Is Simkl compliant with GDPR?

Yes, Simkl is fully compliant with GDPR and provides full export, privacy change options like nickname renaming, and removal options to keep your data private on free accounts.

We understand your concerns, and I want to assure you that Simkl takes GDPR and user privacy very seriously. Let me clarify each point:

GDPR Compliance & User Data Rights: Simkl is fully GDPR-compliant. This means all users – free or paid – have the same fundamental rights over their data. You can access your personal information, export it, and delete it anytime, no subscription required. We built Simkl to respect these rights from the ground up.

Data Export & Portability (Free API vs. PRO Features): Every Simkl user can export their entire watch history and data. In fact, we provide a 100% free API that anyone can use to retrieve all their personal data in a structured JSON format. JSON is a machine-readable format, which fulfills GDPR’s Article 20 right to data portability requirements. Our PRO/VIP plans do include some convenient extras – for example, PRO members can download a one-click CSV file without each episode's info, and VIP members get automatic monthly email/Google Drive backups of their data. But those are just perks for convenience. The core data is always available to every user via the free API, so no one is locked out of their information.

Account Deletion (Right to be Forgotten): If you ever want to leave, you can delete your account and all associated data at any time – even on the free plan. This is a self-serve process in your settings (no need to email support or anything). It is very granular at what you can delete at https://simkl.com/settings/login/clean-or-delete/ :

Simkl complies with GDPR’s right to be forgotten by enabling all users to wipe their data whenever they choose. So, free users absolutely can delete their data/accounts without any hurdles.

Profile Visibility – Public by Default: By default, Simkl profiles are public – meaning anyone can see your watch lists and stats. The reason is that Simkl is a community-driven platform at heart. It’s designed for sharing and social discovery – connecting with friends, exchanging reviews, and comparing viewing stats is a big part of the experience. A public profile lets other fans follow your movie/TV lists, see your ratings, and so on, which makes the site more fun and engaging for everyone. We make this default clear in our terms (your profile info is public unless you choose to hide it). You can also freely change your Nickname to a random one without requiring to share any personal information to make it private.

Privacy Settings (VIP/PRO Feature): We do understand not everyone wants a public profile, and we do offer privacy toggles – such as the ability to make your profile and watch history private or visible only to friends. However, these advanced privacy controls are part of our PRO/VIP plans. In other words, free-tier users won’t have a “make profile private” switch (their profiles remain public). We know that might sound odd, but I’ll explain why below. (Just to note: even without a paid plan, none of your private notes/memos or any hidden content is ever exposed to others – we only mean the general watch history/profile visibility here.)

Free Plan = Ad-Supported (Privacy Trade-off): Our free plan is supported by advertising. We display ads through third-party ad networks (like Google), which is how we keep the basic service free. Naturally, those third-party ad servers receive certain data when you use Simkl free – for example, they see the page URLs you visit in order to serve contextual ads (this is how most ad-supported websites work). Because of this, it’s not possible for us to guarantee strong privacy on the free tier – your activity isn’t completely private due to those external ad trackers. We want to be transparent and respectful about this reality. It wouldn’t feel right for us to promise “total privacy” to free users while still allowing third-party ads that track usage. So, out of honesty, we don’t advertise unrealistic privacy claims on the free plan. Free users’ data is handled safely by us, but the presence of third-party ads means there’s some inherent data sharing we can’t fully control and thus no option to make it fully private in this case (PS: not your personal information, which you can always hide, rename or delete, but specifically the watch history of an unnamed user's public profile).

Paid Plans = No Ads & Enhanced Privacy: Upgrading to a PRO or VIP plan removes all those third-party ads, which significantly improves privacy. With no ads, Simkl isn’t quietly pinging any external ad servers about what you’re doing – an ad-free experience is a more private experience. Moreover, paid plans unlock the privacy features mentioned above. If you go PRO/VIP, you can make your profile completely private, hide watching history for unamed profiles from public view, etc., using the privacy settings. In short, paying for Simkl not only supports our small development team, it also lets you use the site with zero ads (no outside trackers) and gives you full control over your profile visibility and data sharing on the platform.

Bottom Line: We ensure every user can exercise their GDPR rights fully – whether you pay or not. You can always get your data (we even offer it in machine-readable form for free - while GDPR also allows for paid export options in more convenient formats that require extra things to generate), and you can always delete your data. The differences in free vs. paid are about extra features and the reality of ad support. Simkl’s mission is to be a great community for tracking and sharing what you watch, and we offer a free tier so everyone can use it. To keep it free, we rely on ads and some premium features. That’s why privacy toggles are a premium perk – because only with paid plans can we afford to turn off ads and give you a truly private space.

In addition, Simkl also provides Free PRO with all the perks for members who are actually using Simkl via the Loyalty program: https://simkl.com/vip/loyalty/

I hope this clears up the confusion! We totally understand the importance of privacy. Thank you for caring about your data rights and for giving us a chance to clarify. 🙏