Reclaim Privacy Policy
Last updated: 21 September 2026
Reclaim is an Android app that makes photos and videos take up less space on your phone. This policy explains what happens to information when you use it.
Reclaim is made by Darren Horrocks, who is responsible for the information described here. You can contact them at dhorrocks@gmail.com.
The short version
- Your photos and videos never leave your phone. Reclaim reads and rewrites them on the phone itself. Nothing is uploaded: not the pictures, not their names, not where they are stored, not where or when they were taken, and not any other information inside them.
- There is no account and no sign-in. Reclaim never asks for your name, email address or password.
- Usage and crash reports are sent only if you say yes. The first time you open Reclaim, it asks. Saying no changes nothing about what Reclaim does, and you can change your answer in Settings at any time.
- No adverts. Reclaim does not use an advertising ID.
- The Pro purchase is handled by Google Play. Reclaim never sees your payment details.
Your photos and videos
To work out how much space it can save and to make files smaller, Reclaim needs permission to read your photos and videos, and, for each batch you start, Android asks you before Reclaim may change them. This includes photos and videos on an SD card.
All of that work happens on your phone. Reclaim has no server, and nothing about your photos or videos is sent anywhere. That includes the files themselves, previews and thumbnails, file names, folder and album names, storage locations, and anything stored inside a file such as location, capture date, camera details or other metadata.
If you choose to remove information from your photos when optimizing them, such as their location, that happens on your phone too.
What Reclaim keeps on your phone
In the app’s private storage, which other apps cannot read:
- The results of a scan: for each photo and video, its size, type, dimensions, date, and Reclaim’s estimate of how much space optimizing it would save. This is what the home and review screens show.
- A record of each batch: which items were optimized, their sizes before and after, and whether each one succeeded. This is how Reclaim shows your history, resumes a batch that was interrupted, and avoids optimizing the same photo twice.
- Your settings: the compression level, any metadata you chose to remove, and your answer to the usage and crash reports question.
- Temporary copies while your library is measured. To work out what your photos would save, Reclaim re-encodes a few of them into its own private storage, measures the result and deletes it straight away. The photos themselves are not changed, and nothing is sent anywhere.
- Temporary copies while a photo or video is being changed. Before Reclaim rewrites a file, it keeps a copy of the original so that it can put it back if anything goes wrong. The copy is deleted once the new file has been checked. If the original could not be put back, for example because an SD card was removed while it was being written, the copy is kept until you put it back from the home screen.
None of this is backed up to the cloud or copied to a new phone. It is all deleted when you uninstall Reclaim, or when you clear its storage in your phone’s settings.
Usage and crash reports (only if you say yes)
If you agree, Reclaim sends reports to Google Firebase (Google Analytics for Firebase and Firebase Crashlytics), a service run by Google that stores them on Reclaim’s behalf.
Usage reports say how the app is used:
- which screens are opened
- which settings are chosen, such as the compression level
- how many photos and videos your library has
- how many items a batch holds, how many were optimized, how much space was saved, and, when an item fails, a short code for the reason (for example “not enough space”)
- your phone’s model and Android version, the app’s version, and your country, which Google works out from your network connection
Crash reports are sent if Reclaim stops unexpectedly. They contain the place in Reclaim’s code where the problem happened, your phone’s model and Android version, and the app’s version. Before a crash report is sent, Reclaim removes anything that looks like a file name, a storage location or a media address from it.
Reports are linked to a random number that Firebase creates for this installation of Reclaim. It is not your name, your Google account or your phone’s advertising ID, and Reclaim cannot use it to find out who you are.
Reclaim does not use these reports for advertising, and does not allow Google to use them for advertising or ad personalisation.
Changing your mind
Turn off Share usage and crash reports in Reclaim’s Settings. From then on nothing more is sent. Turning it off also deletes any crash report not yet sent, and replaces the random number used for usage reports, so usage reports sent later, if you turn sharing back on, cannot be linked to earlier ones.
How long reports are kept
Usage reports are kept for 2 months and crash reports for 90 days, after which Firebase deletes them.
Legal basis
For people in the UK and the European Economic Area: reports are sent only with your consent, which you can withdraw at any time as described above. Withdrawing it does not affect what was sent before.
Buying Pro
The Pro upgrade is a one-time purchase made through Google Play. Google handles the payment, and Reclaim never receives your card details, your name or your email address. Reclaim asks Google Play only whether this Google account has bought Pro. See Google Play’s terms and privacy policy for how Google handles purchases.
Permissions Reclaim asks for
- Photos and videos: to find and optimize them. Nothing leaves your phone.
- Notifications: to show a batch’s progress while Reclaim is in the background, and a way to stop it.
- Running in the background: so a long batch can finish when you leave the app.
- Internet access: used by Google Play for the Pro purchase, and by Firebase for usage and crash reports if you agree to them. Nothing else in Reclaim uses the internet.
Children
Reclaim is not aimed at children and does not knowingly collect information from anyone under 13.
Your rights
Depending on where you live, you may have the right to ask what information is held about you, to have it corrected or deleted, or to object to its use. Reclaim holds nothing on a server that identifies you by name or account. The only information sent anywhere is the usage and crash reports described above, linked to a random installation number that is not linked to you.
Because of that, Reclaim cannot pick out one person’s reports to show or delete them. What you can do is stop them: turn off sharing in Settings. Reports already sent are deleted automatically at the end of the periods above. For any question about this policy or your information, contact the address at the top.
In the UK you can also complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ico.org.uk).
Changes to this policy
If this policy changes, the new version will be published at the same address with a new date at the top. If a change means more information is sent than described here, Reclaim will ask you again before sending it.