Questions, bugs, and the things that surprise people.
Email support@cairnstudio.si with your device model, iOS version, and a short description of what happened. We read everything.
Three things have to be true at once: a walk session is running (tap Start Walk), you are inside the place's area, and Location is allowed While Using the App. Scrolling the feed or opening a card does not count — presence is the whole mechanic. Check Me → Settings & privacy → Permissions to see what the app currently has.
Yes, for as long as the walk is running. Start the walk, then pocket the phone — the fog keeps lifting and iOS shows its blue location indicator while it does. Ending the walk switches that off again. Please do put the phone away on rough or steep ground; see Walking safely.
No. It only ever asks for "While Using the App" location, never "Always", and it turns background recording on when you start a walk and off when you end one. With no walk running it has no location access to use — and nothing it records ever leaves your phone.
A denied Health read looks identical to an empty Health, so the app falls back to the iPhone's pedometer. Check Settings → Privacy & Security → Health → FogTrail and allow step count, and allow Motion & Fitness. Steps by hour need Health — the pedometer only reports a daily total.
No. The circle is a local demo the app creates on your phone on first launch, labelled as such on the Circle tab and in Settings. FogTrail has no friend requests and no follower list, and the circle is not synced anywhere — signing in creates an account for your walker name and avatar colour only. Hiding a place "for" one of them makes a fogged copy on your own device; nothing is sent anywhere. To reach a real friend, use Send — it hands them a FogTrail file through Messages, AirDrop or Mail, and they need the app installed to open it.
This version ships four seeded example places around Vancouver's North Shore and East Vancouver. Fog lifts on those, so walking elsewhere will not clear a trail yet.
No. The coordinates are real, but the drawn line is an illustrative shape so the fog has something to lift, and the difficulty, surface, amenity and note fields are examples written for the app. The stills are artwork, not photos of those places. Do not navigate by it — see Walking safely.
Your walking never does. There is no analytics and no advertising — your walks, steps, location, health data and lifted fog stay in the app's storage on your iPhone, and we never receive any of them.
One thing does. If you sign in, FogTrail stores a name and your avatar colour in an account on our server so your walker card is yours. Nothing about your walking goes with it, and Me → Settings & privacy → Delete account removes the account permanently. Signing in is optional and the app is fully usable without it.
Which door you use changes one thing. Sign in with Apple gives us your name and nothing else — we never ask Apple for your email address. Google gives us your name and your email address together, because Google does not let us ask for one without the other; we use it only to recognise you when you sign in again, and it is deleted with your account. Continue with email is not an account at all — the address is used to suggest a name and is never saved or sent anywhere. The Privacy Policy sets all of this out in full.
If you subscribe to FogTrail Pro, Apple handles the purchase — we never see a payment detail, a receipt or an Apple Account. And if you send a place, you are handing a file to iOS's share sheet yourself and choosing where it goes; it travels straight to your friend's phone, never through us. Full detail in the Privacy Policy.
No — walking, the fog, Health, the seeded places, the demo circle, opening a place a friend sends you, and keeping your first walk as a place of your own are all free and stay free. Pro unlocks keeping more than one, writing your own hint, adding your own still, and sending a place. It is an auto-renewing subscription (weekly, monthly or yearly) sold through Apple; the plan lengths, prices, trial and renewal terms are on the Terms of Use page and on the subscription screen in the app.
Cancel: Settings → Apple Account → Subscriptions. Cancel at least 24 hours before the period ends, or it renews. Restore: tap Restore Purchases on the subscription screen or in Me → Settings & privacy — it restores to the same Apple Account you bought with. Refunds are Apple's to give, at reportaproblem.apple.com; we cannot process one for you.
Yes. Me → Settings & privacy → Export my walks writes a JSON file of your finished walks and saved daily steps and passes it to the share sheet, so you choose where it goes. It is written on your device and nothing uploads it. The row appears once you have finished at least one walk.
Me → Settings & privacy → Clear local data. That removes every walk and the path it recorded, the fog those walks lifted, your saved daily steps, the places you made or were sent, the photos you attached to them, and your walker name — including the name Apple gave us if you signed in with Apple. The example places are then planted again. Deleting the app removes everything.
It does not cancel a subscription, because Apple holds that one, not us — cancel in Settings → Apple Account → Subscriptions.
Not in this version. An Apple Watch, Garmin or Fitbit counts only if its app writes steps into Apple Health, which FogTrail then reads — there is no FogTrail Watch app and no Garmin or Fitbit login. You can sign in with Apple or Google, or continue with an email address or no account at all. Facebook is not available yet.