Same
Terms & Privacy
These are the terms for using Same and how it handles your data, in one place. Last updated 26 October 2026.
Who We Are
Same is made and run by Thomas Mook, one person in Groningen, the Netherlands. He is responsible for your data under the GDPR, and "we" in this text means him. Anything about your data or your rights goes to the address at the bottom.
The Rules
Same is for people aged 18 and over. You give your date of birth once, when you join, and that is the only check. If we learn an account belongs to somebody younger, it is removed.
There is zero tolerance for objectionable content and for abusive behaviour towards other people. If you post it or do it, your account can be removed without notice.
What you write in Same stays yours. You allow us to store it and to show it to the people this text says can see it, for as long as it is in the app.
The cards and packs in Same are written by Same. The names of films, series, events, places and companies in them belong to their owners, and a pack about one of them is not made with or endorsed by its owner.
Same is free and is offered as it is. It can change, and it can stop. As far as Dutch law allows, we are not liable for what other people say or do in it, or for the app being unavailable. Nothing here takes away your rights as a consumer. Dutch law applies. On an iPhone, Apple's standard licence agreement applies as well.
Blocking and Reporting
You can block anybody, from their profile or from a chat. Blocking works both ways at once: they stop reaching you, you stop reaching them, and a chat between you stops being readable for both of you. Nobody is told they have been blocked.
In Showdown, press and hold a line or a reply to block or report whoever wrote it. That block hides the two of you from each other in Showdown only, so it never tells you who wrote a line. A block made anywhere else hides you from each other in Showdown too. A report there sends us the line or reply and who wrote it.
You can report a person, or somebody in a group. A report sends us their name, their photograph, what you write, and the conversation it came from: your chat with them, or the last 500 messages of the group. That is the only way we ever read anybody's messages. We act within 24 hours. You are not told what we decided, because that would be news about somebody else.
If we remove your account, you are told the next time you open the app, and you can write to us and a person will read it.
What We Hold, and Who Sees It
To use Same you need an email address, or Sign in with Apple or Google, and a name, a date of birth, a photograph and a town. Same cannot work without them. You also get an @handle.
Your name, handle and photograph can be seen by your friends and by anybody who finds you in search. A match card shows people near you your first name, your photograph and the activities you both said yes to. A match, and anybody who can open your page, sees how many cards the two of you answered the same and differently, never which ones. Going to an event shows your friends that you are going. Others going see your photograph, small and without your name, and the people you are put with see your first name and photograph. Your date of birth and your town are never shown to anybody; your town only decides who you can meet.
Your answers are seen by friends who answered the same card. Private cards are seen only by friends whose private answers you can read too, and you choose which friends in Private Cards. A card you pin is seen on your profile by anybody who has answered it too.
A Guess Deck is ten cards played by two people: you and a match, or you and a friend. You both answer all ten. Each of you sees the other's answers, three at the start and the rest as you guess them, and any line either of you writes on a card. Those answers are kept apart from the answers on your profile, and nobody but the two of you sees them.
A Same Deck is ten cards dealt to two friends. Each of you keeps up to five that are true for you, and we store the cards each of you kept. Only the cards you both kept are ever shown, and only to the two of you. If the friendship ends, by unfriending or a block, your Same Decks are hidden from both of you, and they come back if you become friends again. Deleting your account deletes your Same Decks, and what you both kept, for both of you.
Showdown is the one public part of Same: six cards a week, open to everybody who answers them. Taking part is up to you: answering a card only adds to its counts, and nothing of yours is shown unless you add a line or a reply. A line you add there is shown to all of them without your name. We know it is yours, and nobody else is told, unless it wins and you choose to put your first name and photograph on it. A reply under a line shows your first name and photograph to everybody who can read the line. Hearts are counted, never named. Past weeks stay readable to anybody in Same. You can delete your own lines and replies.
We also hold what you do in Same: your friends and friend requests, the notes on your answers, your guesses about friends, your Guess Decks and Same Decks, the cards you pin or write, your Showdown lines, replies and hearts, your chats and groups, the people you block, your settings, and a token that lets your phone receive notifications.
Your photograph is checked on your own phone to confirm it shows one face. The image is not sent anywhere for that check, and nothing about your face is kept beyond the photograph itself.
Scanning a friend's code uses your camera. The code is read on your phone and no image leaves it. On Android, if you installed Same from an invite link, Google Play tells the app which invite it was, so the invite reaches you without typing its code.
Answering an invite link on the website keeps only the answer, with nothing about who gave it, unless you join Same within a day. Some cards show how many people answered each way; those counts never name anybody.
Belief, Politics, Mind and Sex
Answers under Belief, Politics, Mind and Sex say what you believe, how you vote, what goes on in your head, and about your sex life and orientation, which the GDPR treats as sensitive. These categories are off until you switch them on, and switching one on asks for your consent to that category. Sex is only for adults, and every card in it is private. In all four, a private answer is seen only by friends you pick in Private Cards, once they have answered the same card. Switching it off again only stops its cards. To withdraw your consent, open Settings, then Reset, then Delete Sensitive Answers, and choose the category: it deletes your answers there and the guesses about them.
Why We Use It
Most of it is needed to give you the app you signed up for: your account, answers, friends, chats, matches and notifications. That is the contract between us. Every card can be skipped, and no card has to be answered to use Same.
Belief, Politics, Mind and Sex rest on your consent, and so do notifications and access to your photos and camera, which your phone asks you for.
Reports, removals, limits on how much one account can do, and short lived server logs rest on our legitimate interest in keeping Same safe. You can object to that by writing to us.
When the app runs into an error, it sends us what went wrong so we can fix it: the error, the screen it happened on, your phone's system and its version, the app version, and your account if you are signed in. Never your answers, your messages or anything you typed. This rests on our legitimate interest in an app that works.
The app counts which screens are opened, how far signing up gets and which notifications and links are tapped, and an invite's page counts how often it is opened. Each count carries a random number made for that copy of the app or that browser, never your account, and is deleted after 90 days. This rests on our legitimate interest in an app that works.
There is no advertising and no tracking, and nothing about you is sold. The app chooses which cards you are dealt, who appears on your match cards and who you are put with for an event, partly by how alike you answer, and it never makes a decision about you with legal or similar effects.
Who Helps Run It
A few companies run parts of Same for us. They use your data only to do that.
Supabase keeps the database, sign in and photographs, on servers in Frankfurt.
Resend sends the sign in codes by email, from Ireland.
Expo delivers notifications and app updates. A notification's text, such as a name and a message, passes through Expo and then Apple or Google.
Apple and Google handle sign in, if you use them, and notifications.
DigitalOcean hosts the website and invite links.
Expo, Apple, Google and DigitalOcean are American companies, so some data leaves the EU. That is covered by the EU-US Data Privacy Framework or by the European Commission's standard contractual clauses.
How Long We Keep It
Your account and everything in it: until you delete it. A sign up that never got as far as a name is deleted after a day.
A chat with a match ends after 72 hours if nobody has written in it, and after 30 days of quiet once somebody has, though not while a deck is being played in it. A group ends after 30 days of quiet, or two days after its event. After that nobody can write in it, and 12 months later its messages are deleted, for everybody and for us.
A chat between friends never ends, so its messages stay while you both use Same. Deleting it takes it off your list; your friend keeps their side, and it comes back if either of you writes in it or a Guess Deck is being played in it.
A report is kept until it has been dealt with, and for 30 days after that, then deleted with the conversation copied into it. A removed account stays as it is until you delete it or ask us to.
A notification token goes when you sign out. Our host keeps server logs, including IP addresses, for a few days. Error reports from the app are deleted after 30 days.
Your Rights
You can see and change most of your data in the app, and delete your account in Settings at any time. That takes your profile, answers, photograph, friends, chats and messages. It cannot be undone and nobody is told. Two things outlast it: a report about you, until 30 days after it is dealt with, and a card you wrote that is in the deck, with nothing linking it to you.
You can also ask us for a copy of your data, to correct it, delete it, restrict or object to how we use it, or receive it in a form you can take elsewhere. Write to us, from the address you sign in with, and we answer within a month.
If you think we handle your data wrongly, you can complain to the Dutch data protection authority, the Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens, at autoriteitpersoonsgegevens.nl.
Changes
If this text changes in a way that matters, the app tells you before the change takes effect. If a change needs your consent, you are asked for it again.
Contact
Thomas Mook, Groningen, the Netherlands. Questions, reports and anything else go to: