Beneath privacy policy
Last updated 15 September 2026. This policy covers the Beneath iOS app, published by AppActive. If you are looking for the AppActive website policy instead, it is here.
The short version
Beneath collects nothing about you. There are no accounts, no analytics, no advertising and no third-party SDKs. The app sends no data to AppActive and has no telemetry of any kind. It is a browser, so it does make network requests, and the next section says exactly which and to whom.
What Beneath does on the network
Beneath is a web browser, so it loads the pages you ask it to load. Those requests go to the websites you visit, exactly as they would in any browser, carrying that site’s own cookies.
Four things are worth spelling out.
- Re-fetching source. When you read the raw source of a page, Beneath re-issues the request to that same website so it can show you the bytes as the server sent them. It carries the page’s own cookies and user agent so the response matches what you were actually served. This request goes to the site you are viewing, and nowhere else.
- Resolving stylesheets. When a page’s CSS lives on another origin, the Styles panel can fetch those stylesheets natively, using the page’s cookies, so it can show you the rules that actually matched. This only happens when you tap Resolve cross-origin sheets, and it goes to whichever host serves the stylesheet.
- Search. If you type something into the address bar that is not a URL, Beneath treats
it as a search and sends it to DuckDuckGo at
duckduckgo.com. That is a request to a third party, and it is the only one Beneath makes to a service you did not navigate to. There is no search-engine setting, and no search history is kept. Type a full URL and no search request is made. - No telemetry. Beneath has no analytics endpoint, no crash reporting service and no remote configuration. It does not phone home, because there is no home to phone. Nothing is ever sent to AppActive.
The developer tools built into Beneath, including JSON, Base64, URL encoding, JWT decoding, hashes, timestamps, number bases, string escaping and colour conversion, run entirely on your device and never send what you paste anywhere.
What Beneath stores on your device
Everything Beneath keeps stays on your device or in your own iCloud backup, under iOS protection. Nothing is uploaded.
| What | Where | How long |
|---|---|---|
| Browsing data for sites you visit, such as cookies and local storage | The app’s own website data store | Until you clear it, in Settings or with Clear site data |
| Pages captured from the Safari share sheet | A private App Group container shared with the extension | Pruned automatically to the newest 20 captures, or 7 days |
| Your settings, such as code theme, font size and Pro mode arming | Standard iOS app preferences | Until you change them or delete the app |
| Files you save from a download | Wherever you choose to save them in Files | You control this |
You can clear all website data at any time from Settings inside the app. Deleting the app removes everything above.
The Safari extension
The View Source in Beneath action captures the DOM of the page you are looking at, so it can show you that page’s source. That capture is written to Beneath’s private App Group container on your device. It is not transmitted anywhere, and it is pruned automatically along with your other captures.
Purchases
Beneath Pro is sold through Apple’s App Store using StoreKit. AppActive never sees your payment details. Apple handles the transaction and tells the app only whether the unlock is active. We receive no personal information from that process beyond the aggregate sales reporting Apple gives every developer.
Chrome DevTools and other vendored code
Pro mode runs the Chrome DevTools frontend on your device, served from inside the app bundle. It is not loaded from Google’s servers and it does not communicate with them. The vendored JavaScript in Beneath, namely chobitsu and the chii DevTools frontend, is pinned by version and checksum and runs locally.
Age rating
Beneath is rated 17+ on the App Store. That rating reflects unrestricted web access, because Beneath is a browser and can open any page you point it at. It is not because the app collects anything, since it collects nothing from anyone.
Your rights
Because Beneath collects no personal data, there is nothing for us to export, correct or delete on your behalf. The data described above is on your device and under your control. Uninstalling the app removes it.
Changes to this policy
If the app’s behaviour changes in a way that affects this policy, we will update this page and change the date at the top. Material changes will also be noted in the app’s release notes.
Contact
Questions about this policy go to info@appactive.nl. AppActive is based in the Netherlands.
Back to the Beneath overview, or see it on the App Store.