1. Who we are
WhatSurah is a free service that identifies which Surah and Ayah of the Qur'an is being recited in a video or in your own voice, reads the Qur'an with you, and holds a library of hadith. In this policy, "we" and "us" mean the people who run WhatSurah, and "you" means anyone who uses it. It applies to the website at whatsurah.org, the Telegram bot @WhatSurahBot, and the WhatSurah Android app.
2. What we do not collect
- No accounts, no sign up, and no passwords.
- No names, email addresses, or phone numbers (unless you choose to email us).
- No advertising identifiers, no advertising, and no third-party analytics or tracking libraries.
- No contacts, photos or files from your phone, and never your location (see prayer times below).
3. What you send to be identified
To find an Ayah you paste a link, record your voice, or type Arabic words. What happens depends on which one:
- A link is sent to our server, which retrieves the first part of the audio from the platform the link points to (YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook or X), transcribes it and matches it against the Qur'an. Some sideloaded builds of the app fetch the audio on your phone instead and upload only that clip; either way the same rules apply.
- A voice clip is sent to our server and matched the same way. Recording starts only when you tap the button, stops when you tap Done or after forty-five seconds, and the microphone is not used at any other time.
- Arabic words typed into the app are searched on your phone and do not leave it. On the website and in the bot they are sent to our server.
Prayer times. The app can use your approximate location, only when you press Use my location, to work out prayer times and the direction of the Qibla on your phone. Your location, and any place you choose, stay on your phone and are never sent to us. Prayer alerts are set on your phone too. On the website, Find me asks your browser for your position, rounds it to about a kilometre and opens the prayer times for that spot; the position is used to work out that page and nothing else.
4. What we keep, and for how long
- What you send is used to find the match, to check that the matching was right, and to make it better. It is not copied anywhere else and not shared with anyone.
- The request. We keep a record of each request: when it was made, whether it came from the website, the bot or the app, the link or the words you sent, what our transcriber heard, the result and how confident it was, the country it came from, the kind of device and browser, and the app version. This record does not include your name, and there is no account to attach it to.
- Your IP address is stored with the request record and used to work out the country and to protect the service from abuse.
- On Telegram, the bot also stores your Telegram user id and username with the request, because that is how Telegram identifies who to reply to. A summary of each request (not the audio, not the IP address) is posted to a private Telegram group that only we can read, so we notice problems quickly.
A report you send us
The app has a Report screen for a mistake, a bug or a suggestion. What travels is what the screen says: your note, up to three pictures you chose, a Telegram username or email if you typed one so we can answer, the app version and the phone model, and which screen you were on. It goes to our server and on to the private Telegram group where we read reports; we keep the note and the details, and the pictures live only in that group. There is no identifier that outlives the report, and nothing is sent unless you press Send.
5. What stays on your phone
In the Android app, the ayat you save, your reading position, your identify history, your saved hadith, your reading marks and your settings are stored only on your phone. They are never sent to us. If you have Android backup switched on, Android may include them in the backup of your device to your own Google account, under Google's terms, so that they come back on a new phone. Clearing the app's data or uninstalling it deletes all of it.
Usage sharing
The app has one switch, Share anonymous usage, in Settings, on unless you turn it off. While it is on, the app makes a random id on first launch (not your phone's serial, not an advertising id, gone when you clear the app's data) and, once a day when it is online, tells our server under that id: the app version, the Android version, the country the connection comes from, and the settings you chose (language, theme, reciter, reading mode, script). It also sends what was used, not what was in it: how long the app was open, which surah was read or played and for how long, which narration was open and for how long, which hadith book was opened, which topic, which ayah's tafsir, whether word by word was turned on, an Arabic search you typed on the phone, a download, a save, a share, an open. Nothing you type anywhere else, no names, no contacts, no history from your phone. Identify requests made while the switch is on carry the same id, so we can count people rather than requests. If the app crashes, the next open sends what crashed and where (the error's name and the code path, never any content), so we can fix it. We use it to see which parts of the app are used and to make them better; it is kept on our own server, joined to nothing else, and shared with no one.
Turn the switch off and the app sends nothing under the id, deletes anything queued, and asks our server only for its settings (a version floor, a line from us, a maintenance notice), with no id at all. Clearing the app's data makes a new id next time.
6. Other services the app talks to
To play recitation and to show the printed mushaf, the app downloads recordings and page fonts from public content networks (everyayah.com, quran.com) as you need them. A second hadith language, if you choose one, is downloaded once. These services see your IP address when the app fetches from them, as any website would; we send them nothing about you.
When you paste a link, the platform it points to is contacted to retrieve the audio. Your use of those platforms is governed by their own privacy policies, which we do not control.
7. Permissions the app asks for
- Microphone, asked for the first time you tap the button on Identify, used only while it is listening.
- Notifications, so that recitation can be controlled from the lock screen while it plays.
- Internet, to identify, to play recitation and to download page fonts.
8. Cookies and analytics
The website sets no tracking or advertising cookies. It remembers your light or dark preference in your own browser. We count requests and page views ourselves, on our own server, from the request records above; no analytics company is involved.
9. Children
WhatSurah is suitable for all ages. It has no accounts, no messaging, no advertising and no purchases, and it does not knowingly collect personal information from anyone, including children.
10. Your choices, and deleting your data
Because there is no account, there is nothing to log in to and nothing to delete on demand in the app. If you would like a request record removed from our server, email us with roughly when you sent it and what it was, and we will find and delete it.
11. Security
Everything travels over HTTPS. Request records are held on a single server we control and are not shared with anyone. Because we keep so little, there is very little about you for anyone to access.
12. Changes to this policy
If this policy changes, we will update the date at the top of this page. Significant changes will be made clear on the site and in the app.
13. Contact
Questions about your privacy? Email us at hello@whatsurah.org.