Last updated October 4, 2026
Your hive records are stored on your device. There are no accounts, no analytics, and no advertising. If you subscribe to AI Mentor, the questions you ask and the records relevant to them are sent to our server and on to OpenAI to produce an answer — apart from weather lookups, described below, nothing else leaves unless you choose to send it.
Everything you record — apiaries, hives, inspections, harvests, queens, tasks, varroa tests and treatments, and photographs — is stored only on your device. We have no copy and no way to see it. Deleting the app removes it, so export a backup first if you want to keep it.
Photographs are reduced to a maximum edge of 2048 pixels when you add them. That reduction re-encodes the image, which removes the original file's embedded location and capture-time data. If you take a photo inside the app and allow it, the full-resolution original is saved to your own photo library; if you decline, the full-resolution copy stays in your records so nothing is lost.
Hive Advisor is part of the AI Mentor subscription. If you do not subscribe, nothing in this section applies to you.
Your question, the recent conversation, and a summary of the records relevant to it are sent to our server, which forwards them to OpenAI. That material can include:
What you typed is sent as you wrote it. Nothing is rewritten or summarized before it is sent.
You can stop sharing at any time: in the app, go to Settings, then AI Data Sharing, and tap Stop Sharing with Hive Advisor. Hive Advisor then stays off until you agree again.
Your apiary's coordinates are never sent to the AI. The app uses them only to work out which hemisphere you are in, so seasonal advice is right for you, and that is checked automatically so it stays true.
Two things you should know. If you ask about weather, your apiary's name is sent along with the question. And "Apiary Location", "Yard Name" and "Region" are boxes you type into freely — whatever you write there is sent as written, so if you type a street address it is sent.
If you link an apiary to a forage area in Forage Journal, Hive Advisor reads Forage Journal's forage report on your device. The report never contains locations. When a question is about that apiary, the plants in bloom and coming up there are sent with it, under the apiary's name. The name you gave the forage area, your notes and your photos are not sent. A report you send to Hive Journal yourself stays on your device until a newer one replaces it.
To show conditions and forecasts, your apiary's location is sent to Apple's weather service. It is rounded to about a kilometer first, so the exact position of your hives is never sent. This happens whether or not you subscribe — recording an inspection fills in the weather too.
If you enter an apiary address, it is sent to Apple's geocoding service to find its coordinates.
Tapping to view an apiary on a map opens Apple Maps with that apiary's name and coordinates.
If you tap the microphone beside your inspection notes to dictate them, the app uses Apple's speech recognition, and the sound of what you say may be sent to Apple to be turned into text. The app itself receives only the written words, which go into your notes like anything you type; it does not keep the recording.
When you subscribe, Apple issues a signed receipt. The app sends it to our server so we can confirm your subscription. It contains Apple's identifiers for your subscription and its dates — not your name, Apple ID or payment details.
For questions about a named product or a general beekeeping topic — a treatment's label, a piece of equipment, local regulations — Hive Advisor may search the web through OpenAI to get current information. The search terms are built by the app from the product or topic, never from your own words, and never contain your hive names, your queens' names or anything from your journal. Questions about your own records are answered from your records and are not searched for.
Almost nothing, and nothing that identifies you.
We do not keep your questions, your records, or any history of what you have asked.
OpenAI processes advisor questions. Under their published API terms, this material is not used to train their models, and their abuse-monitoring logs are retained for up to thirty days unless longer retention is legally required or necessary to protect their service.
Cloudflare hosts our server and, like any host, sees your device's internet address when the app connects.
Apple provides weather, geocoding, maps, and handles all payments and subscriptions. We never see your payment details.
The app contains no third-party analytics, advertising or tracking software of any kind.
Nothing is sent automatically. If you report a problem from inside the app, you are shown exactly what is being sent before anything leaves, and you can remove any part of it.
Every report includes the app and iOS version, your device model, your language and time zone, your plan, how many apiaries, hives and inspections you have, which half of the world you are in, whether an apiary location is set (never where it is), and a log of what the app did in this session. It also includes anything you type into the report. Other things are added only if you turn them on: the advisor question and answer you are reporting, or the details of a crash.
When you tap Send, the app sends the report to our server, which emails it to us. If your phone has no connection it is kept on your device and sent later; if you close the screen instead, nothing is sent at all. A report never includes where your apiaries are or your photographs.
You can export everything at any time from Settings, with or without photographs. Deleting the app removes everything stored on your device. We hold nothing that identifies you. Problem reports you choose to send reach us by email and are kept only until the fault in them is fixed; if you attach an advisor exchange, it can include hive names or notes the advisor quoted. A backup also carries your Hive Advisor conversations — the questions you asked and the answers you were given — so that they move with you to a new phone; keep a backup file as carefully as you would the journal itself.
This app is not directed at children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect information from them.
We will update this page and the date at the top when anything here changes.