Privacy notice

The short version

Swathwise is built to need very little about you. This website sets no cookies and shows no advertising. It and the planner in your browser count visits with Cloudflare Web Analytics, which stores nothing in your browser and does not tell us who you are. Beyond that, the planner keeps your work on your own computer and tells us only that it was opened and that routes were exported - which platform, which version and which country, never who or what. If you ask for directions, the places go to our own directions server to work out the route, and are not kept. The only personal information we ask for is an email address, and only if you choose to give it. We do not sell or rent personal information, and we do not share it with anyone for their own purposes.

The rest of this notice says exactly what is collected, where it goes and how to have it removed. "We" and "us" mean the seller named at the foot of this page, who is responsible for the information described here.

This website

The pages you read here set no cookies and carry no advertising. They do count visits, with Cloudflare Web Analytics. Cloudflare adds one small script to each page on its way to you, and that script is the only thing these pages load from anyone else.

Each time a page loads, the script reports it to Cloudflare: the address of the page, the page you came from if there is one, how long the page took to load, your browser and operating system and their versions, and how much memory the page used, with a random number for that one page load. It stores nothing in your browser, so it cannot recognise you when you come back, or follow you to other websites.

From those reports we see totals: how many visits each page had, which websites sent them, and their countries, browsers, operating systems and kinds of device. We do not see who anyone is. Cloudflare keeps the detailed reports for seven days and a smaller sample of them after that, and we can look back six months. Its Web Analytics documentation says more.

The site reaches you through Cloudflare, a network provider in the United States. Like any network, Cloudflare and our web server receive your IP address and technical details of your request, such as the time, the page asked for and your browser type, in order to deliver the page and to keep the site secure. These technical records may be kept for a short time and are not used to identify you or to build a profile of you.

Two editing pages used only by the people who maintain this site load code from GitHub and unpkg. Visitors never load them.

The notification list

If you leave your email address to be told when Swathwise opens, we keep that address and the date you gave it. We do not ask for your name. We use the address only to write to you about Swathwise opening to the public, and about nothing else. Every message will include a way to come off the list.

To slow down abuse of the form, the IP address a sign-up comes from is kept for up to two hours and is then deleted automatically. It is not stored with your email address.

The list is stored with Cloudflare in the United States. When we send the message we will use a mail service to deliver it, which will handle your address for that purpose only. Nobody else receives the list.

We keep your address until you ask us to remove it or the list is no longer needed, whichever comes first. To be removed at any time, write to the address at the foot of this page.

The beta request form, which has closed

Until September 24, 2026 the Download page carried a form to ask for a beta key: a name, an email address, what you fly, and the date. Swathwise is free now and the form is gone. We keep the requests that were made for up to a year from that date, so that we can answer anyone who wrote to us, and we use them for nothing else. To have yours removed at any time, write to the address at the foot of this page.

Requests are stored with Cloudflare in the United States, in the same place as the notification list, and are read by us alone.

The planner

The Swathwise planner runs in your browser or in the desktop program. The areas you draw or import, your settings, your saved projects and your saved maps are stored on your own computer. They are not sent to us, and we cannot see them.

To do its work the planner asks services run by others for information, and each of them receives your IP address along with the request, as any website you visit does:

Map images come from the U.S. Geological Survey, Esri, OpenStreetMap and the U.S. Census Bureau. They receive the part of the map you are looking at.

Place-name search is answered by Photon, a public service run by Komoot on OpenStreetMap data, and by the U.S. Census Bureau's address service. They receive the words you type into the search box.

Ground elevation comes from the U.S. Geological Survey, or from Open-Meteo if that is unavailable. For the estimate it receives the coordinates of one point: your launch point, or the middle of your first area if you have not set one.

Terrain for a route. When you export flight routes with terrain built in, the U.S. Geological Survey also receives a rectangle around each route, with about two kilometres of margin on every side, so that it can return the ground heights for that rectangle. This happens only when you export, and only if the terrain box is ticked.

Photos for a flight plan. When you print or save a flight plan, the U.S. Geological Survey receives the rectangle covered by each map in the plan, so that it can return an aerial photo of that ground to print under the route. This happens only when you make a plan.

Directions. When you open Directions or ask for a route, the places in it go to Swathwise's own directions server, which we run on OpenStreetMap data, only to work out the route: the start, which may be your device's location, and each stop. They are not stored or counted. If a stop is off the road, the U.S. Geological Survey also receives a rectangle around the walk, so that it can return the ground heights, and a directions PDF sends the rectangle covered by each of its maps, as a flight plan does. While you are navigating, your device's location is used on your device to follow the route.

Places. Files you open in Places, and the pins, paths and shapes you make there, stay in your project on your own device. They are sent only as above, if you ask for directions to one.

The boundaries you draw are not themselves sent to any of these services: a map service sees the part of the map you are looking at, a terrain request sees the rectangle that contains the route, and a flight-plan photo request sees the rectangle a map in the plan covers. Each service handles what it receives under its own privacy policy, which we do not control.

Usage counts

So that we know whether anyone is using Swathwise, every copy of the planner - in a browser, on Windows, on a Mac, and on an iPhone or iPad - sends us one small message when it is opened, at most once a day, and one each time a set of flight routes is exported.

The message holds four things: which platform it is, which version of the program, which of those two events it is, and a random identifier that the copy made up for itself the first time it ran, so that one person opening it every day is counted as one person rather than thirty. Cloudflare, which receives the message for us, adds the country it came from. Nothing else travels with it: not your name, not the project, not the area, not the map. Your IP address reaches Cloudflare as with any request and is not stored with the count.

The counts are kept by Cloudflare in the United States for three months and are then discarded. They are used for one thing - to see how many people use Swathwise, on which platform, which version and in which country - and are never joined to anything that could identify you. Downloading the program from our download page is counted in the same way.

The identifier lives in your browser's own storage, or the program's. Clearing that storage makes a new one; the old one simply stops appearing in the counts. There is no switch to turn the counting off, because it carries nothing about you; if that ever changes, this notice will change first.

The hosted planner, and the staff sign-in

The copy of the planner at app.swathwise.org is open to everyone: no account, no key and no sign-in. Nothing is set in your browser to let you in.

The planner in your browser, at app.swathwise.org, carries the same Cloudflare Web Analytics script as this website, and what is said under "This website" applies to it too. The script reports that the page loaded, not what you do in it: not your project, your area or your map. The desktop programs and the iPhone and iPad app do not carry it.

There is a sign-in for the few people who run Swathwise. It is used to reach the page that shows the usage counts described above, and to unlock map sources that we may use ourselves but may not hand out. When one of us signs in with Google, Google confirms the email address to us and we set one cookie in that browser. The cookie holds the email address and an expiry date, is protected against tampering, cannot be read by scripts, and lasts up to 30 days or until sign-out. It is used only to keep that person signed in, and never for tracking. Nobody else is ever asked to sign in.

We never see a Google password. The sign-in page loads Google's sign-in button, and Google may set its own cookies when it does; Google's privacy policy covers those.

We keep the short list of staff email addresses so that we can decide who may sign in. We do not record what anyone does in the planner.

The desktop program

Downloading the program is a download like any other: the download server, which Cloudflare runs for us, sees your IP address and nothing else about you.

The desktop program needs no sign-in. Your projects and exports are saved in folders on your computer. What it tells us about its use is exactly what the hosted planner does - the usage counts described above - and nothing more.

About every six hours while it is running, and when you ask it to, the program checks our update server for a newer version and downloads it if there is one. That request shows our server and Cloudflare your IP address and the version you have, as any download does.

Payments

Swathwise does not take payments today. If paid plans are offered, card details will be handled by a payment company and will not pass through or be stored on our systems, and this notice will be updated before the first payment is taken.

Who receives information

We do not sell or rent personal information, and we do not share it with anyone for their own marketing or other purposes.

Information is handled on our behalf by the companies that provide our infrastructure: Cloudflare, for delivering the site and counting visits to it, and for the planner, the notification list and the usage counts, and a mail service when a message is sent. They may use it only to provide that service to us.

We may disclose information if the law requires it, or to protect the safety or rights of any person. If Swathwise is transferred to another owner, including a company set up to run it, the information described here may be transferred with it and will stay subject to this notice.

Your choices and rights

You can use this website and read everything on it without telling us who you are.

You may ask us at any time what personal information we hold about you, to correct it, or to delete it, by writing to the address at the foot of this page. We will do so for anyone, wherever you live, and will answer within 30 days. We may need to confirm that the request comes from the owner of the email address concerned. We will not treat you differently for making a request.

Depending on where you live, the law may give you further rights, including the right to complain to a data protection or consumer protection authority.

Because we do not track you across websites, this site behaves the same whether or not your browser sends a "Do Not Track" or Global Privacy Control signal.

Security

We use reasonable measures to protect the little we hold, including encrypted connections and access limited to the people who need it. No method of storage or transmission is completely secure, and we cannot promise that it is.

Children

Swathwise is a professional tool for adults and is not directed to children. We do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone under 13. If you believe a child has given us information, write to us and we will delete it.

Where information is kept

We are in the United States, and the information described here is stored and handled in the United States. If you are elsewhere, your information will be transferred to the United States, where the law may protect it differently from the law where you live.

Changes to this notice

We will update this notice before we change what we collect or how we use it. The date at the top says when it last changed. If a change is significant, we will say so on this website.

Who to write to

Swathwise is offered by River James, Oregon, USA.

Email: hello@swathwise.org