Last updated 28 September 2026
Lotus is a life counter for Magic: The Gathering. This policy covers the Lotus app on iOS and Android, Lotus on Apple TV and Android TV, and the web version at lifecounter.app.
Controller (Art. 4 GDPR)
Vanilla b.v.
Hurksestraat 19
5652 AH Eindhoven
The Netherlands
Company number: 76313271
Data protection questions: [email protected]
Lotus has no accounts and no login. Your games, counters, player names, profiles and settings are saved on your own device. They only leave it when you choose to share a game, and then only what that shared page shows.
The following are stored locally, in your browser’s storage or the app’s own storage, and are not sent to us unless you share a game (see below):
Deleting the app, or clearing your browser data, deletes all of it permanently. We cannot recover it, because we never had it.
Card search. When you search for a card, the query is sent to Scryfall, which returns card data and images. Their privacy policy applies to that request.
GIF search. If you search for an animated background, the query is sent to Giphy. Their privacy policy applies to that request.
Website analytics (web only). lifecounter.app uses Google Analytics to count visits and see which features get used. This is aggregate and is not used to identify you. The iOS and Android apps do not currently send analytics.
Game recaps you share. When you tap Share recap, Lotus uploads a summary of that one game: player names (or “Player 1”, “Player 2” if you turn on Hide player names), colours, card-art backgrounds picked from Scryfall or Giphy, life totals over time, knock-outs, commander damage, format, date and duration. Photos you added from your device are never uploaded. Anyone with the link can open the recap. Recaps can’t be listed or searched; the link is the only way in. To share, your device gets a random anonymous ID from Google Firebase (no name, email or phone number), which is deleted after 30 days of not sharing anything. Recaps are stored in Google Firebase in the EU (Belgium). To have a recap deleted, send us its link.
Live games you share. When you tap Cast to TV (or turn on Allow spectators), Lotus sends the game as it happens: player names, colours, card-art backgrounds from Scryfall or Giphy, life totals, counters, commander damage, whose turn it is and the game clock. Anyone with the game code can watch at lifecounter.app/watch. The live game is deleted when you tap Stop sharing, or at the latest 24 hours after your phone last sent anything. People watching get their own anonymous ID so you can see how many are watching; nothing else about them is stored. When a game ends while you share, its recap (see above) is created so viewers can look back at it.
Lotus on your TV (Apple TV, Android TV). The TV app only shows games other people share. To follow a game it gets its own random anonymous ID from Google Firebase and counts as one viewer. To let a phone connect to it, it keeps a 4-character TV code in Google Firebase, together with the time the app was last opened; a phone that knows the code can send its game code to the TV. Nothing else about the TV or the people in front of it is stored, and nothing can be typed or posted from the TV. A TV code unused for 30 days is deleted.
Chat and polls on the watch page. If the host allows it, people watching can post short messages and vote on who wins, under a nickname they pick. Messages and votes are visible to everyone watching that game (never inside the Lotus app) and are deleted together with the live game. The host can clear the chat at any time. A game’s poll result and the nicknames of those who called the winner can appear in its recap.
Purchases. If you choose to support Lotus, the payment is handled entirely by Apple or Google. We never see your name, email, card details or address. We only receive confirmation from the store that a purchase exists.
Lotus does not knowingly collect personal information from anyone, including children.
Under the GDPR you have the right to access your personal data, to have it corrected or deleted, to restrict or object to its processing, to data portability, and to withdraw consent at any time. For games you did not share there is nothing for us to act on, because that data never leaves your device. For a shared recap, send us its link and we delete it. For the website, requests about analytics data can be sent to the address above.
You also have the right to complain to a data protection authority. The European authorities are listed at edpb.europa.eu. We would rather you came to us first.
If this policy changes, the date at the top changes with it.
Questions: [email protected]
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