Privacy and cookies
Neko Nihongo is a free study site run by one person. It collects as little as it can, shows no ads and sells nothing. This page explains what is collected and why.
Updated
The short version
- You can use the whole site without an account. Your progress then stays in your browser.
- Analytics cookies are set only if you press Accept. Declining changes nothing about the site.
- If you create an account, we keep your email address, your settings and your practice progress.
- You can ask us to delete your account and data at any time.
Google Analytics
We use Google Analytics 4 to see which pages and exercises help learners most, for example how many people finish the kana quiz or open a lesson's stories. It runs in Google's Consent Mode:
- If you accept, Google Analytics sets cookies that recognise your browser on later visits and records the pages you view, events such as finishing a quiz, your approximate location (country and city), your device, browser and screen size, and the page you came from.
- If you decline or haven't chosen yet, no analytics cookies are set. Your browser still sends Google a cookie-free ping when a page loads, without any identifier, so we can estimate visitor numbers.
Advertising features are switched off, and the data is not used for ads. Google processes it on our behalf and keeps it for at most 14 months. Google's own use is explained in How Google uses information from sites that use its services.
Cookies and browser storage
| Name | What it does | Kept for |
|---|---|---|
_ga, _ga_9DEF7DH6TY | Google Analytics cookies, only after you accept | 2 years |
nd.consent | Your cookie choice, so we don't ask on every page | Until you clear it |
nd.settings, nd.progress | Your app settings and practice progress | Until you clear it |
| Auth0 sign-in data | Keeps you signed in, only if you have an account | Until you sign out |
Everything except the Google Analytics cookies lives in your browser's local storage and is needed for the site to work, so it doesn't need your consent. None of it is sent to us unless you sign in.
Changing your choice
You can change your mind at any time: . The same button is in the footer of every page and in the app under Settings, Privacy. To remove cookies already set, clear this site's data in your browser.
If you create an account
Signing in is optional and moves your progress to your account so it follows you between devices. We then keep:
- your email address and an account id from our sign-in provider;
- your settings, including the name, country and age you enter to make practice sentences personal;
- your practice progress: which items you answered, how often right or wrong, and when.
Your account data is used only to run the app. It is never sold or shared for marketing.
Services we use
- Auth0 (by Okta) handles sign-up and sign-in, including "Continue with Google".
- ElevenLabs records the audio. If you are signed in and save a name, country or age, the sentences that use them are sent to ElevenLabs once to be recorded, and the audio is stored on our server.
- Amazon Web Services hosts the site, the database and nightly backups in Frankfurt, Germany. Backups are deleted after 30 days.
- Google Analytics, as described above.
Some of these companies may process data outside the European Economic Area, under the safeguards their terms provide, such as the EU Standard Contractual Clauses.
Your rights
You can ask to see the data we hold about you, correct it, download it, or delete your account and everything linked to it. In the app, Settings also lets you reset your progress yourself. If you're in the EU or UK and think we've handled your data wrongly, you can complain to your data protection authority.
Contact
For any privacy question or request, email privacy@nekonihongo.com. We reply within 30 days, usually much sooner.
If this page changes in a way that matters, the date at the top will change too.