Privacy Policy

CourtSide · Last updated: October 29, 2026

CourtSide is a social and coaching app for tennis players. This policy explains what we collect, why, who can see it, and what you can do about it. “We” means the people who run CourtSide. We have tried to write it so anyone can read it.

The short version

• We do not sell your information, show ads, or use advertising or tracking tools.
• Most of what you post can be seen by other people using CourtSide. Direct messages can only be read by the people in the chat.
• Your location is never shared on its own. You show on the map only when you tap Check in, only to friends who follow each other with you, and only until 10pm that day. Strangers never see where you are.
• Find friends from contacts only checks which of your contacts already use CourtSide. We do not keep your contacts.
• Before a photo or video is uploaded, the app removes the location your phone saved in it. In the rare case a file cannot be processed, it may go up as you picked it (see “Who can see what”).
• Health and fitness numbers are private unless you choose to share them on a post, or on a tennis session that logged itself (shown only to the people you choose), and are never used for ads.
• You can download your data and delete your account from inside the app, or from a web browser if you no longer have the app.
• CourtSide is for people 13 and older. Accounts for 13 to 17 year olds get extra protection.

What we collect

What we do not collect or do

• We do not sell your information or share it with advertisers.
• We do not show ads. The app has no advertising tools, and no outside analytics or tracking tools built in. The record of what you watch in the feed stays inside CourtSide and is only used to order your feed. The record of which days you open the app is kept in our own database, not by an analytics company.
• We do not track you across other apps or websites.
• No health data for ads or marketing. Health and fitness numbers are never sold, never used for ads or marketing, and never shown to anyone except on a session you post yourself (only the numbers you choose) or a tennis session that logged itself, which only the people you choose see (see “Tennis sessions and workouts”).
• No card or bank details. Coaching on CourtSide is free right now. If paid lessons open later, you will pay on Stripe’s own page, and Stripe keeps the card details. Coaches give their bank details to Stripe, not to us. For a paid booking we would keep only what we need to run it: the price, CourtSide’s fee, when it was paid or refunded, and Stripe’s reference for the payment.
• We only use your camera, photos and microphone when you choose to: the camera to take a photo or record a video to post, an instant after you play, or a photo for a chat; your photos to pick something to post or send, or to save a photo or video you choose to your phone; and the microphone only while you are recording, for the sound of a video you post or a voice note you send in a chat. We only receive what you post or send.
• We only read your contacts when you tap Find friends from contacts and allow it, and we do not keep them.

Who can see what

Treat anything you post outside direct messages as public. Anyone using CourtSide can see:

• Your name, handle, photo, bio and city.
• Your tennis profile. Two parts of it are not for everyone. Tournaments you plan to play (their name, date and place) are seen only by you and by people you follow who also follow you back, whatever your age. Injury, schedule and equipment notes you give the coach are private: only you see them (and, if you agree to use the AI coach, they are sent to Anthropic so it can answer you; see “Coaching and the AI coach”).
• Your posts, clips and instants (unless your account is private), your comments, who liked what, who you follow and who follows you.
• Your discussion threads, answers, questions to coaches and replies. Votes are stored with your account, so they are not anonymous.
• Tips you post on the tips board, with your name, for anyone signed in to read and vote on.

Private accounts. If you turn on Private account, only followers you approve can see your posts and instants, and the app only shows your tennis profile to them. Your name, handle, photo, bio, city, discussion threads, answers, questions to coaches, and comments you leave on other people’s posts can still be seen by everyone. A post whose “Let CourtSide feature this on its Instagram” switch is on can still be shown on CourtSide’s Instagram, where anyone can see it, even from a private account. Switch it off on any post you want kept to your followers (see “When CourtSide features your post” in our Terms).

Instants show on the rail for 24 hours. After that (or sooner, if you archive one) they move to your archive, which only you can see. When you watch an instant, your view is recorded with your account, and the app shows the person who posted it how many people viewed it. Right now an instant cannot be deleted by itself; it is deleted when you delete your account, or you can ask us to delete it.

Views. For regular posts, we record that you viewed a post once, only so the view count is honest. Nobody can see the list of who viewed.

City boards. Each month, cities are ranked by the tennis sessions their players log. Your sessions count for the city on your profile (the town you picked in Edit profile), never where you are or where you played; with no town on your profile, you are not on a board. Players who open the boards see each city’s totals: its sessions and players that month, and a city is listed only once it has at least 5 players. If you are 18 or older, other players may also see your name, photo and month’s session count on your city’s Top players, and your face in its “Up to hit” row with a few words on when you usually play (for example “Usually evenings” or “Played Saturday”, never a time or a place, and never today; never from a tennis session that logged itself that only you can see). A private account is named only to people who follow it, and never anyone you have blocked or who has blocked you. Top players never lists everyone, so nobody’s own count can be worked out from a city’s total. A public clip of yours can be shown as your city’s most watched clip of the month. Busiest courts and Most active courts show courts and their counts only, never people, days or times. On Most active courts a visit is one player at a court on one day (a session logged there, an open hit for everyone posted there, or “I’m playing here”); only adults with public accounts who show on city boards count; a court is listed only once 3 different players have been there that month, and its count goes up at most once a week, and only when at least 3 different players add to it, so a rise never points at one person. Teens, and anyone who has not given a date of birth, are named on a board only to friends who follow each other with them, never to anyone else, and their clips are never shown; their sessions always add to their city’s totals. To stay off the boards, turn off “Show me on city boards” in Settings → Privacy center (or hide your activity status): your sessions still count in your city’s total, but your name and clips are not shown.

Only you (and CourtSide) can see: your email address, your phone number if you linked one, your date of birth, your health and fitness numbers, tennis sessions and workouts (except a tennis session that logged itself, which the people you choose can see, see “Tennis sessions and workouts”; and apart from the monthly count city boards can show, see “City boards” above), your saved posts, your settings, who you have muted or blocked, and the reports you send. Other people are never shown your age: our server applies the teen rules below itself. Someone could still guess that an account is a teen’s, because a teen account starts as private and the app tells people when a teen rule stops them (for example, that only people you follow can message you).

Your handle. If you sign up with Google or Apple, your handle starts as the part of your email address before the @. You can change it in Edit profile → Handle, once every 30 days.

Photos and videos are stored as files in online storage. Each file has a long, hard-to-guess web address, and anyone who has that address can open the file, even if the post is later archived, your account is private, or the post is deleted. Photos and videos can also carry hidden details from your phone, such as where they were taken. Here is what the app does about that before anything is uploaded, from your phone or your browser:

• Photos are saved again as a new, smaller picture. The new copy only has the picture itself, so hidden details like where it was taken are left behind.
• Videos have the place where they were filmed blanked out of the file.
• If the app cannot process a file (for example, a format it cannot read), it may be uploaded as you picked it, with whatever details your phone saved in it. Photos you send in a chat are the exception: if one cannot be processed, it is not sent.
• CourtSide never adds a location to your files. Some older uploads, made before the app did this, may still have one; email us and we will remove the file.

Direct messages

• Messages are stored in our database (the online system where the app keeps its information) so both people can read them on any device. The database only lets the people in a chat read it.
• Messages are not end-to-end encrypted (locked so that only the people in the chat could ever read them). That means CourtSide’s operators could technically read them. We do not read your messages unless we need to look into a report, keep someone safe, or follow the law.
• If you edit a message you sent, it shows as “Edited”. If you unsend it, it is removed for everyone in the chat. If you delete a message, it is hidden only for you; the other person still has it.
• The app records when each person last read a chat, to show unread counts and whether a message was seen. If you turn off Read receipts in Settings, the people you chat with no longer see “Read” under the messages they send you.
• Photos you send in a chat are kept in private storage that only the people in that chat can open (and, if the chat is reported, the person at CourtSide reviewing it). Voice notes (up to two minutes) are stored like other uploads, as audio files at a long, hard-to-guess web address.
• Links. When a message has a link in it, our server opens that web page to make a preview card (its title and picture), so the page sees a request from our server, not from your phone. Previews are kept in our server’s memory for a few hours.
• Reported chats. If someone reports a chat or a message in it, a person at CourtSide can read that chat’s last 30 messages and see its photos to review the report, and a copy of those messages is kept for the review, so a message that is unsent or edited afterwards can still be checked.
• Only people a teen follows can start a new chat with a teen.

Finding friends from your contacts

• Find friends from contacts (Settings → Find friends from contacts, in the phone app) is optional. Before your phone asks for permission, the app tells you what will happen. If you allow it, the app sends the phone numbers and email addresses in your contacts to our server. The server checks which of them belong to CourtSide players and sends back only those players. Names and other details in your contacts are not sent.
• Nothing you send is kept. The numbers and emails are checked and then thrown away. We only keep a note that you checked, and when, so one account cannot check more than 10 times a day.
• A phone number only finds someone who linked that number and confirmed it with a texted code. An email only finds someone who confirmed it, or who signs in with Google. People you have blocked, or who blocked you, are never found.
• “Let people find me from their contacts” (Settings, or Settings → Privacy center) is on unless you turn it off. While it is off, nobody can find you from their contacts, by your phone number or your email.
• Linking a phone number (Settings → Phone number) is optional. We text a 6-digit code to the number to check it is yours; the text is sent through Twilio, a texting service. Your number is never shown on your profile or to anyone else, and you can unlink it on the same page.

Health and fitness

This only applies if you connect a source on the Health page.

• Private unless you share. Your health numbers, tennis sessions and workouts are private to your account, and are never sold or used for ads or marketing. Nobody else can see them unless you post a session yourself and choose to share them (see “Sharing health numbers on a post” below), or a tennis session logs itself, which the people you choose can see once you have chosen (see “Tennis sessions and workouts” below).
• Apple Health is read on your phone, only after you allow it on Apple’s own Health screen. What CourtSide reads is saved in our database, not in iCloud. Heart-rate readings stay on your phone: for a workout we keep only the average and the maximum.
• WHOOP is read by our server after you sign in to WHOOP and allow it there. WHOOP’s numbers are never sent to the AI coach.
• The AI coach. Only if you agree to use it, your recent sleep and heart rate variability from Apple Health are sent to Anthropic, which powers it (see “Coaching and the AI coach”). Nothing from Health goes anywhere else.
• Tennis sessions and workouts. If you turn them on, a tennis session your Apple Watch, the Health app or WHOOP records, and any other workout your Apple Watch or the Health app records (a run, a ride, a gym session), shows up in CourtSide so you can log it. A tennis session of 20 minutes or more that your tracker itself calls tennis is logged for you, so your streak shows it, and it shows as a session in Activities and on your profile to the people you choose (Settings → “Who sees them”, or the first time one is logged, on its “Tennis logged” page): friends who follow you back (people you follow who follow you back), anyone who can see your posts, or only you. Until you choose, only you see them. Connecting WHOOP from a screen that says friends who follow you back will see them chooses that; connecting Apple Health never chooses for you. If you are under 18, or have not given a birthday, it is friends who follow you back or only you, never more. It shows when it was played, how long it was and what it was, and the heart rate, heart-rate zones and calories (and WHOOP’s Strain) your tracker recorded, whatever your age (under 18 too). Never where you played, the start time or the device. You can post it yourself to add the score, a photo or the court (that post goes to everyone who can see your posts, and takes its place), remove it (“Not tennis? Remove”), choose “Only me”, or turn this off in Settings (“Log tennis automatically”). Fitbit files tennis as “Sport”: once you have said yes, it was tennis, to two of them, your Fitbit’s Sport sessions of 20 minutes or more are logged the same way, until you say no to one (hide it, or remove one that logged itself). The first time, the past week’s show up too. Logging one does not post it. Each one is deleted 30 days after it ended; if you logged it, your session keeps only the day, how long it was and, for a workout, what kind it was.
• Heart-rate zones. For a tennis session from WHOOP we also keep how long you spent in each heart-rate zone, with the session.
• Sharing health numbers on a post. When you post a tennis session or a workout, a “Share health data” switch and its “Choose” list let you pick which of that session’s numbers go on the post: your heart rate (average and maximum), your time in each heart-rate zone, WHOOP’s Strain, and calories. Only the ones you pick are shown, to anyone who can see the post; the rest stay private. The choice is the same for every account, whatever your age: it starts switched on for everyone, under 18 too, and you can switch it off or change it on every post. The numbers on the post always come from your own tracker’s record, never typed in. The start time and the device are never shown. A workout’s post also shows what kind of workout it was and, if it has one, its distance, the same way it shows its time.
• Alerts. A “Tennis detected” alert says only that, a “Tennis logged” alert only that and who can see it, and an “Activity detected” alert only that and what kind of workout it was. How long it was and your heart rate show only inside the app.
• Disconnecting a source stops new numbers. Disconnecting WHOOP also withdraws CourtSide’s access at WHOOP and removes its tennis sessions. What was already read is deleted when you delete your account, or sooner if you ask us.

Location

Location is off unless you turn it on (Settings → Location, “Use my location”, or Check in on the map). Your phone or browser then asks your permission, and it is only used while you are using the app. On its own, your phone uses it only to show the courts near you, where the map opens and the name of your town (see “Place search” and “Town names” below); your location is never shown to anyone automatically: not when you open the app, not when you move, not on a timer, and never in the background.

• Check in, each time. You show on the map only when you tap Check in. That reads your position once and shows your pin to friends who follow each other with you (you follow them and they follow you) until 10pm that day on your phone’s clock (2 hours if you check in at 8pm or later, never more than 16 hours). Then it disappears on its own. Tap Check out at any time and it is gone at once. To show up again, you tap Check in again; there is no setting that checks you in automatically.
• Your permission first. The first time you tap Check in (or “I’m playing here” at a court, or Show friends on a session), the app asks “Who can see you on the map?”: Friends · people you both follow, or Not now. Then your phone asks for location permission. If you say no to either, nothing is shared. You can change your answer any time in Settings → Privacy center → Who can see you on the map (Friends or No one).
• What we keep. Only while a check-in lasts. For an adult, the position to about 10 meters (about 30 feet); for anyone under 18, or anyone who has not given a birthday, only a rough area about a kilometer (under a mile) across, never their exact position. When the check-in ends or you check out, it stops being shown straight away and is deleted from our servers within 15 minutes.
• Strangers never see where you are. People who are not friends who follow each other with you never see your pin, your position or your distance from them. The only way someone you don’t know sees you on the map is at a court you chose: an open hit you post at a court (its flag shows at the court, never where you are; tapping it shows who posted it, the way a post shows its author), or “I’m playing here” at a court (any court, a club’s included, but never someone’s home court), which shows other players only a count of how many are playing there (once 2 or more are), with names only to your friends (and until when you said you’d be there), for as long as you choose when you tap it: 30 minutes to 4 hours. A court’s page names only friends who follow each other with you as players there. To check that you are at the court, “I’m playing here” reads your position once and does not keep it. The same goes for answering Busy or Full to “How is it right now?” at a court: only an adult’s answer given at the court makes it light up on the map, so for an adult the app sends your position with that answer once (a teen’s answer, or one from an account with no birthday on file, never lights a court and is sent without a position), our server checks it against the court and does not keep it, and the answer itself shows with no name, as before. If Location is already on and allowed, Find Players may notice on your phone that you are standing at a court and ask “You’re at this court? Light it up”: that is worked out on your phone, never asks for location permission, and nothing is shared unless you tap it. Starting a session never does this by itself: on the session, Show friends is a tap of its own, each time.
• Flyby. When you say “I’m playing here” at a court, we keep which court, the day and the part of the day (morning, afternoon or evening, never a time) for 2 days, so adult friends who follow each other and were at the same court that day can see it in Flyby. Nobody else can read it, and older check-ins are deleted every hour. The day after, if you are an adult with a public account who shows on city boards, it adds one to that court’s visits on Most active courts, a number with no one attached. Turning Location off or choosing “No one” on the map deletes yours straight away; if you hide your activity status, you are not shown in Flyby.
• Under 18 (and anyone who has not given a birthday). The same Check in, only ever to friends who follow you back, and only your rough area. Strangers never see you, and you only see friends who follow you back. Nothing is shared until you say yes and tap Check in yourself, and you can hide any time with Check out. Your open hits, and the hits you join, are shown only to friends who follow you back. You cannot say “I’m playing here” at a court, and your posts cannot carry a place.
• Under 16: the same as above. It is off until you turn it on yourself, and it is never shown to strangers.
• Blocking someone hides you both from each other on the map and in open hits, who posted them and who joined. If either of you is under 18 (or has not given a birthday), muting does too, whoever muted whom.
• “Up for a hit today.” You turn it on yourself each day (“I’m free”), and it ends by itself at the time you pick. An adult’s green ring is shown on their profile, and players in your town see you in “Open to hit” with the town on your profile (for example “Raleigh”), never a distance or where you are. On the map it shows only on a friend’s check-in. If you are under 18, yours is kept private and only shown to the friends who follow you back.
• “Near me” and “Near you.” These lists show the players whose own profile city is the same as yours (or within 30 miles of it), with that city (for example “Raleigh”), never a distance, never where anyone is, and never on the map. Adults are listed to other adults there. If you are under 18 (or have not given a birthday), you are listed only to friends who follow each other with you, and you see only those friends there. Friends who are checked in also show how far away they are. Leave the city off your profile and you are not in these lists.
• If you hide your activity status, friends see your check-in without the time you checked in.
• The nearest city name is kept on your device only. It is added to your profile or a post only if you tap “Use my location” to put it there yourself. Your profile then keeps the position of that town, never your own: its centre, rounded to about 10 kilometers (6 miles). Nobody else can read it; our server uses it only to work out who is in your town (“Near me”, “Open to hit”) and for alerts about hits in your area.
• Map pictures come from OpenFreeMap, using OpenStreetMap data, in the phone app and on the web. Like any map, OpenFreeMap receives the area you are looking at. When Location is on, that area is around you.
• The map’s code (MapLibre, a free map program) is loaded in the phone app from unpkg, or from jsDelivr if unpkg does not answer, or, if neither does, from our own site (app.courtsidebase.com). unpkg and jsDelivr are public file hosts, and they see an ordinary web request from your device. On the web it comes with the app itself.
• Place search uses Photon, a free search made by komoot for OpenStreetMap places. When you search, Photon receives what you typed and a point near you, so nearby places come first. How exact that point is depends on where you search: the map’s own search rounds it to about 10 kilometers (6 miles); adding a place to a post and looking up a city for your profile send a more precise point, to about 10 to 100 meters (30 to 300 feet). That point is your own position when Location is on; when it is off, adding a place uses your profile’s town instead, and the city lookup sends no point.
• Town names. When Location is on, the map sends Photon your position, to about 10 meters (30 feet), to show the name of the town you are in. A court’s page sends Photon the court’s position to name its town. No account details are sent with any of these.
• Tennis courts on the map come from OpenStreetMap, through its Overpass service. Our server asks Overpass for the courts around the area you are looking at. If nobody has looked at that area yet, your device may ask Overpass directly, which sends it that area.
• Directions. If you tap Directions on a court or place, it opens in your phone’s own maps app (Apple Maps on iPhone), or Google Maps in a browser, which then receives that place. CourtSide does not use them to draw its map.
• Weather on the map comes from Open-Meteo. The app sends Open-Meteo the center point of the map, rounded to roughly the nearest kilometer (under a mile). When Location is on, that point is near you; otherwise it is the middle of the city on your profile. No account details are sent with it.

Notifications and alerts

• In-app notifications (likes, comments, follows, replies and so on) are stored with your account, and only you can see yours. Each one records who did what and a short preview.
• Push alerts (the ones that pop up on your phone): after you sign in, your phone asks once if CourtSide may send them. If you say yes, we save your phone’s push address with your account. When something happens for you, our database sends the alert through Expo’s push service (Expo is the company whose tools the app is built with), and Apple or Google delivers it to your phone.
• An alert contains the other person’s name, what they did, and a short preview. Message alerts include the words of the message. So that text passes through Expo and Apple or Google, and can show on your lock screen. You can hide previews in your phone’s notification settings.
• To turn alerts off, use your phone’s settings. Settings in the app also has switches for alerts about likes, about coach replies and, if you use them, about tennis sessions. When you sign out on a phone, that phone stops getting your alerts.

Crash reports

When the app hits an error, it sends a crash report to our own database so we can fix it. A report contains the error message and technical details about where in the app’s code it happened, the screen you were on, the app version, the kind of device (iPhone, Android or web) and its system version, and your account ID (a random code that identifies your account) if you are signed in. It does not include your messages, posts, photos or videos. Crash reports are only used to fix bugs and are not shared with anyone else.

Coaching and the AI coach

• Ask a coach questions are public, like discussion threads. Replies come from accounts CourtSide has marked as coaches.
• Coaching is free right now. You can ask coaches questions and message them. If paid lessons open later, a booking will be saved with your account (what you asked, the price, and the coach’s reply), and only you and that coach will see it; we will update this policy first.
• If you coach on CourtSide, your listing (headline, credentials, what you coach, services and prices) is public once you list it. Stripe collects the identity, bank and tax details it needs to pay you; we only learn whether your payouts are ready.
• The Apply to be a coach form sends us what you enter (your name, email, phone number, ratings, experience, certifications, references and how you coach) and your résumé file if you attach one. Your application and résumé are private: only you can see your own from the app, and only the CourtSide team reviews them. The résumé is kept in private storage, not at a public web address. If you delete your account, your application and your résumé file are deleted with it.
• The AI coach is powered by Claude, an AI made by Anthropic. When you ask it something, or it writes your week, our server sends Anthropic your question, your recent conversation with the coach, and a summary of your tennis profile: rating, play style, goals, current injury and schedule notes, next tournament, your training plan for the week, and your recent sleep and heart rate variability from Apple Health if you connected it. Nothing from WHOOP is sent. Nothing is sent to Anthropic until you agree: the app asks once, before you first use the coach, and says what will be sent. You can stop any time (Account center → Coach memory → Stop using the AI coach). To remember what you are working on, we store your recent conversations with the coach, a short summary of them, and how many questions you asked each day. Anthropic’s terms for business customers say it does not use this information to train its AI.
• Training, injury and nutrition content in CourtSide, including anything the AI coach says, is general information, not medical advice. If something hurts, see a doctor or physio.

Reports, blocking and muting

• You can report a post, an instant or a profile from its ••• menu, a thread from the flag at its top, a comment, a reply or a chat message by pressing and holding it, a question to a coach from its ••• menu, and a chat from its details. We save who sent the report, who it is about, and what was reported, and a person at CourtSide reviews it. We do not tell the other person who reported them.
• Blocking someone means neither of you can message the other one-to-one, and each of you stops seeing the other’s posts, instants, threads, replies, comments and questions to coaches. Your one-to-one chat with them leaves your inbox. Your profile itself stays visible to them. In a group chat you are both in, their messages are folded away for you.
• Muting someone stops their posts from showing up for you. They are not told.
• Hidden words (Settings → Hidden words) hides comments on what you post and messages, from people you don’t follow, that may be offensive or use words you add yourself. Comments and messages from people you follow are never hidden, whatever your age. It is checked on CourtSide’s own servers, so nothing new leaves the app or goes to anyone else; your own list is private to you, and nobody is told when something of theirs is hidden from you. Slurs, sexual words about children, telling someone to kill themselves and the most serious threats can’t be posted anywhere on CourtSide, by anyone.

Our website, the waitlist and the feedback box

On courtsidebase.com, the “Get the iPhone app” button opens Apple’s TestFlight, Apple’s app for trying apps before they are in the App Store. Apple’s own privacy policy applies there, and the tap itself tells us nothing about you.

Links from players and friends. A link to our website can carry a label, such as the post it was shared in (Reddit, X or Instagram), a CourtSide player’s @handle (for players who invite people), or a friend’s waitlist code. If the label is an @handle, the page asks our server whether it belongs to a real, public CourtSide account, and only then shows it to you, with a reminder to type it when the app asks “Invited by?”. If you came from a player’s or a friend’s link, the page offers, before TestFlight opens, to take your email so they get the credit. That is optional: leaving it empty takes you straight to TestFlight, and nothing is saved.

The email list. Joining is optional. It asks for your email, and your first name if you want to give it, so we can send you the link to the app and the occasional update. We also note the link’s label, if there was one, so we know which posts are working and whose invites to count. If you later make a CourtSide account with the same email and the label was a player’s @handle, that player is credited with inviting you (unless you type a different one in the app). The page’s feedback box takes your message and, only if you add it, your email so we can reply. Nobody but CourtSide’s admins can read either list. We never sell your email or hand it to anyone else, and every email has a one-click unsubscribe. To be taken off the list, unsubscribe from any email or email us, and we delete you. You need to be 13 or older to join.

Services we rely on

• Supabase stores accounts, posts, messages and uploaded photos, videos and voice notes, handles sign-in, sends account emails (like confirming your email or resetting your password), and runs our small server programs.
• Google handles sign-in if you choose “Continue with Google”. We receive your name, email address and basic profile details; we never see your Google password. Google also delivers alerts to Android phones.
• Apple handles sign-in if you choose “Sign in with Apple” (we never see your Apple password), delivers alerts to iPhones, keeps Apple Health on your phone (CourtSide reads it only if you allow it), and runs TestFlight, where you get the iPhone app before it is in the App Store.
• Twilio, through Supabase’s sign-in system, sends the text message with your code when you link a phone number. It receives that phone number and the code.
• Expo passes push alerts from our database to Apple and Google, and delivers app updates to the app.
• GitHub Pages hosts our website: the web version of the app and these policy pages.
• Open-Meteo provides the weather on the map.
• OpenFreeMap, using OpenStreetMap data, draws the map in the phone app and on the web.
• unpkg and jsDelivr serve the map’s code (MapLibre) to the phone app.
• Photon, by komoot, finds places when you search the map or add a place, and names the town at a spot. It receives what you typed and a point near you (see “Location” for how exact), or the spot it is naming.
• OpenStreetMap’s Overpass service lists the tennis courts around the area you are looking at.
• WHOOP, only if you connect it, sends your WHOOP numbers to our server.
• Instagram (owned by Meta) is where CourtSide may show a post whose “Let CourtSide feature this on its Instagram” switch is on. Only that post (the photo or clip, its caption and your @handle) goes there, and Instagram’s own terms apply to that copy.
• Anthropic powers the AI coach, only for people who agree to use it.
• Stripe pays coaches out, and will process payments for coaching if paid lessons open. It receives a coach’s identity, bank and tax details when they set up payouts, and, for a payment, your email address and card details (on its own page).

Each one only gets what it needs to do its job, and handles it under its own privacy policy.

What the app keeps on your device

The app saves a few things on your phone or in your browser: your sign-in, so you stay signed in; up to five logins saved for quick account switching (kept in your phone’s secure storage, or your browser’s storage on the web); a few settings; a copy of what you last saw (the newest posts and threads, recent messages, and the people in them) for up to 21 days, so the app opens quickly, deleted when you sign out; and your answer to the age question. If someone under 13 tries to sign up, the device remembers that too (see below). The web version does not use tracking cookies. “Log out of all devices” in Account center signs you out everywhere and forgets the saved login on that device.

Your choices

• See or change your details: Settings → Edit profile, or Settings → Account center for your email, password and Google sign-in.
• Make your account private: Settings → Private account.
• Show friends where you are, or stop: Check in or Check out on the map. Turn location on or off for this phone in Settings → Location.
• Stop people finding you from their contacts: turn off “Let people find me from their contacts” in Settings or Settings → Privacy center.
• Link or unlink your phone number: Settings → Phone number.
• Choose who sees your check-ins: Settings → Privacy center → Who can see you on the map (Friends or No one), or tap your own pin on the map.
• Stay off city boards: Settings → Privacy center → turn off “Show me on city boards” (see “City boards” above).
• Turn alerts off: your phone’s settings, or the alert switches in Settings.
• Keep a post from being featured: switch off “Let CourtSide feature this on its Instagram” on the post screen before you share it, or any time after, on the post itself: tap ••• on it, then Edit, switch it off and tap Save. That stops any new use. To have something we already shared taken down, email us.
• Download your data: Settings → Account center → Download your data. You get one file with your profile, posts, instants, comments, threads, answers, who you follow, saved items, your messages and your coaching requests. It covers what the app has loaded, so if something is missing, email us and we will send the rest.
• Delete something: delete a post from its ••• menu, a reply on a thread or a message by holding it, and a question to a coach from its ••• menu. Comments, threads, tips and hits cannot be deleted one by one in the app yet. Email us and we will remove them.
• Delete your account: Settings → Account center → Delete account. Type DELETE and tap “Delete my account”. This cannot be undone. If you signed in with Apple, Apple asks you to sign in once more on an iPhone, so CourtSide is also removed from your Apple ID’s list of apps that use Sign in with Apple. No app? It works the same in a web browser: sign in at app.courtsidebase.com, then Settings → Account center → Delete account. Or email us at the address below and we will delete it for you.
• Anything else, such as asking what we hold about you or asking us to fix or remove something: email us at the address below.

What deleting your account removes

Deleting your account removes your sign-in, profile, date of birth, posts, hits, comments, likes, saves, follows, follow requests, discussion threads (and the replies on them), answers, questions to coaches (and the replies on them), coaching requests, tips, notifications, your settings, your linked phone number, your push addresses, the record of which days you opened the app, your health and fitness numbers, anything the AI coach stored about you, and your files: the photos, videos and voice notes you uploaded, the photos you sent in chats, and a coach application résumé. Messages you sent are removed from the other person’s chat too.

Some things stay:

• Messages other people sent you stay in their copy of the chat.
• Reports other people made about you are kept, to keep CourtSide safe.
• Reports you sent are kept, without your name on them, so a person at CourtSide can still review them. If a chat was reported, the copy of its recent messages made for the review, and the photos sent in that chat, are kept for that review too, even if those messages are later deleted.
• Posts CourtSide already featured on its Instagram or in its marketing may stay up there. Email support@courtsidebase.com and we will take them down.
• Crash reports are kept, but are no longer linked to your account.
• Your old account ID (a random code) may remain in a few places, such as vote tallies or other people’s block lists, with nothing else attached to it.
• Our providers may keep backup copies for a short time before they are replaced.

How long we keep things

We keep your information as long as your account exists, unless you delete it sooner. Hits leave the rail after 24 hours and stay in your private archive. Reports and crash reports are kept as long as we need them to keep CourtSide safe and working.

Children and teens

CourtSide is for people 13 and older. We ask for a date of birth once, on the sign-up form or on a one-time screen the next time you open the app. Giving it is optional: you can skip it by confirming you are 13 or older, and add it later in Settings, Account center.

• Under 13: no account is made. If one was just made (for example, with “Continue with Google”), it is deleted right away, and the date of birth is not kept. That phone or browser then remembers the answer and will not offer sign-up again.
• 13 to 17 (teen accounts): the account starts as private, so only approved followers see posts and hits. The teen can change this later. The “Let CourtSide feature this on its Instagram” switch starts on for teens too, so a teen’s post with the switch on can still be shown on CourtSide’s Instagram, where anyone can see it; the teen can switch it off on any post (see “When CourtSide features your post” in our Terms). Only people the teen follows can start a new chat with them. Chats that already exist carry on.
• Search: anyone signed in can find a teen account by its name or @handle, the same way as any other account. Search finds people only by their name or @handle (and a coach also by the words of their coaching listing), never by the city on their profile, and the people it lists are shown without their city. Being found changes nothing else: a private account’s posts and hits are still only for followers the teen approves (apart from a post featured on CourtSide’s Instagram, above), and the app shows its tennis profile only to them (see “Private accounts” above), and the chat and map rules here still apply. “Players you might know” only suggests a teen to people the teen follows.
• The players map: teens, including under 16s, can check in to show their rough area, until 10pm that day, only to people they follow who follow them back. It is off until they say yes and tap Check in themselves, it is never shown to strangers, and they only see those friends on the map. “Near me” and “Near you” list a teen only to those same friends. See “Location” above.
• City boards: a teen is named on a city board only to friends who follow each other with them, never to strangers. Their sessions add to their city’s totals (see “City boards” above).
• Heart rate on sessions: the same as for adults. A teen’s tennis session that logged itself shows its heart rate, heart-rate zones and calories (and WHOOP’s Strain) to the friends who can see it (friends who follow each other with them, or only them). A session a teen posts themselves goes to everyone who can see their posts (approved followers on a private account, anyone on a public one), and “Share health data” starts switched on there; they can switch it off. Never where they played.
• No date of birth given: the account gets the same protections as a teen account (it starts as private, only people it follows can start a new chat with it, and the map rules for under 18s apply) until a date of birth is added.
• Your date of birth is private and never shown on your profile. You cannot change it in the app; if you made a mistake, email us.

If you think a child under 13 has an account, or you are a parent with a question, email us and we will help. We will delete a child’s account.

Security

• Passwords are handled by Supabase’s sign-in system and stored in scrambled form. We never see your password.
• Our database has rules, called row-level security, that decide who can read or change each piece of information. For example, only the people in a chat can read its messages.
• The app talks to our servers over encrypted connections (HTTPS).

No system is perfectly secure. If you find a problem, please tell us.

Where your information is stored

CourtSide is run from the United States. Our service providers may store and process your information in the United States and other countries.

Changes

If this policy changes in a way that matters, we will tell you in the app before it takes effect. The date at the top always shows the current version.

Contact

Questions about privacy, or requests about your data: support@courtsidebase.com

See also our Terms of Service.

CourtSide is operated from the United States.