Last updated 11 October 2026
Audiobook Co-op is a client for Audiobookshelf, the self-hosted audiobook and ebook server. It talks to the servers you point it at, and there is no Audiobook Co-op account. What it sends to its developer is set out below: a problem report you choose to submit, the questions Discover asks, counts of taps on shop links, books you recommend to the people on your server, and, only if you switch them on, a profile of your reading taste and automatic error reports.
Which versions this covers. All of them: the version in the stores and the test versions (TestFlight, and Google Play's testing tracks) have Discover, sharing your taste, recommending to the people on your server and problem reports alike, including recording the screen into a problem report.
Audiobook Co-op connects only to the Audiobookshelf servers you add yourself. Those servers are yours or belong to people you know; the app has no default server and no server of its own. What it sends to them is what a library client has to send:
It does not change or delete anything in your library. It writes listening state and nothing more.
None of it leaves the device except back to the server it came from, in a report you submit, or as described under The Audiobook Co-op service below.
The app also talks to a service the developer runs, at
feed.sidequestered.com. Everything it receives is listed here.
Offered only in the United States for now. Until we have legal advice for the EU, the UK and everywhere else, the app does not offer these switches outside the US and sends nothing about your taste from there; a profile sent from a device before is deleted the next time it tries to send one. The app goes by the country you chose under Shopping, or your device's region if you have not chosen one, and the service also checks the country an upload comes from and refuses it from anywhere else.
In the US it is off until you switch it on, on every version of the app. Settings → Sharing has one switch for each use, and you can switch on any, all or none of them:
The first time you switch one on, the app says what it would send and asks before it sends anything. From then on, after the app syncs and at most once a day -- and at once whenever you change these choices -- it sends the service a profile containing these kinds of data, and only these:
Your wishlist has a switch of its own, Share my wishlist, off until you switch it on, on every version of the app, and the app asks before it is first sent. On, the books on your wishlist (each one's ISBN or ASIN where known, and its title and first author) go with your profile and are used for two things only: telling a book's publisher or author how many readers want it -- one total per book, never broken down by server, library or region, nothing finer than a month, and nothing about who -- to arrange a sale or a discount; and, if Share with people on my server is on as well, showing the other people on your server who share with it how many of them want a book -- never who. On a small server they may be able to guess. It is not used for suggestions or sponsors.
With Share with people on my server on, the profile also carries a code for each library you read, worked out on your device from details only members of that library can see, so the service can tell which readers share a library without learning which server or library it is.
Never sent, whatever is switched on: server addresses, usernames, passwords and sign-in tokens, file names, listening positions, bookmarks, notes, highlights, exact times, and anything from a problem report. Your wishlist is sent only with its own switch on.
On the Unlimited and Family versions you can also choose which of those kinds of data are collected at all; one you leave out is not sent for any use. On every version, switching every use off sends nothing, and switching uses off is never something you have to pay for.
How it is kept. The profile is held under a random identifier and secret your device makes the first time it sends anything; there is no account, no name and no email, and the profile is never joined to a problem report, a purchase or a server address. The service keeps only the latest profile, replaced whole each time, and deletes it when you switch every use off, when you delete it, or after 180 days without an update, and removes it from its encrypted backups within 60 days after that. Settings → Sharing shows the profile as the service holds it. Reports drawn from profiles show only totals: the wishlist as one total per book, as above, and anything else across at least twenty readers. There is no page for one person's profile. It is never sold, and never shared with any other company.
The service runs on servers in the United States, behind Cloudflare, which carries the connection.
A problem report is sent only when you choose to submit one. Nothing is gathered for it automatically — not on a crash, not on a schedule, not in the background — and no report is sent unless you write one and press send.
It contains what you write; your device's model and system version, its screen size and text size, and which version and build of the app it is; and any screenshots, videos or screen recordings you attach. You can read the whole thing before sending it. It does not contain the app's log. If automatic error reports are on, it also carries their random reference, so that the report can be matched to the errors your device sent. Server addresses, sign-in tokens, passwords, usernames and email addresses are removed from what you write first. Screenshots and recordings go exactly as they were taken — a recording shows everything on screen, your library included — so check what is in shot. Your title and description become an issue in the developer's bug tracker; the report as sent, the recordings and the screenshots are kept on the developer's own report server and the issue links to them. Settings lists every report you have sent, and deleting one removes it from your device at once. If nobody has started on it yet, the issue and everything on the report server are deleted too. If work has started, the issue — your title and description — stays as the record of that work, and the rest is deleted when the work is finished (at once, if it already is). Either way they are kept only long enough to fix what you reported: a report you never delete goes 180 days after its issue is closed.
Off until you turn it on, in Settings → Privacy → Error reports; the app asks once, the first time it notices a problem. When something goes wrong, the app keeps the lines of its own log around it. With automatic error reports on, it sends those to the developer's report server about once a day, never while a book is loading or playing: what kind of problem it was and how many times it happened; the log lines around it, with server addresses, the names you gave your servers, sign-in tokens, passwords, usernames and email addresses replaced first (a line the system wrote rather than the app, such as a crash's own message, is sent as it is after the same replacements); your device's model and system version; and which version and build of the app it is. If the app stopped while it was on screen -- a crash, rather than your device closing it in the background -- the next batch also carries the last 200 lines of its log from before it stopped, with the same replacements, and which build it was. Never the rest of the log, and never a screenshot or recording.
Each batch carries a random reference made on your device when you turned this on, so that the same problem from the same device is counted once, and so that a problem report you submit can be matched to it. It is not the identifier your profile is kept under, and nothing joins the two. Turning automatic error reports off stops them at once and forgets the reference. To check that a batch came from the genuine app on a real device, the app asks Apple (App Attest) or Google (Play Integrity) to vouch for it, as it does when you prove you own a server.
A problem seen on more than one device, or many times, becomes an issue in the developer's bug tracker giving the kind of problem, the app version and the counts; the log lines stay on the report server, and are deleted 90 days after the problem was last seen.
Some of the app's links to shops are affiliate links: if you buy after tapping one, the shop may pay us a commission, at no cost to you. A shop link opens only when you tap it, in your device's browser or the shop's own app, never inside Audiobook Co-op. There, the shop -- and, for some shops, an affiliate network that credits the referral on its behalf, such as Amazon Associates, Awin or Rakuten Advertising -- may set cookies or similar identifiers in that browser to record that the visit came from us, under its own privacy policy. Audiobook Co-op itself sets no cookies and has no advertising identifier, and the link carries nothing that says who you are; the shop or network learns only what any visit to its site tells it. What those programmes report back to us is sales and commissions, not who made them.
Delete what I've shared, in Settings → Sharing, removes everything the Audiobook Co-op service keeps for your device -- your profile, any books you recommended to the people on your server or asked its owner for, and any gift details, support link or owner proof you set up -- at once from the live service, and from its encrypted backups within 60 days -- and answers with a receipt. Your switches stay as they are, but nothing is sent again until you confirm in Settings → Sharing.
Removing a server from Audiobook Co-op deletes its saved credentials and its cached library from the device. Uninstalling the app removes everything it stored, downloads included. Neither touches your Audiobookshelf server, and data held there is governed by whoever runs it — which, for a self-hosted server, is usually you.
Audiobook Co-op is not directed at children. It collects nothing about anyone's reading unless they switch sharing on themselves, and no report unless they submit one or turn automatic error reports on.
If this policy changes, the date at the top changes with it, and the current version is always the one at this address.
Questions about this policy: privacy@sidequestered.com.