Long-exposure astrophotography for iPhone
Last updated: 13 August 2026
Starlapse collects nothing. There is no account, no server, no analytics, and no network code in the app at all. Nothing you do in it is transmitted anywhere, because there is nowhere for it to go.
That is unusual enough for a camera app that the rest of this document exists mainly to be specific about it.
Camera. To photograph the night sky. Frames are combined on your device — that is the entire product — and the result is written to your photo library only when you tap Save. Nothing is uploaded, and nothing is kept outside your photo library and the app’s temporary folder.
Location, while the app is open. Used to compute where things are in the sky above you: which meteor showers are active, where their radiants sit, where the Moon is, and therefore where to point the camera. The calculation runs entirely on your device using published astronomical formulas. Your position is never sent anywhere, never stored on disk, and is discarded when the app closes. Deny it and everything still works except the aiming overlay.
Motion sensors. The gyroscope, accelerometer and magnetometer tell the app which way the camera is aimed, so the sky overlay lines up with what you see. This data is used for display only and never leaves the device.
Photo library, add-only. Used to save your finished photographs and videos. The app requests add-only access, which means it can put pictures in your library but cannot read, browse or scan what is already there.
Finished photographs and time-lapses go to your photo library, under your control, and are governed from that point by Apple’s Photos privacy settings rather than by this app.
Event clips from detector mode are written to the app’s temporary folder first, so you can review them before deciding. Anything you discard is deleted; anything you keep is copied to your photo library. Uninstalling the app removes everything left in its temporary folder.
Starlapse is not directed at children and collects no personal information from anyone, regardless of age.
If this policy ever changes, the updated version will appear at this address with a new date at the top. The full revision history is public in the repository — you can see exactly what changed and when.
Questions: info@superduperai.co
Source code: github.com/fortunto2/starlapse — MIT licensed, so the claims above are verifiable rather than merely asserted.