Last updated: 28 July 2026
The short version. Shade Compass has no user accounts, shows no ads, and contains no analytics, advertising or tracking SDKs of any kind. The developer runs no service that receives your personal information and stores nothing about you. What the app does do — and this page explains it precisely — is send the coordinates of the place you are looking at to public weather and environmental data services in order to fetch conditions for that place.
Nothing about you personally. There is no sign-up, no profile, no email capture, no advertising identifier, and no analytics. Your settings, saved places, grow plans and yard scans are stored on your device, and — if you have iCloud enabled — in your own iCloud account, which the developer cannot access.
Apple's privacy manifest for this app declares precise location as collected for app functionality only, not linked to your identity and not used for tracking. That is an accurate description of the behaviour below.
If you grant location access, your coordinates are used on the device to compute the sun's position, your shadow's direction and length, sunrise and sunset bearings, twilight, moon data, planting windows and activity windows. All of that mathematics runs locally — no network involved.
Location is also used to request data for that location from the services listed in the next section. In every case what leaves the device is a coordinate — a latitude and longitude — and nothing that identifies you.
You can use most of the app without granting location access by searching for a city or dropping a pin instead. You can also pin a remote location and the app will report on that place rather than where you are.
These are the third parties the app talks to, why, and what is sent. Each request contains a coordinate and, where a service requires one, an application key belonging to the developer — never an identifier for you.
| Service | Why |
|---|---|
| Apple WeatherKit | Primary weather, forecast and minute-scale precipitation. Handled by Apple under Apple's Weather privacy terms. |
| Open-Meteo | Weather fallback where WeatherKit is unavailable, plus air quality, marine data and historical archives. |
| US EPA AirNow | Official US air quality index and reporting area. Requested by the developer’s server on the app’s behalf — see below. |
| NOAA / National Weather Service | Active weather alerts and warnings for the area you are viewing. |
| NOAA Tides & Currents | Tide predictions from harmonic station data. |
| NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center | Geomagnetic activity and aurora outlook. |
| NOAA National Data Buoy Center | Wave height, period and direction from offshore buoys. |
| USGS Water Data | River flow and water temperature from nearby gauges. |
| NASA FIRMS | Active fire detections used for the wildfire-smoke signal. Requested by the developer’s server on the app’s behalf — see below. |
| NOAA CoastWatch | Satellite sea-surface temperature (the NASA JPL MUR dataset), used for water temperature where no buoy or gauge is nearby. |
| USDA Soil Data Access | Soil type, pH and drainage for a location you pin when planning a garden. Sent only when you use the growing features. |
| RainViewer | Precipitation radar imagery. Off by default — contacted only if you switch radar on in settings. |
| National water services outside the US | Norway (NVE), the United Kingdom (Environment Agency) and Switzerland, used only when you are in those regions. |
| astrocompare.cc | The developer's own static file host. Serves two small JSON files — a gear catalogue and regional weather-history data — so they can be updated without an app release. See below. |
Two of the services above — AirNow and FIRMS — require an application key. Rather than ship those keys inside the app, where anyone could extract them, the app asks astrocompare.cc for that data and the server makes the keyed request. In practice this means your rounded coordinates reach AirNow and FIRMS by way of the developer’s server rather than directly from your phone. Nothing additional about you is sent or stored, and the server keeps no record that identifies you.
The app periodically downloads two static files from astrocompare.cc, a server operated by the
developer. These are plain file downloads: the app sends no location, no identifier and no information about you.
As with any web request, the hosting provider's standard server logs will record the requesting IP address and
timestamp. Those logs are not used to build any profile, are not linked to anything else, and are not shared.
Some product links in the app's gear sections are affiliate links, including the Amazon Associates programme and AvantLink. If you tap one, your browser opens that retailer's site with a referral tag attached, and the developer may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. This only happens when you deliberately tap a product link. No information about you is sent to those networks by the app itself, and their handling of your visit is governed by their own privacy policies. Paid placements, where they exist, are labelled Sponsored in the app. Gear links are switched off in the current release, so no affiliate link is shown, and none is contacted.
The augmented-reality features use the camera, and on iPhone Pro models the LiDAR sensor, to place shadows in the scene in front of you and to scan a yard for a sun-and-shade map. This imagery is processed live on the device. Nothing from the camera is uploaded anywhere. Yard scans you choose to save are stored on your device and in your own iCloud, and can be deleted at any time from within the app.
All notifications — sun and moon events, activity windows, frost, air quality, aurora, meteor showers, the morning summary and severe-weather alerts — are scheduled locally by the app on your device. There is no push server, so no third party is told what you have enabled or when you are notified.
The app collects no personal information from anyone, including children under the age of 13.
If this policy changes, the updated version will be posted on this page with a new "last updated" date. Material changes will also be noted in the app's release notes.
Questions about this policy, or anything else? Email HydroMyst@outlook.com.