We built Cotypist around one principle: what you type stays on your Mac. The AI that generates suggestions runs locally on your device, so the app never has to send your writing to a server.

Below, you'll find what Cotypist needs access to on your Mac, what happens if you decline any of it, and the few things the app can optionally remember locally. For the full legal details, you can always read our Privacy Policy.

Cotypist uses standard macOS permissions. You grant each one through System Settings, and you can revoke any of them at any time without uninstalling the app.

Accessibility (required)

• What it does: Lets Cotypist read the text field you are actively typing in and insert completions there.
• Why it is needed: Without this permission, there is no autocomplete at all. Cotypist has no way to see what you are typing or to insert suggestions.
• If you decline: Cotypist cannot function. This is the one permission you really need to grant for the app to do anything useful.
• What Cotypist cannot see: Password fields are automatically blocked by macOS, so Cotypist cannot read passwords or other sensitive input from password fields. The only exception is if you explicitly click a "Reveal Password" option that some apps or websites offer.

Screen Recording (recommended, optional)

Cotypist asks for this permission during first-run setup, because a bit of surrounding context makes suggestions noticeably more relevant. You can skip the onboarding step, or revoke the permission later in System Settings.

• What it does: Lets Cotypist briefly look at the text visible around the field you are typing in, using on-device text recognition, so it understands the context of your writing.
• Why it helps: Cotypist can match the tone of the email you are replying to, pick up names already on screen, or avoid repeating what is already in the document.
• If you decline or skip: Cotypist still works. You just see slightly more generic suggestions, since it has to rely only on the text inside the field itself.
• What Cotypist does with it: Everything is processed in real time, on your Mac. Screenshots themselves are never stored or sent anywhere. (If you have also enabled the optional recording of your writing described further down, the text Cotypist reads from the surrounding area may be stored locally alongside the text you typed; see below.)

Clipboard (optional, off by default)

• What it does: When enabled, lets Cotypist read your clipboard contents as additional context for more relevant suggestions.
• Why it helps: If you just copied something you are about to paste and discuss, Cotypist can take that into account.
• If you decline or leave it off: No impact on core completions. This is off by default specifically so that nothing happens without your explicit consent.
• What Cotypist does with it: Clipboard content is read in memory only. Nothing is stored, and nothing is transmitted.

Under certain rare circumstances, Cotypist may also briefly use the clipboard itself when it needs to insert a longer completion. In that case, Cotypist will try to save your original clipboard contents beforehand and restore them immediately afterwards.

Everything in this section is optional and off by default. None of it is ever uploaded to our servers, and we never receive any of it. It stays on your Mac, with one exception you choose: iCloud sync copies your recorded writing between your own Macs through your own iCloud account. It is encrypted before it leaves your Mac, with a key that reaches your other Macs through iCloud Keychain, which Apple cannot read either, so neither Apple nor we can read it.

Recording your writing for personalization (off by default)

Cotypist offers an optional feature that saves the text you type in enabled apps, so future suggestions can learn your writing style.

• Default: Off. Nothing is stored until you explicitly enable it.
• Where it lives: Encrypted on your Mac, with the key in the macOS Keychain, protected by your Mac's built-in security. With iCloud sync switched on, an encrypted copy also sits in your own iCloud.
• Your controls: You can switch the recording on or off per app, and per domain for browsers. You can delete everything recorded at any time in Cotypist's settings, in bulk or per app/domain — and that deletion reaches iCloud and your other Macs too. Password fields are filtered out automatically.
• Recommendation: If you regularly work with particularly sensitive information, we recommend leaving this off, or at least disabling it for the apps where that information appears.

Personalization profile

When the recording is enabled, Cotypist can derive a small profile of your writing style from the recorded text, so suggestions adapt to your vocabulary and tone.

• Where it lives: Encrypted, on your Mac only. Never transmitted anywhere, and never synced — each Mac derives its own from whatever writing it holds.
• Your controls: You can adjust the strength of personalization or disable it entirely in Cotypist's settings. Deleting your recorded writing also deletes the profile derived from it.

Syncing between your Macs (off by default)

If you use Cotypist on more than one Mac, sync pools the writing they have each recorded, so a Mac you set up last week knows what you taught the one you have typed on for a year.

• Default: Off. It also does nothing until you have switched on the recording above, since there would be nothing to sync.
• Where it goes: Your own iCloud account, never ours. Each text is encrypted on your Mac with a key that reaches your other Macs through iCloud Keychain, which Apple cannot read either, so neither Apple nor we can read it. It counts toward your iCloud storage.
• What travels: The text you typed, and the context it was written in — the app, the window title, the web address, and the text Cotypist read from the window around you. Not screenshots, not your per-app settings, not your statistics.
• Your controls: Switch it off at any time, or remove the iCloud copy outright while leaving every Mac's own data untouched. Apps and websites you exclude are never recorded, but that exclusion has to be set on the Mac where the writing happens.
• More detail: the iCloud Sync page.

To help us spot issues and decide what to improve next, Cotypist sends a small amount of anonymous data about how the app is being used, along with crash reports when something goes wrong. Your writing is never part of it — completions happen entirely on your Mac, so we have nothing to send even if we wanted to.

• What we receive: Anonymous app metadata only — e.g. that a particular feature was used, how the app is performing, or the technical details of a crash. Never the text you typed, your clipboard contents, or anything recognized from screen content.
• Where it goes: Crash reports go to Sentry (data stored in Frankfurt, Germany). Anonymous usage counts go to Google BigQuery (servers in Frankfurt, Germany).
• Your control: Open Cotypist's settings, go to General → Privacy, and turn off "Share anonymous usage statistics and crash reports". The change takes effect after restarting Cotypist.

• Revoke any permission in System Settings → Privacy & Security, and/or disable the corresponding feature in Cotypist's settings. Cotypist will continue to run with whatever permissions it still has.
• Delete your stored data (recorded writing, personalization profile) at any time from Cotypist's settings: in bulk, per app, or per domain. With sync on, deleting reaches iCloud and your other Macs as well.
• Turn off iCloud sync, or remove the iCloud copy entirely, in Settings → Cotypist Labs. What each Mac already holds stays where it is.
• Opt out of anonymous usage statistics in Cotypist's settings under General → Privacy.