Privacy Policy

Last updated: May 20, 2026

AudiophileRadio.com ("we", "us", "our") operates the website audiophileradio.com and the AudiophileRadio mobile & TV app (Android & iOS). This page explains what data we collect, why, and how.

1. At a glance

We do not require an account. We do not collect your name, email address, phone number, location, contacts, or any advertising identifier. We do not use third-party analytics or advertising SDKs. The app may report anonymous, aggregated track-play events (artist + title only — no user, device, or session identifier) to power public listening charts; see § 5 below. The app's preferences and personal lists live on your device only and are deleted when you uninstall.

2. Website – server logs

Our web server (like every web server on the internet) automatically records standard access logs: your IP address, browser type, pages visited, and timestamps. These logs are used solely for diagnosing technical problems and are deleted after 30 days. They are never shared with third parties.

3. Mobile / TV app – what stays on your device

The app stores the following data locally (in Android/iOS shared preferences and the app's cache directory) and never transmits it to us or any third party:

  • Favourite tracks – artist / title pairs you mark as favourites, plus an optional note you add.
  • Listening time – per-station listening duration, used only to sort the station list on your screen.
  • Cached station list – the catalogue returned by our server, kept for fast app startup and refreshed when it changes.
  • Version-check cache – the most recently fetched minimum and latest version numbers plus a timestamp, so we don't re-check on every launch.
  • Cached cover art – JPEG images of recently shown album covers. Capped at 80 MB; automatically pruned on a least-recently-used basis.
  • Welcome chime audio – a tiny FLAC file used to warm up the audio pipeline on app start.

Uninstalling the app removes all of the above.

4. Mobile / TV app – what we send to our server

While the app is open in the foreground, it talks to our server for the following:

  • Station list – a single request to audiophileradio.com/api/stations.php at startup, returning the catalogue of supported stations.
  • Version check – a lightweight request to audiophileradio.com/api/min_version.php a few times per day, returning the minimum and latest supported app versions plus a download URL. Used to surface an "update available" prompt when relevant.
  • Now-playing metadata – the slug of each station whose current track appears in the app at that moment (the one playing on your device plus the ones visible on the home grid). Sent to audiophileradio.com/backend/nowplaying.php and audiophileradio.com/backend/all_nowplaying.php approximately every 30 seconds while the app is foreground. Stops automatically when the app is backgrounded or you navigate away from the station list.

These requests carry no account identifier, no user identifier, and no advertising identifier — the app does not use any. Standard HTTP metadata (IP address, User-Agent) reaches our web server and ends up in the access logs described in section 2.

5. Aggregate listening statistics

The app may report anonymous track-play events to our server so that we can publish aggregated statistics — for example, a “most-played” chart on audiophileradio.com. An event contains only the artist and title of a track that played on one of our curated stations. It does not contain any account identifier, user identifier, device identifier, advertising identifier, session token, or persistent fingerprint of any kind — the same play happening twice from the same device looks identical to two plays from two different devices. We aggregate these events into per-track counts and discard the underlying events once aggregated. As with every request the app makes (§ 4), standard HTTP metadata — the IP address and User-Agent — reaches our web server and is kept only in the 30-day access logs described in § 2.

6. Radio streams

When you play a station, your device connects directly to that station's streaming server. We do not host, encode, store, proxy, or rebroadcast any audio — all streams play directly from the respective stations' servers. The station operator's privacy policy applies to that connection. The station's own server may log your IP address according to its own policy. Many station streams use plain HTTP rather than HTTPS; the app accepts this so the catalogue can stay inclusive. Station availability and content are the responsibility of the station operators.

7. Cover-art metadata sources

We resolve album covers and artist portraits for currently-playing tracks via the iTunes Search API, MusicBrainz (and the Cover Art Archive), Last.fm, and the English Wikipedia API. These lookups happen on our server (not on your device); we then forward the resolved image URL back to the app, which downloads the image directly from the relevant CDN (e.g., mzstatic.com, coverartarchive.org, last.fm, upload.wikimedia.org). For some artists we also serve hand-curated portraits from audiophileradio.com directly.

8. Favourite-track transfer feature

The app can transfer your favourite-track list from one device to another via a six-character pickup code. The list is uploaded to our server, held briefly, and deleted on first read or after 15 minutes — whichever comes first. The pickup code is the only credential, so it is shown to you as transient and meant to be used immediately. We do not retain the data beyond that window.

9. App permissions

On Android, the app declares the following permissions:

  • INTERNET – required to fetch station streams and the catalogue.
  • FOREGROUND_SERVICE and FOREGROUND_SERVICE_MEDIA_PLAYBACK – required so audio keeps playing when the screen is off or the app is in the background, as Android requires for any media-playback app.
  • WAKE_LOCK – keeps the audio thread alive while playing.
  • POST_NOTIFICATIONS – Android 13+ requires this for the persistent media notification (with play / pause / next-station controls) that appears while audio is playing.

On iOS, the app uses standard AVFoundation playback APIs and declares no microphone, camera, location, contacts, photo-library, or tracking permissions.

10. Cookies

The public website does not use tracking or advertising cookies. A short-lived session cookie is set only if you log in to the admin area, and is deleted when you close your browser. The mobile / TV app does not use cookies.

11. Third-party services

We do not use Google Analytics, Facebook Pixel, or any other third-party analytics or advertising service. The app contains no advertising SDKs and shows no ads. We do not ship Sentry, Crashlytics, or any other crash-reporting service — uncaught errors are logged on your device only and never leave it. The only third-party network endpoints the app reaches (and only when the app needs them) are the radio station streams (section 5) and the album-cover and artist-portrait CDNs listed in section 6.

12. Children's privacy

The app and website are not directed to children under 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone under 13 — there is no account, no sign-up, no user-generated content, and no personal data is sent to our servers.

13. Your rights

Because we do not collect personal data on our servers, GDPR and similar laws' rights to access, rectify, port, or delete personal data do not apply to data we hold — we hold none. Your local app data can be cleared at any time by uninstalling the app or clearing the app's storage in your device settings.

14. Changes to this policy

If we make material changes, we will update the "Last updated" date at the top of this page and adjust the corresponding App Store / Play Store privacy disclosures.

15. Contact

Questions about this policy? Email us at hi@audiophileradio.com.