Privacy

Where your data lives

Binders is a local-first app for Mac and iPhone. It has no account system, no analytics and no server of its own. This page describes Binders for iPhone 2.2 and the Mac app as of version 0.14.0. Binders Hub, the team server, is software you run yourself; what it keeps is at the end.

What stays on your Mac

  • Recordings, transcripts, meeting notes, captures, notes, captured writing, to-dos, your dictionary and snippets. They live in the Binders folder inside your user Library, which you can open from Settings.
  • Speech recognition. Audio is transcribed on your Mac by the Parakeet or Whisper model you choose. Audio is never sent anywhere for transcription.
  • The search index and the knowledge graph.

What leaves your Mac, and only when

  • Your language model. Formatting, meeting notes, note digests, answers, to-do detection and Distill (reading a note into work items) send text to the language model you configure, and so does indexing for search by meaning. By default that runs on your own Mac: built into Binders on a Mac with Apple silicon, or Ollama. If you point Binders at another server, that text goes to that server and is covered by its terms.
  • Team sharing. When you share a binder, its notes and meeting notes, with the files attached to those notes, are written to the folder you picked inside your own cloud drive. Your drive provider syncs them to your teammates. Captures, notes made from what you said to yourself, and the audio Binders records are never shared.
  • Model downloads. The speech models, and the built-in language and search models if you use them, are downloaded once, on first use, from Hugging Face or the mirror you set. A decision model you choose in Settings → AI is downloaded the same way when you click Download; Binders never downloads Tev1 0.8B.
  • Ollama, if you ask for it. When you click Install Ollama, Binders downloads it from ollama.com, checks that it was signed by its makers and notarized by Apple, and puts it in your Applications folder. Ollama is separate software with its own terms and its own updates. The language model you choose is then downloaded by Ollama from its library.
  • A hub you link. When you link a binder to a Binders Hub, its notes, folders, pictures and cards go to that hub and come back from it. Meetings, captures, knowledge and dictations go only when you choose Send to Hub. The hub is the server your team runs, not ours.
  • Things you ask for. A voice command such as “search the web for…” opens your browser with that query.

AI tools and agents you connect

  • Tools that read your binders. AI tools on your Mac, such as Claude Code, Codex or Cursor, can read your binders and work on your boards through Binders’ MCP server, once you add Binders to them yourself. What a tool reads goes wherever that tool sends it, usually to its maker’s AI model, under its maker’s terms.
  • Captures, meeting transcripts and the items your teammates share are left out for every tool until you allow them for that tool in Settings → MCP. Notes, meeting notes, dictations, captured writing and your boards are there for any tool you add.
  • Agents you hand cards to. In Settings → Agents you can set up agents that take cards from your boards. Binders starts one on your Mac, or calls the address you gave it, only when you give it a card, answer its question, comment on a card it’s working on or send its work back, or when you or a teammate change the section of a note that a card it’s working on was distilled from, or, for an agent you let start on cards Binders sends it, when a card you typed into Ready, a to-do you added in Command Mode, or a “Binders, …” your iPhone heard as your voice is clearly its work, when another agent places a card for it on a board where you let agents place work items, or, while your iPhone is in Auto mode, when something your iPhone heard you say on your own, said on its own or thought out loud with no one else talking, looks like its work. Such an agent is always told to ask your approval before it sends, posts or buys anything. It gets that card, not your binders, with at most three short passages from that binder’s notes and meetings that match it (never a transcript, and you can turn this off for each agent), and each hand-off is noted on the card. A card made with Distill also lets its agent read the note it came from, with that note’s earlier versions and who made each, and the lines that changed when its section changes; a card that asks an agent to distill a note holds the note’s text, with the names of the binder’s agents and your teammates its items can be for, and what each of those agents is for. Unless you let an agent send, post or buy for you, it’s told to ask first, and its request for your approval travels only between your Mac and your iPhone. A web hook’s key is kept in your Keychain. A Claude Code run that Binders starts can reach only its card, its repository and the sites you list. Codex likewise, in its own sandbox, with no network. OpenCode and GitHub Copilot CLI read and edit files in the card’s worktree and run no commands. None of them can read your SSH and GPG keys, your gh, npm, cloud and Docker sign-ins, or the coding tools’ own folders and histories. Antigravity edits files in the card’s worktree and runs only the commands your Antigravity settings allow, in its sandbox, with no network; Binders won’t start it when those settings would let it read those keys, sign-ins and folders, reach the web or use your other MCP servers, and your own Antigravity hooks, plugins and servers still load with it. A command you set up runs as you, with whatever you can reach on this Mac.
  • Codex, OpenCode, GitHub Copilot CLI and Antigravity send the card to whoever runs their model: OpenAI for Codex, GitHub for Copilot CLI, Google for Antigravity, and for OpenCode the provider of the model you choose, as your OpenCode sets it up. They also make calls of their own: Codex sends its usage analytics to OpenAI, Copilot CLI its telemetry to GitHub, and OpenCode fetches its list of models from models.opencode.ai.
  • Nothing you say to your iPhone hands work to an agent without your tap, with two exceptions, both only for an agent you let start on cards Binders sends it and said yes to on that iPhone: a “Binders, …” you say on your own, that your iPhone hears as your voice, when it’s clearly that agent’s work; and, if you choose Auto for what you say to yourself, a to-do or an idea you say on your own, in your voice, or a to-do, a fix or an idea you think out loud in a capture in which your iPhone heard only you, when Binders’ decision model is sure enough it’s that agent’s work, or you named that agent. Its card then holds what you said, word for word: from a capture, only the sentences it came from, never anyone else’s words, and nothing else of the capture, not even its notes. Auto mode never hands anything to an agent that may send, post or buy for you, and every agent keeps its own permission checks. Nothing heard in a conversation with anyone else in it, and nothing told to Siri or a Shortcut, ever starts one.
  • Sorting cards. Binders picks the binder, and the agent, for a new card with the decision model you choose in Settings → AI. It runs inside Binders on your Mac, or in a decision server you run on this Mac, which Binders reaches only at this Mac’s own loopback address and never with a key. Such a server gets what Binders’ own model would read: the card’s words, and your binders’ and agents’ names with what each is for and the titles of their latest notes and meetings. What it does with them, including whether it passes them on, is up to that server: Binders can’t see past its port. Binders downloads a decision model only when you choose one there, from Hugging Face or the mirror you set, as it does a language model, and never downloads Tev1 0.8B, which you add from its folder. With none, or with it off, what you say to your iPhone goes in the binder you name, else is sorted by your language model, and the cards and to-dos you type stay where you put them, with an agent suggested only when you name one. Measuring a model sorts made-up cards that come with Binders, never yours. A record of each decision stays on this Mac, without your words and without the names of your binders, agents and models, so the sorting can be tuned: when, which binders and agents it weighed, what it did, and whether you moved the card, gave it to an agent or stopped one. It’s kept 90 days at most and capped in size, and Settings → Agents, or Delete all history, clears it.
  • On your iPhone you can give a card to an agent you set up on your Mac. The first time for each agent, Binders tells you what goes with the card and where, and who the agent sends it to, such as OpenAI, Anthropic or GitHub, when you named it in Settings → Agents or Binders knows it from the agent’s program (an OpenCode agent names its model’s provider), and asks first. It asks again when any of that changes.
  • An agent’s request for your approval shows on your iPhone’s Lock Screen as who asks and what, never who it goes to or what it says. You approve or decline on the card, on your Mac or on your unlocked iPhone, where exactly who it goes to and what it says are shown.
  • Binders never starts an agent with its permission checks switched off. Binders never takes an agent’s request as yours on your boards. An agent can’t change how it’s started or what tools may read, and can’t start dictation, writing capture, a recording or pairing without Binders asking you first.
  • Pictures from the web in a note or a card aren’t loaded by themselves, so the site they’re on can’t tell you opened it. Double-click one to open it in your browser.

Updates

On its second launch Binders asks whether it may check for updates. If you agree, it fetches one small file from binders.io, at most once a day, to see whether a newer version exists. That request carries what any web request does (your IP address, the app’s version and your macOS version) and nothing about you or your data. No system profile is sent. Updates are verified against a signing key built into the app before they are installed, and you can switch the checks off in Settings.

Writing capture

  • It is off until you switch it on, and it shows in the menu bar while it is on.
  • It reads the text field you are writing in through macOS Accessibility, and keeps the text only when you send or save it. It never records keystrokes and never reads secure fields.
  • Password managers, terminal screens, and pages whose address mentions login, sign-in, checkout, payment, banking or wallets are always skipped.
  • In the terminal, it keeps only the prompts you send AI tools (Claude Code, Codex, Gemini CLI, Qwen Code, Copilot CLI and OpenCode), read from the history those tools keep on this Mac, starting when capture is switched on, and the prompts handed to Binders by a hook you add to an AI tool yourself, such as the one Settings → Writing capture offers for Antigravity, while capture is on. Shell commands and pasted text are not kept. Settings → Writing capture → In the terminal turns each tool off.
  • Labelled passwords, card numbers, social security numbers, IBANs and long keys are redacted before anything is stored.
  • Captured writing is deleted after the period you set, 90 days by default, and you can delete any of it at any time.

Binders for iPhone

  • It talks only to Binders on your own Mac, over your network or through a VPN you use on both, such as Covee or Tailscale, on an encrypted connection that only your paired iPhone can open. There is no Binders server in between. Your Mac tells your paired iPhone where it can be reached: its network and VPN addresses (labelled with the VPN's name, when your Mac's network settings show one), any you add, and, while Tailscale runs on the Mac, Tailscale's name for it. The iPhone keeps them to find it. To list them, your Mac asks Tailscale on it, when it's installed; only its addresses and its name for this Mac go to your iPhone. A name, whether you added it or it's Tailscale's, is looked up like any other name, through the DNS your iPhone uses, or your VPN's when it answers for names; with the VPN off on your iPhone, the network it's on can see that name, and Tailscale's carries your tailnet's name. Without a Mac, dictation, the Binders keyboard and All-day capture work on the iPhone alone, and what they write down stays on it until you pair a Mac.
  • It keeps a copy of what it last showed from your Mac, such as your to-dos, notes and meetings, so you can read them while the Mac is away. Forgetting the Mac deletes that copy.
  • What you dictate is written down on the iPhone by Apple’s on-device speech recognition, then tidied up by your Mac when it’s in reach, or on the iPhone when it isn’t, and kept with your other dictations on your Mac.
  • The Binders keyboard doesn’t store or send what you type. Corrections are looked up on the iPhone. With Full Access, the keyboard hands your dictation to the Binders app on the same iPhone.
  • All-day capture is off until you turn it on, and iOS shows its microphone indicator while it listens. Mute turns the microphone off. Only speech is kept, on the iPhone. Its audio waits there until it has been written down, then it’s deleted. That happens when you open Binders or plug the iPhone in, or within minutes if you turn on Write down while the iPhone is locked. If it can’t be written down, its audio is deleted after its last try, at most three days after it was heard, and a capture with no words in it loses its audio at once. Only the text goes to your Mac, over the connection above or in a Binders file you share yourself by AirDrop or Files. The text stays on the iPhone for 30 days after the conversation, so you can read it there. If you choose Add at Once or Auto for what you say to yourself, your iPhone also tells your Mac, with each capture, the mode you chose, whether it heard only your voice in it and, when it didn’t, why, in a word, how close your voice was and how long anyone else spoke, as numbers, which things you said to yourself during it may go with it, and, in Auto mode, your yes for each agent. Your Mac then reads such a capture for to-dos, things to fix and ideas, and adds them at once, or in Auto mode may hand them to an agent, as above. In Auto mode, a short exchange that would have been let go, too short to keep, is written down on your iPhone when it holds something you said to yourself, only to tell whether it was only you: its words aren’t kept, and only those numbers go to your Mac, which keeps them with it for a week.
  • What All-day capture keeps on the iPhone, its audio, its text and the text waiting for your Mac, is left out of your iCloud backups, and so are the speech models.
  • If you teach Binders your voice, the voice print is kept in the iPhone’s keychain. The recording you read for it isn’t kept.
  • Things you say to yourself. If you turn this on, Binders writes down, on the iPhone, short things you say on your own while All-day capture listens. It keeps one only when it starts with “Binders”, whoever says it, or, once Binders knows your voice, when it’s you and it sounds like something to do or to look up, such as “I need to book the dentist”. In Auto mode it also keeps one without a cue, such as “the login times out too fast”, when Binders’ rules and Apple’s on-device model both read it as something to do, a problem to fix or an idea. On iOS 26 with Apple Intelligence, Apple’s on-device model reads the words of one that passed those checks, on the iPhone, to confirm what it is. Only those words go to your Mac, with when you said them, the cue that let them through, how closely they matched your voice (a number), the mode you chose for them (Suggest, Add at Once or Auto) and, for what your iPhone heard as you on your own, your yes for each agent you said yes to there (its name and a fingerprint). Your Mac adds it, offers it to you or answers it, and in Auto mode may hand a to-do or an idea to an agent, as above. Nothing is kept of anything else. If you tap Not Me, Binders keeps how closely that clip matched your voice, a number, to tune the match later; never the audio. Calibrate checks this on your iPhone with phrases you read: it keeps scores and timings, never audio or words, on the iPhone only, until you delete them or share them yourself as a CSV.
  • Siri, Shortcuts and the Action Button. “Ask Binders” and “Tell Binders” send the words to Binders on your Mac. Siri hears and writes down what you say, as it does for any app, under Apple’s terms. Ask needs your iPhone unlocked. Tell only adds things, so it never reads anything from your binders back to you.
  • While All-day capture listens, the Lock Screen shows that it’s listening and how many things were filed (captures, and to-dos, ideas and notes made from what you said), the Needs you widget shows how many things wait on you, and the Today widget shows how much was heard and done today and who is working on what, in counts and names. A notification about something you said says what was done, such as “To-do added in Personal”, rather than your words, and a notification about a card names its binder, such as “On the Personal board”, rather than its title, as a card can be made from what you said. None of these shows what was said unless you turn on Show what you said on the Lock Screen, which also lets the Today widget and notifications name a card. If iOS shows previews only when your iPhone is unlocked, a notification’s words wait for that.
  • The speech models for All-day capture are downloaded once from Hugging Face: the large ones over Wi-Fi, the small voice detector (about 1 MB) over any connection that isn’t in Low Data Mode.

Recording other people

Meeting notes record what the other people on a call say, and All-day capture, on the Mac or the iPhone, writes down conversations around you. Many places require everyone’s consent before a conversation is recorded. Binders reminds you of this before your first recording; telling people, and not recording when someone objects, is your responsibility.

How your data is stored

Your data sits in ordinary files in your user Library. Binders does not add its own encryption, so it is protected the way the rest of your Mac is: by your login and, when you have it switched on, FileVault. The API key for a language model server, if you use one, and the keys your paired iPhones connect with are kept in the macOS Keychain.

Permissions

  • Microphone to hear you while you hold the shortcut or record a meeting.
  • Accessibility to notice your shortcut in any app, type the result for you, and read the field you are writing in when capture is on.
  • Audio capture to record the other side of a call for meeting notes.
  • Calendar, optional, to title meetings and name attendees.
  • Notifications, optional, to remind you when something you promised is due, to offer a card or an answer after a conversation, and to show an agent's question on a board, which you can answer in the notification.

On the iPhone: Microphone and Speech Recognition to write down what you dictate and, when it is on, All-day capture; Local Network to reach your Mac; and Notifications, optional, for what your Mac offers after a conversation, for what it did with something you said to yourself, for an agent's question on a board (an answer you type in the notification goes to your Mac), to tell you when All-day capture was paused, and to tell you when captures are waiting to be written down.

Binders Hub

Binders Hub is software you run on your own server. We publish it; we don’t run it for you, and we receive nothing from it: no account with us, no analytics, no copy of your data.

  • What it keeps, on your server. Its boards, notes, live work and agents, people’s sessions, and the keys of your GitHub App, sealed with a secret only your server holds. They live in your Redis and in the notes repo you choose.
  • GitHub. The hub talks to GitHub on your behalf through the GitHub App you create for it: it saves cards as issues, commits notes, reads pull requests, checks and deployments, and merges what you approve. GitHub sends it webhooks. What GitHub keeps is covered by GitHub’s terms.
  • Agents. Agents run on your machines, through the Binders runner, and reach the hub with a token you make. Your code stays on those machines. The agent tools themselves (Claude Code, Codex or your own) send what they work on to their model providers under those providers’ terms.
  • Who sees what. Whoever runs the hub decides who can sign in. Each person’s own binder is theirs alone, the hub’s admins included.

Contact

Questions about any of this: hello@binders.io. If you have found a security problem, please write to security@binders.io before making it public, and give us a chance to fix it. Mail to those addresses is delivered through Amazon SES to the publisher’s inbox.

This website

The site is static. It sets no cookies, runs no analytics and loads nothing from other companies: even the fonts are served from here. Like any website, the host that delivers the page (Amazon CloudFront) sees your IP address in order to send it to you. The download button and the app's own updater fetch the app from its GitHub release, so GitHub sees the request for that file, and counts it: that count is the only measure of downloads we have, and we like it that way.