Privacy Policy

Effective October 26, 2026 · Nearclip for Mac, Windows, Android, iPhone and iPad, by ivLis STUDIO

• No serverThere is no Nearclip cloud. Clips go from your device to your device.
• No accountNothing to sign up for. Your devices pair with each other directly.
• No trackingNo analytics, telemetry, ads or crash reports.

What stays on your devices

• Clipboard history — the text, links, colors and images you copy, with the name of the device each came from. It lives in Nearclip's storage on each of your devices and is kept for the time you choose in Settings (30 days by default). Deleting a clip or clearing history removes it on every device in your group.
• Your group key — a random key created on your device that encrypts everything between your devices. It is kept in the system's protected storage (Keychain on Apple devices, the Android Keystore, Windows Data Protection) and is handed to a new device only when you pair it.
• Settings and device names — for example "MacBook Pro" or "Galaxy S25", which your other devices show.

Items that password managers mark as private are never read into history or sent. On a computer you can also exclude apps, and every device can pause syncing.

What travels on your network

To find each other, your devices announce Nearclip on the local network (Bonjour / mDNS) with the device name, platform and random identifiers, so other devices on the same network can see that a Nearclip device is there. Clips, history and device lists are only ever sent to devices in your group, over connections that are end-to-end encrypted with fresh keys for each connection.

Remote connection (optional, off by default)

If you turn on Remote connection, Nearclip's built-in Tailscale node signs in to your own Tailscale account and connects your devices through Tailscale's network. Tailscale's coordination service then sees your account, the device names Nearclip registers (like nearclip-macbook-pro-…) and network addresses, and Tailscale's relays may carry the encrypted connection when no direct path is possible. Tailscale never receives readable clips: Nearclip's own end-to-end encryption runs inside. Tailscale's handling of that information is described in Tailscale's privacy policy. Signing out in Nearclip takes the device offline; you can remove it from your Tailscale admin console.

Permissions

• Clipboard — to send what you copy and to put received clips on the clipboard.
• Local network — to find and connect to your devices. On Windows, the firewall asks once.
• Camera (phones, optional) — only to scan a pairing QR code. No image is saved or sent.
• Notifications (Android) — to keep the connection alive in the background and show what arrived.
• Notification access (Android, for "Send verification codes") — Nearclip looks at new notifications of your text-message apps and KakaoTalk, on your phone, for a 4–8 digit verification code. Only the code is sent, and only to your own devices; the message, its sender and every other notification stay on your phone and are not stored. Turn it off in Settings › Send verification codes, or take away notification access in Android's settings. On Android 15 and later you may allow Nearclip to see codes (Shizuku or adb); that allowance does nothing else.
• Shortcuts (iPhone, optional) — if you set up the "Send Verification Code" automation, iOS hands Nearclip the text message; Nearclip sends only the code it finds to your own devices and keeps nothing else.
• Shizuku (Android, optional) — only if you turn on instant capture, to read copies in the background. It stays on your phone.

Children

Nearclip is a general-purpose utility and collects no personal information from anyone, children included.

Changes

If this policy changes, the new version appears on this page with a new date, and the change is visible in the project's public history on GitHub.

Contact

Questions or requests about privacy: open an issue at github.com/ivLis-Studio/nearclip/issues.