These terms are the agreement between you and SurfSense covering the SurfSense desktop application, this website, and any licence you buy from us. Downloading or using the application, or using this website, means you accept them. If you do not accept them, do not use either.

They are shorter than terms of this kind usually are, because an application that runs on your own computer and holds no account needs fewer rules. Where an open source licence in our repository covers a file, that licence governs that file and these terms do not override it.

1. Who may use SurfSense

You must be old enough to enter a binding contract where you live, and at least 13, or 16 in the European Economic Area and the United Kingdom. If you are using SurfSense for an employer, a firm or any other organisation, you confirm you are authorised to accept these terms for it, and "you" means that organisation as well.

You may not use SurfSense if sanctions or export controls prohibit us from supplying you, as described in section 17.

2. The software and your rights in it

Most of SurfSense is open source under the Apache License 2.0, which lets you run, modify, redistribute and build on it commercially, subject to that licence's terms. One directory is not: surfsense_backend/app/proprietary/ is licensed under the Business Source License 1.1. The LICENSE file in the repository is the authority on which terms apply to which files, and it wins over this page wherever the two disagree.

Third-party components keep the licences their own authors gave them. That includes the language models, the speech model, the document parser and the other components bundled with the installer or downloaded by it. Some carry their own use restrictions, which travel with them and are not ours to waive, so check them if your use is commercial or unusual.

The SurfSense name and logo are not covered by those licences. You may say your project is built on SurfSense. You may not publish a fork under our name, or brand anything in a way that suggests we released or endorsed it.

3. Your documents and everything you make

Your documents, your prompts, your chats and every deck, report, spreadsheet, podcast or summary the application produces from them are yours. We claim no licence, no ownership and no right to use any of it. We could not exercise such a right if we had one, because the application keeps your material on your machine and never transmits it to us.

That cuts both ways. You are responsible for having the right to use whatever you put into it, and for what you do with what comes out. Do not use SurfSense to infringe copyright, to breach a confidentiality or professional duty you are under, or to process personal data you have no lawful basis to process. If you handle client or patient material, your own regulator's rules continue to apply and this software does not discharge them for you.

Keep your own backups. The application writes to a folder on your disk, and a failed drive, a deleted folder or an operating system fault takes your workspace with it. We hold no copy and cannot restore anything.

4. Acceptable use

You agree not to use SurfSense or this website to break the law, infringe anyone's rights, or harm anyone. Specifically, do not use them to:

attack, overload, probe or gain unauthorised access to any system, network or account, including ours;
generate or distribute malware, spam, phishing material, or content that sexually exploits children;
harass or threaten people, or produce material designed to defraud or impersonate someone;
collect personal data at scale without a lawful basis, or scrape a service in breach of its terms;
remove, disable or work around a licence check, rate limit or other technical protection;
resell, sublicense or redistribute a licence file or the plugin service as your own product.

Because the application runs locally, we mostly cannot see what you do with it and do not police it. Section 4 still binds you, and it is enforceable for anything that touches a service we run.

5. Licences, trials, payment and refunds

The application and its updates are free. A licence adds the scraper plugins and priority support and gates nothing else. You can start with a 30-day licence on an email address without giving us a card. Paid licences are sold through Stripe, and team licences are arranged by email.

A licence is verified on your own machine against a cryptographic signature, so it keeps working offline. Do not share, resell or publish your licence file, and do not attempt to defeat the check. A licence is for the person or organisation it was issued to.

When a licence expires, the plugins and priority support stop. The application and every future version of it keep working, and nothing you created with it is locked, degraded or taken away.

If a licence does not do what this site says it does, email us within 30 days of buying it and we will refund it in full. Beyond that, fees already paid are not refundable except where the law says otherwise, and your statutory cancellation rights as a consumer are unaffected. We may change prices for future purchases; a licence you have already bought keeps the terms and price you bought it on.

6. The scraper plugins and the service behind them

The plugins are the one paid feature that uses a service we operate. When you ask a plugin to fetch something, your request and its target reach that service so it can carry out the fetch.

Use it lawfully, for data you are entitled to collect, at a reasonable volume, and respect the terms and technical signals of the sites you point it at. We may apply rate limits, and we may suspend or terminate a licence being used to attack a third party, to collect data unlawfully, or obtained by fraud or chargeback. Where the problem is fixable we will tell you before cutting you off, unless the abuse is serious enough that waiting would cause harm.

7. Models and services you choose

SurfSense can use a model you run locally or one reached with an API key you supply. If you supply a key, your agreement for that model is with its provider, on their terms and at their prices. You are responsible for staying within those terms, for what the key is permitted to do, and for the bill it generates.

We do not control those providers and we do not promise they will be available, accurate, private or unchanged. If a provider alters its models, pricing or policies, or withdraws access entirely, that is a matter between you and them.

8. What the output is worth

Language models produce fluent text that is sometimes wrong, and they can invent citations, figures and quotations that look correct. Nothing SurfSense generates is legal, financial, medical, tax or other professional advice, and none of it is a substitute for review by someone qualified to give it.

You are responsible for checking anything you rely on or send to someone else. The application cites the sources behind an answer specifically so that you can check it, and we expect you to.

9. Changes to the software

We are actively developing SurfSense. Features will be added, changed and sometimes removed, and a capability present in one version may not be present in the next. We try not to break things people depend on, and the changelog records what moved.

Because the application runs on your machine, you decide when to update. An older version keeps working until you replace it, though we only support the current one and only the current one receives security fixes.

10. Ending this agreement

You can end it at any time by stopping use and, if you like, deleting the application and its data folder. Nothing further is required of you.

We may suspend or terminate your access to services we run, including the plugin service and this website, if you materially breach these terms, and we may terminate a licence for the reasons in section 6. Termination of a service does not revoke your rights under the open source licences covering the code, which continue on their own terms. Sections 3, 8, 12, 13, 14, 15 and 19 survive termination.

11. This website

The website is provided for information, documentation, downloads and the free chat pages. Do not attempt to disrupt it, circumvent its abuse protections, or use automated means to hammer it. The free chat pages are anonymous and rate limited; do not paste confidential material into them, and do not treat them as a private channel.

12. Disclaimer of warranties

We build this carefully and we want it to work well for you. What follows is the legal floor beneath that, in capitals because a disclaimer of implied warranties has to be conspicuous to be effective.

The software and this website are provided "as is" and "as available", without warranty of any kind. To the fullest extent permitted by law, we disclaim all warranties, express or implied, including any implied warranty of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, accuracy, quiet enjoyment and non-infringement. We do not warrant that the software will be uninterrupted, secure or error free, that defects will be corrected, or that it will meet your requirements or produce accurate output.

13. Limitation of liability

To the fullest extent permitted by law, SurfSense and its contributors and suppliers will not be liable for lost profits, lost revenue, lost goodwill, lost or corrupted data, business interruption, or any indirect, special, incidental, consequential, exemplary or punitive damages, however caused and on any theory of liability, even if advised of the possibility.

Our total aggregate liability for all claims relating to the software, this website or these terms is limited to the greater of the total amount you paid us in the twelve months before the claim arose, or fifty US dollars.

Some jurisdictions do not allow the exclusion of certain warranties or the limitation of certain damages, so parts of sections 12 and 13 may not apply to you. Where that is so, they apply only as far as that jurisdiction permits. Nothing in these terms limits liability for fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation, for death or personal injury caused by negligence, or for anything else that cannot lawfully be limited. If you are a consumer, your mandatory statutory rights are unaffected.

14. Indemnity

You agree to indemnify and hold harmless SurfSense and its contributors from claims, liabilities, damages and reasonable legal costs arising out of your use of the software or this website in breach of these terms or of the law. That expressly includes your use of the scraper plugins against a third party, and any claim that material you processed infringed someone's rights.

15. Governing law and disputes

These terms, and any dispute arising out of them or out of your use of SurfSense, are governed by the laws of the jurisdiction in which SurfSense is established, without regard to its conflict of laws rules.

We would much rather fix a problem than argue about one, so please email us first and give us a genuine chance to resolve it. If that fails, you and we agree that the dispute will be settled by binding arbitration before a single arbitrator, conducted in English, seated in the jurisdiction in which SurfSense is established, and brought on an individual basis rather than as a class, consolidated or representative action. Where a claim proceeds in court instead, each of us waives any right to a jury trial.

Two exceptions. Either of us may bring a qualifying claim in a small claims court, and either of us may ask a court for an injunction to stop misuse of intellectual property or confidential information without first arbitrating.

If you are a consumer resident in the European Economic Area or the United Kingdom, nothing in this section removes your right to bring proceedings in the courts of the country where you live, or to rely on the mandatory consumer protections of that country's law.

16. Copyright complaints

If you believe material on this website infringes your copyright, email rohan@surfsense.com identifying the work, the material you say infringes it and where to find it, your contact details, and a statement that you hold the right or act for the person who does. We will review it and remove material where the complaint is well founded. We do not host the documents you process in the application, so a complaint about those has to go to whoever is hosting them.

17. Export controls and sanctions

The software may be subject to export control and sanctions laws. You confirm you are not located in, and will not use or re-export it to, a country or party subject to an embargo or restriction that would prohibit us from supplying you, and that you are not a person listed on an applicable restricted-party list. You are responsible for complying with those laws where you are.

18. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms as the product or the law changes. The date at the top of this page moves when we do, and for a material change affecting people holding a paid licence we will email the address on that licence. Continuing to use the software or this website after a change takes effect means you accept the updated terms. If you do not accept them, stop using them, and section 5 still governs any refund you are due.

19. The rest

If a provision here is held unenforceable, the rest stays in force and that provision is narrowed to the minimum needed to make it valid. If we do not enforce a right immediately, we have not waived it. You may not assign these terms without our consent; we may assign them to a successor in connection with a merger, acquisition or sale of assets, and we will say so on this page. Neither of us is liable for a failure to perform caused by something genuinely outside our control.

These terms, together with the licences in our repository and any separate written agreement covering a team licence, are the whole agreement between us about the software, and they create no rights for anyone who is not a party to them. Notices to us go to the email address below; notices to you go to the address on your licence or are posted on this site.

20. Contact

Questions about these terms go to rohan@surfsense.com. How we handle data is described in our Privacy Policy.

Terms of Service