Help

Hideroom hasn’t launched yet, and we won’t give a date until there is one. It’s coming to iPhone first, with Android next. Join the launch list and we’ll send one email when it’s out on your phone, then delete your address.

No. Hideroom will have no account and no sign-in: you open the app and draw a pattern. There’s no Hideroom server that receives what you keep.

Photos, videos, notes and important papers such as passports, ID cards, birth certificates and insurance cards. You can also keep photos of crypto recovery words, but a photo is only as safe as your phone, so keep a paper or metal copy too for larger amounts. See important papers.

You open Hideroom by drawing a pattern of at least six lights, with at least one turn. Each pattern opens its own room: Free has one room, and with Pro a different pattern opens a different room. Nothing on screen says how many rooms there are.

No, and we say so plainly. People draw familiar shapes, so a pattern on its own is weak. That’s why Hideroom will always combine it with a secret held only by your phone, and slow down repeated guesses. The strength table gives the honest numbers.

Any extra room can be the one you show if someone makes you open Hideroom. Decoy rooms come with Pro, because a decoy is another room, and there’s no decoy setting anywhere, because a setting would give away which room is real. Put believable things in it.

The wipe pattern is part of Pro. Drawing your wipe pattern opens this room. Straight away, every other room on this phone is erased: its photos and its pattern. Your backup isn’t touched, so you can bring each room back later, on any phone, with its recovery phrase. Anything that wasn’t backed up yet is gone for good.

Yes. Everything is encrypted on your phone before it’s backed up, so only locked files reach your own private iCloud (Google Drive on Android). Hideroom never holds a copy. Only the room’s recovery phrase can open a backup, never the pattern.

After every upload, Hideroom reads it back from your iCloud. Each week it downloads a sample and decrypts it. Check my backup lets you run a practice restore with your recovery phrase whenever you like.

Your rooms come back from their encrypted backup in your own private iCloud; Hideroom never holds it. On the new phone, install Hideroom, tap Restore a room, type each room’s recovery phrase and draw a pattern. If you still have the old phone, choose Move to a new phone in each room: Hideroom makes an encrypted move file that opens on the new phone only with that room’s recovery phrase. Lost a phrase but can still open the room? Room settings, Make a new recovery phrase, free. Your Pro plan comes back with the same Apple Account.

Install Hideroom on your new phone, tap Restore a room and type the room’s recovery phrase. The new phone fetches the encrypted backup from your own private iCloud, so anything that was backed up comes back. Hideroom never holds it.

Nine words that Hideroom makes for each room, worth about 87 bits, which is far beyond guessing. It’s shown once when you save it. It opens the room on any phone, which is how a room comes back from its encrypted backup in your own iCloud.

No. People who choose their own words pick guessable ones, so Hideroom always generates the phrase. Write it down and keep it away from your phone.

On the lock screen, choose Use recovery phrase and type the room’s nine words. The room opens and you set a new pattern. It’s free, and there’s never a paid reset.

Then nobody can open that room, including us. That’s the point of real encryption: we never have your keys, so we can’t open a room for anyone, you included.

Free is one private room with 100 photos and documents plus 10 videos. Backup, Check my backup, the recovery phrase, moving to a new phone and export are free for good. More rooms, including decoy rooms, come with Pro. See pricing.

Lifetime is £39.99 · $39.99, once. Yearly is £19.99 · $19.99, with 7 days free if you haven’t had a Hideroom trial, and Monthly is £4.99 · $4.99. These are launch prices; the App Store sets each country’s price, including local taxes.

You can’t add more to that room until you go Pro, but everything in it stays viewable, backed up and exportable. Nothing is ever locked away, at the limit, after a trial or when a plan ends.

Apple handles payments, cancellations and refunds for anything bought through the App Store, so refund requests go to Apple. On a new phone with the same Apple Account, Pro comes back on its own, and Restore purchases is on every paywall. Family Sharing won’t be switched on at launch.

No. Everything is encrypted on your phone with keys we never have, and there’s no Hideroom server that receives your photos. We couldn’t open your rooms if we were asked. Read how it works on the security page.

No. They store your locked files in your own iCloud or Google Drive, but they can’t open them without your phone or your recovery phrase.

Not yet. An independent review is recommended before launch, and this answer will change, with who did it and when, on the day one is done.

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Not yet. Hideroom comes to iPhone first, and Android comes next with the same features. Choose Android on the form on the Android page to hear when it’s ready.

Yes, once the Android app is out. The encrypted format is the same on both. You save the room’s encrypted backup folder wherever you choose, such as iCloud Drive, Google Drive or a computer, and open it on the other phone with its recovery phrase. Hideroom never holds it.

Yes. Pro, Lifetime included, is designed to follow you when you move a room from iPhone to Android.