Last updated 17 August 2026
Autograph collects no personal information, and makes no network requests of its own. There is no account, no sign-in, no analytics, no advertising, no tracking, and no third-party SDK of any kind in the app. Nothing you write is sent anywhere unless you ask for it to be.
The rest of this page is the detail behind that sentence.
Scores are ordinary documents saved through the iPad's own Files app. They live where you choose to put them: on the device, in your iCloud Drive, or in a folder belonging to another cloud provider you have set up yourself.
I have no access to any of them. If you store a score in iCloud Drive it is handled by Apple under Apple's privacy policy and their agreement with you, exactly as any other document on your iPad would be. If you email me a score to help with a problem, I have it because you sent it, I use it only to look into the problem you described, and you can ask me to delete it at any time.
One thing: a single date, being when your free trial began. It is written to your device's Keychain and to Apple's iCloud key-value store so that the trial does not restart when you reinstall the app or pick up a second iPad. It is a date and nothing else. It is tied to your Apple ID, is visible only to this app, and is not readable by me.
Off unless you switch it on. There is a setting called Record handwriting in Score Details. It is off when you install the app and stays off until you turn it on.
While it is on, the app keeps the raw ink of each mark you draw with the Pencil, what the recogniser made of it, and the notes played on a MIDI keyboard. It exists for one reason: when the app reads a mark wrongly, the stroke can be replayed against the recogniser afterwards to find out why. Guessing at that from memory is how handwriting recognition stays bad.
It is kept on your device and copied to your own iCloud, in this app's private area, so that it reaches your other devices. It goes nowhere else, and I cannot read it.
You can see it and you can delete it. Under the same setting, Review lists every mark recorded and what it was read as, and you can remove any single one. Delete All removes the whole recording from the device and from your iCloud. That cannot be undone, which is the point of it.
Two ways it can reach me, and both of them are you deciding to send it. Share hands the file to whatever you choose, and Prepare Report gathers it up with the score for a bug report. If you send me one, I have it because you sent it, I use it only to look into the problem you described and to make the recogniser better at reading handwriting, and you can ask me to delete it at any time.
Handwriting recorded this way is a picture of pen strokes on a staff. It is not a signature, it is not used to identify anybody, and there is no way for it to be.
If you buy Autograph, the purchase is handled entirely by Apple through the App Store. The app asks Apple whether a purchase exists and receives yes or no. I never see your name, your email address, or your payment details, and Apple does not give them to me.
The beta is distributed through TestFlight, which is Apple's service. When you join, Apple shows me how many testers there are, how many sessions they have had, and any crash reports and feedback that testers choose to submit. If you send feedback through TestFlight, Apple passes on what you wrote along with your device model and iPadOS version. TestFlight is governed by Apple's own privacy policy.
If you email me, I have your email address for as long as we are corresponding about it. I do not add it to a mailing list, and there is no mailing list to add it to.
Autograph is a tool for writing music and is suitable for any age. It collects nothing from anybody, so it collects nothing from children either. There is no profile, no messaging, and no user-to-user contact of any kind.
If you teach with it, the one thing worth knowing is the setting above: with Record handwriting switched on, the app keeps a recording of what is drawn on that device. It stays on the device and in that device's iCloud unless somebody chooses to share it. If a student writes on your iPad and you would rather nothing were kept, leave the setting off, or use Delete All afterwards.
If this ever stops being true, if a future version needs the network for something, this page will say so plainly before that version ships, and the date at the top will change.
Questions to autographapp@icloud.com.