Privacy Policy
Subtitle Notes · last updated 3 October 2026
Subtitle Notes saves words you highlight while watching something, translates them, and keeps them so you can study them later. This page says exactly what is stored, who can see it, and how the friends feature stays safe.
What is collected
- Your Google account email and display name. Used only to recognise you when you sign in and to keep your words separate from everyone else's. No password is ever seen or stored.
- The text you highlight, its translation, and the title, season, episode and timecode of what you were watching.
- A nickname, your friend list, likes and safety reports, if you choose to use the social part of the app. Sharing is off by default. If you turn it on, your nickname and saved words can be visible only to people who add you in Subtitle Notes. A report records the item or person reported and the reason so we can investigate it.
- An age-eligibility date, after you complete the neutral date-of-birth screen. We use the date of birth only to calculate when social features may become available, then retain that eligibility date rather than your birth date. For a child account, a guardian confirmation is also recorded.
There is no advertising, no analytics, no tracking across other apps or sites, and nothing is sold or shared for marketing.
Android subtitle reader and screen access
If you enable translation over other apps, Subtitle Notes uses Android Accessibility access when you hold the left edge of the screen over a video, or, with the phone upright, the middle of the top edge by the camera in any app. Only then does it read visible text or take a screenshot to recognise the words on your phone. The screenshot is processed on your phone and is not uploaded. The service also checks which app is in front so the edge works only where it should; this check happens on the phone and is not sent anywhere.
For a translation, the words you select are sent from your phone to Google Translate and to the Subtitle Notes server. In Careful mode, the surrounding subtitle line is sent to the Subtitle Notes server as context too. Translation providers may process this text as described below. To pause some players without their controls appearing, Subtitle Notes may tap the paused video once, the same tap you would make yourself; it does not tap anything else.
If you choose to save a selection, its selected text, subtitle context, translation and source app name are stored in your account. Depending on your setting, you review the selection first or it is saved automatically. This screen access is not used for advertising or analytics. The Android Accessibility feature is optional; declining it does not prevent you from using your library.
Who else sees the text
To translate a highlighted line, the text of that line can be sent to Google Translate, MyMemory, Cerebras, Groq or Cloudflare Workers AI. For a saved card, the selected expression alone is also searched on Tatoeba, an open collection of sentences, to show real example sentences. If you choose to connect your own AI key, it can also be sent to the provider you selected. Only the line and its context are sent - never your email, your name, or anything identifying you. These services return the translation or explanation.
On Android, the words you select over another app also go to Google Translate directly from your phone, without your account details. Like any request made over the internet, it reaches Google from your phone's IP address.
Payments
Subtitle Notes Pro can be bought on this website, where the payment is handled by Stripe, or inside the Android app, where it is handled by Google Play. Card and payment details go to Stripe or Google and never reach Subtitle Notes. What we keep is whether the account has Pro and until when, a reference to the subscription, and for Google Play the purchase token Google issues, used only to check the subscription with Google.
Friends, blocking and reports
You can remove a friend at any time. Blocking someone immediately hides both of you from each other's search results and feeds, and removes the connection. You can report a person or a shared word from the three-dot menu. Reports are reviewed for safety and are retained only while needed to handle the report.
Where it is stored
In a Cloudflare D1 database, reachable only through this application's interface. Your words are kept until you delete them or delete your account.
So that the same line is not processed twice, the reading of a selected text in a given line (the text, the line and their translation) is also kept for up to 60 days without any link to an account. It is used only when exactly the same text in exactly the same line is selected again.
Deleting your data
Delete a single word by swiping it away in the app; detailed instructions are at /delete-data. To remove everything, open Settings → Delete account, or follow the steps at /delete-account. Deletion is immediate and cannot be undone.
Children
Subtitle Notes can be used for private language learning by children. Social features, including finding people, sharing words and likes, stay unavailable until the account reaches the age set out in the app. A parent or guardian must confirm child learning mode before it is enabled. We do not store a child’s birth date; we retain only the derived date when social features may unlock.