Privacy Policy

1. Information We Collect

When you create an account, we collect your email address, username, and password (stored securely using bcrypt hashing). As you use Garden.gg, we store the garden data you provide — plots, plants, events, photos, soil tests, and related information.

If you use our community features, we also store the content you create for them: your profile bio and customization, optional location text, Shed items, Garden Bed notes, and friend connections.

We automatically collect basic usage data such as IP addresses and request timestamps for security and service reliability purposes.

2. How We Use Your Information

We use your information to:

Provide and maintain the Garden.gg service
Authenticate your account and secure your data
Display your garden data back to you (dashboards, analytics, calendars)
Enable optional community features like public gardener profiles, friends, Garden Bed guestbooks, and leaderboards
Send essential service communications (password resets, security alerts)

3. Public Profiles & Community Features

Community features are optional, and your profile is private by default.

Public gardener profiles. If you opt in, your profile becomes publicly visible at garden.gg/u/your-username and is listed in the public Gardeners directory. A public profile shows your username, display name, bio, avatar, gardening zone, and any optional location text you choose to add, along with your level, badges, garden stats, Shed items, featured plants, visit count, and friend count. Public profile pages may be indexed by search engines. Switching back to private removes your profile from the directory and public view immediately; your content is kept so you can re-enable it later.

Garden Bed notes. Visitors can leave short public notes on profiles and shared gardens that have the Garden Bed enabled. Notes you submit may be held for the host’s review and may never be published — hosts decide what appears on their pages, and can hide notes or restrict who may post. Published notes are publicly visible alongside your username. You can delete your own notes at any time.

Shed links. Shed items may include links to third-party retailers, including the item owner’s affiliate or referral links. If you click one, you leave Garden.gg; the retailer’s own privacy policy applies, and the link may tell the retailer which gardener referred you.

Friends. When you send or accept a friend request, we store that connection to power friend-related features. Your friend count appears on your public profile and in the directory; your friend list is not shown publicly. Pending requests are visible only to the two accounts involved.

Reports and moderation. Anyone can report a published note. When content is reported, we retain a snapshot of the reported content, the report reason, and the accounts involved for review and abuse prevention — this snapshot may be kept even if the original content is later deleted. Reports are reviewed by Garden.gg moderators.

4. Advertising & Tracking

We do not sell, rent, or share your personal information with advertisers. We do not profile users for ad targeting.

We use the Reddit conversion pixel solely to measure the effectiveness of our Reddit advertising campaigns. This pixel fires only after you provide explicit consent via our cookie banner. When active, it sends anonymized event data (page visits, sign-ups, purchases) to Reddit to help us understand which ads lead to conversions. No personal data beyond a hashed email identifier is shared, and Reddit does not use this data to target you with ads on other sites.

5. Data Storage & Security

Your data is stored on secured servers. Passwords are hashed using bcrypt. API access is authenticated via JWT tokens. Photos are stored in S3-compatible object storage. We take reasonable measures to protect your data.

We do not share your personal data with third parties except:

When you choose to make your gardener profile or garden content public (see section 3)
When required by law or valid legal process
To protect the rights, safety, or property of Garden.gg or its users

7. Your Rights

You can access, update, or delete your account data at any time through your profile settings. You can also delete individual Garden Bed notes you have written and switch your profile between public and private whenever you like. If you delete your account, we will remove your personal data from our active systems; snapshots attached to abuse reports may be retained as described in section 3. You may also contact us to request a copy of your data.

8. Cookies

We use essential cookies and local storage to maintain your authentication session. If you accept our cookie banner, we also use the Reddit conversion pixel which sets a cookie to measure ad campaign performance. You can decline this at any time via the consent banner.

9. Children’s Privacy

Garden.gg is not directed at children under 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If you believe a child has provided us with personal data, please contact us.

10. Changes to This Policy

We may update this privacy policy from time to time. We will notify users of material changes by posting the updated policy on this page with a revised “last updated” date.

11. Contact

If you have questions about this privacy policy, contact us at [email protected].