Privacy Notice
Effective date: October 10, 2026
GIF Battles is a browser-based multiplayer party game. This notice explains what information is processed when you use the game and the third-party services that help operate it.
Information used to run a game
You choose a nickname and may create or join a room. We process the room code, an anonymous player identifier stored in your browser, game submissions, votes, and game settings so players in the same room can play together. Do not include sensitive personal information in nicknames, prompts, text answers, or AI-image requests.
GIF search
When you search for a GIF, the search term and technical request data are sent directly from your browser to the configured provider, GIPHY or KLIPY. KLIPY also receives your anonymous player identifier and selection reports with the originating search term. Each provider processes these requests under its own policies. GIF Battles displays attribution for the provider whose content is used.
Our Picks and memes
Our Picks and meme templates are served by GIF Battles. Local catalog searches go to our server. When you create a meme, its template identifier and captions are sent to our server for rendering. Caption text is kept in temporary room state, and the rendered image is stored publicly in Vercel Blob for participants to view. Memes stay temporary unless you explicitly select sharing for Our Picks review. Sharing creates a separate public copy and saves your captions, template credits and consent record for moderation. Approved contributions may be published permanently.
AI features
If a room host enables AI features with a Gemini API key, question-generation and image-generation prompts, or a meme template image and the current game prompt when you request caption suggestions, are sent to Google's Gemini API. Generated images are stored in Vercel Blob so they can be displayed during the game. The host's Gemini key is stored server-side for the room and is not shown to other players.
Analytics and service providers
We use Vercel Web Analytics to understand aggregated site visits and page performance. Vercel states that this analytics product uses anonymized data and does not use cookies. We also use Vercel to host the app and images, and Upstash Redis to store temporary room state and rate-limit data. We record aggregate GIF search, pagination, error, quota-block, and game-completion counts associated with a room and game. These counters do not include raw search terms or player identifiers. For local stock we also record aggregate browsing exposures, selections, voting appearances and votes. Short-lived hashed event identifiers prevent duplicate counts.
Retention
GIF usage counters expire seven days after their last update. Local stock counters expire after 90 days without an update, and hashed deduplication records expire after one day. Lobby data normally expires after 30 minutes of inactivity. Active-game state normally expires after four hours, and completed-game state after 15 minutes. Room Gemini keys expire within 24 hours and are cleared when a game ends. AI images are deleted at game end on a best-effort basis; a failed cleanup may require later administrative deletion. Temporary memes are eligible for deletion after 24 hours and removed by a daily cleanup job, normally within about 48 hours, or earlier when the host starts another game. Failed jobs or a cleanup backlog can extend this period. Permanent stock images and opted-in contributions are retained separately. Rejected contribution images are deleted; a minimal rejection record prevents duplicate uploads.
Your choices and contact
You can stop using the game at any time and clear your browser storage through your browser settings. For questions about this notice or a data request, please open an issue in the GIF Battles repository.