phone to be read.
Exporting a tune or a whole library uses the standard share sheet, so the file goes wherever you choose to send it and nowhere else. A shared Fonn file carries the tune or set, its notes, its links with their names and practice loops, and its PDFs. It does not carry your recordings, videos or photos.
Fonn’s own storage is not browsable from the Files app. Everything comes out through the app — export a library, or share a single recording — which is also what keeps the library consistent: files there are named for the database rather than for you, and deleting one by hand would leave a tune pointing at something that is no longer there.
Fonn is free to download and lets you add up to 20 tunes. A single one-off in-app purchase removes that limit. The purchase is made and processed entirely by Apple, through the App Store. Fonn never sees your payment details, and the developer receives no personal information about who bought it. The app only asks Apple whether this Apple Account has bought the full version, and remembers the answer on your device. It also keeps a count of how many tunes you have added, on your device and in your own iCloud account (including iCloud Keychain), so that the limit survives a reinstall. That count is a number and nothing else.
Fonn has no accounts, no messaging, no user-generated content visible to anyone else, and no advertising. The one purchase is made through Apple’s App Store, as above. Fonn collects nothing from anyone of any age.
If this ever stops being true, the policy will be updated before the change ships, and the date at the top will say when.
Questions about privacy, or about the app: 88_intake.troupes@icloud.com