Privacy Policy
Effective 29 September 2026 · applies to the Gushi apps for iOS, Android and the web at gushichinese.com
Gushi is built by two independent developers, not an ad-tech company. The short version: Gushi shows no ads, uses no third-party trackers or analytics SDKs, and never sells or shares your data. The app works offline; a small amount of data is stored online only so your account can follow you between devices.
What Gushi stores, and why
- Your email address: only if you create an account. It is your login (Gushi sends a one-time code to it) and is linked to your account. No password is ever stored.
- Your learning progress: the characters and words you study, review results, streak, XP and settings. Stored on your device; if you sign in, a copy is kept online so another device can pick it up.
- Your display name and optional profile picture: shown on the shared league board to people you share the app with.
- Feedback you send: the message you type and, to help fix bugs, an automatic screenshot of the screen you were on when you tapped the feedback button. Nothing is captured until you choose to send. Feedback is kept after you delete your account (see below).
- A random device identifier: an anonymous id (never tied to your hardware) so the league board can tell players apart before they sign in.
That is the whole list. Usage analytics stay on your device and are never transmitted.
The microphone
The speaking exercises listen while you repeat a sentence, so the app can score how close you were. Speech recognition runs through your platform's own service (Apple or Google). Gushi never uploads or keeps your voice recordings: the transcript is scored on your device and discarded.
If you join a class
Nothing below happens unless you join a class yourself. A teacher cannot add you: they give you a code, you enter it in the app, and you are shown this same list before anything is shared.
Your teacher can see
- Which days you studied, and for how long, and therefore your streak.
- How many cards you reviewed, and how many you got right.
- How well you know each character and word, as estimated by the app's memory model. It is read from how your reviews have gone; you are not tested for it.
- Your HSK level, how many characters and words you have met, and your XP.
- The name you typed when you joined, and your photo if you chose to include it. Both are stored with that class, not with your account.
Your teacher cannot see
- Your email address.
- Anything you write in the app, and any recording: see “The microphone” above; those never leave your device in the first place.
- Your settings, your reminders or your exam results.
- Anything at all about you if you have not joined their class.
The other students in the class see your name, your picture, your HSK level and your XP, the same things the League already shows to everyone using Gushi. They do not see what you have practised or how well you know it. Only your teacher sees that.
You can leave at any time, from your profile in the app. Your teacher stops being able to see you immediately, and everything you have learned stays yours; leaving a class removes nothing from your account.
Your teacher may also release a lesson to the class. That puts its words and characters at the front of what the app offers you next. It is not a deadline: nothing is marked due, and you are never told you are behind.
Where data lives
Account data is stored with Supabase, our database provider, protected by row-level security so each account can only ever read its own data, and, if you have joined a class, so that the teachers of that one class can read the part of it listed above and nothing else. Data is transmitted encrypted (HTTPS).
Subscriptions. Payment is handled entirely by Apple; Gushi never sees your card or bank details. To keep your subscription status the same on your phone and on the web, the app shares your purchase records from the App Store (which plan, when it started, when it renews or ends, the store country and currency) with RevenueCat, Inc. (United States), our subscription service provider, under your account's random id. RevenueCat does not receive your name, your email address or anything about what you study. The legal basis is the performance of your subscription contract (Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR). Deleting your account deletes this record at RevenueCat as well.
Paying on the website. If you subscribe on the Gushi website instead, the payment is handled by Stripe Payments Europe, Ltd. (Dublin, Ireland), our payment provider. Stripe receives your name, your email address, your payment details (your card or other payment method, which Gushi never sees) and, where tax rules need it, your billing address and country. Stripe keeps the payment and invoice records that tax law requires, and uses some of this data as a controller of its own, to prevent fraud and to meet its own legal duties; it may process data in the United States under the EU standard contractual clauses. Gushi keeps only a link between your account and your Stripe customer number, and whether and until when your subscription runs. A web subscription is recorded at RevenueCat in the same way as an App Store one, so that it counts on every device. The legal basis is the performance of your subscription contract (Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR) and, for the records tax law requires, a legal obligation (Art. 6(1)(c) GDPR). Deleting your account ends a web subscription at the end of the period already paid for; the invoices stay with Stripe for as long as the law requires.
If you cancel a web subscription through the form on this website, we keep your declaration (your name, your email address, what you declared and when it arrived) as the record of it.
Deleting your account and data
In the app: Profile → Account & sync → Delete account. This permanently removes your account, your email address and the online copy of your progress, immediately.
Feedback you sent stays. A report is kept after the account is gone, so the problem it describes can still be fixed. It keeps the message, the screenshot and the name you sent it under. If you want it removed as well, write to hello@gushichinese.com.
By email: if you can no longer open the app, write to hello@gushichinese.com from the address you signed up with and your account and data will be deleted within 30 days.
Progress stored only on your device is removed by deleting the app (or Profile → Reset all progress).
Notifications
Study reminders are optional, scheduled locally on your device, and can be switched off in the Profile at any time. There is no marketing push.
The download opt-in
The HSK 3.0 data at gushichinese.com/hsk-3.0/downloads is free to download with no account and no form. Underneath the files there is an optional field where you can leave a name and an email address to hear when the data is updated.
If you use it we store your name, your address, the sentence you agreed to, the language of the page and its path, and the time. We send a confirmation mail first and write to you only after you have clicked it. An address that has not been confirmed is never written to. The purpose is that one kind of message and nothing else: no newsletter, no advertising, no sharing with anyone. The legal basis is your consent (Art. 6(1)(a) GDPR).
You can withdraw it at any time with one line to hello@gushichinese.com, and the row is deleted. Withdrawing does not affect anything sent before.
Children
Gushi is a general-audience study app and does not knowingly collect data from children under 13. An account is not required to use the app offline.
Changes & contact
If this policy changes materially, the date above changes with it and the app will point to the new version. Questions, requests, or anything else: hello@gushichinese.com. Data controllers: Paul Jacobi and Jonas Niklas Kirner, Echternacher Str. 13A, 50933 Köln, Germany (see the legal notice).