Privacy Policy
The short version: clide runs entirely on your Mac. There are no accounts, no analytics, no tracking, and your audio is never uploaded.
Last updated 5 October 2026
Who this covers
clide is free, open-source software maintained by the staraepp project. This policy covers two separate things: this website (clide.staraep.fun), and the clide app that runs on your Mac. It does not cover the third-party services you may choose to connect.
This website
- No accounts, no sign-up, no forms, and no newsletter.
- No analytics, advertising, or tracking scripts of any kind.
- No cookies and no browser storage. See the Cookie Policy.
- Fonts are bundled with the site, so your browser makes no requests to font providers.
- The pages and the app download are delivered by our hosting provider. Like every web host, it processes technical request data (such as your IP address, browser type and the page requested) to deliver the site and keep it secure. We do not use that data to identify or profile visitors, and we have no access to your dictation.
- Links to GitHub and other sites take you to services with their own privacy policies.
The clide app
The app runs on your Mac. There is no clide account and no clide server, and the app contains no analytics, telemetry or crash reporting. You can read the source in the GitHub repository.
What is stored on your Mac
- History: the text of your transcripts, with the time and the app you dictated into, in a local SQLite database. History never stores audio.
- Recordings: written to a temporary file and deleted as soon as transcription finishes, is cancelled, or expires. A short window (up to 120 seconds) is kept only so a failed transcription can be retried without speaking again.
- Models: the speech models you choose to install, kept on your disk until you remove them.
- Settings: your shortcut, chosen engine, processing mode and similar preferences.
- Local API token: only if you turn on the optional Local API, a random token is kept in the same local settings database. It is never written to logs.
- Old keys: installs that upgraded from a 0.1.x build may still have an unused API-key file on disk. It is no longer read, and you can delete it.
When the app connects to the internet
| When | Who receives what |
|---|---|
| You dictate | Nothing is sent anywhere. Apple Speech is forced on-device, and Whisper and Parakeet run locally. |
| You press Install on a model | Hugging Face receives a download request for that model, including your IP address. No model is downloaded unless you ask for it. |
| Roughly once a day | The app asks GitHub for the latest release information, so it can tell you when an update exists. GitHub receives the request like any web request, including your IP address. |
| You press Update | The new version is downloaded from GitHub, checked against a signature key built into the app, and only then installed. Nothing is ever installed without that button press. |
| You turn on the Local API (off by default) | Nothing is sent anywhere. clide listens on your Mac's loopback address (127.0.0.1) only, so just apps on the same Mac can reach it, and only with the token. It makes no outbound connections. Uploaded audio and transcripts are not logged, and uploaded audio is deleted when the request ends. |
| You use Rewrite with Ollama | Your transcript goes to Ollama running on your own Mac, over the loopback address (127.0.0.1) only. It does not travel over the internet. |
Older preview builds
Preview builds up to and including 0.1.2 also contain optional cloud engines (Groq, OpenAI, Deepgram, ElevenLabs and AssemblyAI) that are off until you add your own API key. If you used one, your audio, or for cloud Rewrite your transcript text, went straight from your Mac to the provider you chose, under that provider's terms and privacy policy, and the key was kept in a user-only local file. Version 2.0.0 and later are local-only and have no cloud engines or API keys. Those older builds also cannot update themselves.
Permissions
macOS asks for each permission when the feature first needs it.
- Microphone: to record while you hold the shortcut.
- Accessibility: to type the transcript into the app you were using.
- Speech Recognition: only for Apple Speech.
The app reads the name of the active application to label history entries. It does not read other apps' content. With Apple Speech live typing on, it types words into the app as you speak them.
Your choices and rights
Because we do not collect or hold your personal data, there is nothing on our side to access, correct or delete. Everything the app keeps is on your Mac, and you control it: you can delete history entries, remove models, uninstall the app, and delete its data folder at any time. For data held by third parties such as our hosting provider, Hugging Face or GitHub, contact them directly under their policies. If you are in a region with data-protection laws such as the GDPR or the CCPA, you have the rights those laws give you. Ask us a question through the contact below and we will answer what we can.
Children
clide is a general-purpose utility and is not directed at children. We do not knowingly collect information from anyone, including children.
Changes to this policy
If the site or the app starts collecting anything it does not collect today, we will update this page first and note the change in the changelog. The date at the top shows when it was last revised.
Contact
Open an issue on the GitHub issue tracker. Please do not post private or sensitive information in a public issue.