Everything people ask before they start
What q.buzz is, who made it, what it costs, and what happens to your data.
What it is, and who made it
You write your own questions, answer them in a few taps, and see what comes of it over time.
It sits somewhere between a survey app and a habit tracker. Like a survey, you decide what gets asked — a scale, a yes or no, a number, a few words, a photo, a place, or a tap on a body map. Like a habit tracker, it can remind you, and it keeps everything you have already answered.
You do not have to invent it all from nothing. There are over 100 example questions and check-ins to start from, and you can change any of them later.
People use it for symptoms, sleep, mood, workouts, productivity, and cat feedings. Most start with one thing they are trying to understand.
Coming soonLive exports to Google Sheets.
We're a small team of designers and developers based out of the US, Vietnam, and New Zealand. We believe strongly that users should have better tools to control and understand the data behind their everyday lives.
The team is led by Jake Hartman, a former NASA astrophysicist and Google engineer, who built the first iterations of q.buzz as his personal accountability tracker. He found it so useful that he put together a team to build the app available today. It's our sincere hope that you will find it helpful too.
Getting it, and getting going
Download q.buzz from Google Play or the App Store.
You can use q.buzz on multiple devices. Data is stored in the cloud, so you will always have your latest questions and responses.
Q.buzz is free. Write your own check-ins, set reminders, chart what you have logged, and keep your record for as long as you want it. There is no trial to run out.
Cloud backup, using q.buzz on more than one device, and answering your check-ins on your watch are all free, and if we ever charge for them, they stay free for everyone who joined before that day.
Yes. You can log without a connection, and q.buzz syncs when you are back in range. A walk out of coverage or a flight does not interrupt your record. Responses on your watch also sync when you have your phone again.
Choosing what to track
You're building a new habit when you decide to use a tracker app, so start small. Aim for a couple check-ins a day, or perhaps one in the evening to recap. You can always add more later.
Yes. Rename it, reword the scale, or switch it off entirely. Editing a question keeps the history you have already recorded against it, so you do not lose the past by improving the present.
Yes. You set what the ends mean, in your own words, and you can rename or remove any field.
What we cannot see, and what you can take
Yes. Your check-ins are end-to-end encrypted — the questions, the answers, and anything you attach to them. They are unlocked on your device and nowhere else, which means what sits on our servers is something we cannot read.
We keep a backup of your key so a new phone does not mean starting again. That backup is locked too — by your recovery phrase, a set of random words the app generates for you, or by the secure storage built into your phone. We never hold the part that opens it.
Your account details are encrypted as well, but we hold that key. We need them to run the app, and to see which features people actually use.
We will never sell your data, and nobody gets to advertise to you based on it.
Our full privacy policy sets out exactly what is collected and why.
While you still have a device with q.buzz on it, nothing is lost — the app is already unlocked there, and your phrase is on your Profile page. Write it down before that changes.
If you lose both, the record is gone. That is the other side of end-to-end encryption: because we never hold your key, there is no reset link we can send and no support request that recovers it. Keep the phrase somewhere you will still have it in a year.
Yes, both, at any time.
- Download your questions and responses whenever you like.
- Delete a single check-in, or your whole account.
- Coming soonLive exports to Google Sheets, if you want to work with the raw data.
Deleting your account is not instant, on purpose. You have 30 days to sign back in and change your mind. After that it is gone, and copies sitting in our hosting provider’s backups clear within another 30 days.
The data management page explains how.
Patterns, and their limits
Usually around two weeks of reasonably regular logging before there is enough in your charts to compare against. It depends on how often the thing you are tracking actually happens.
No. Streaks are there if they help you and off if they do not, so nothing is counting consecutive days unless you have asked it to. Log twice a week, or twice a month, and the picture keeps building from wherever you left it.
If you stop for a while, don't get frustrated. You can always start up again. Some data is better than no data.
No. Q.buzz gives you charts and a calendar of everything you have logged, and reading them is yours to do. Two things turning up together is not proof that one causes the other.
Coming soonTrend and cycle detection, where q.buzz points out what moves with what in plain language.
What q.buzz is not
No. Q.buzz is a personal tracking app. It does not diagnose or treat any condition, and it is not a substitute for advice from a qualified clinician.
What it does is keep a record of what you choose to log, so that when you do talk to someone you have something better than memory to draw on.
No. Q.buzz records what you enter and shows it back to you. It makes no clinical claims, and it is not certified as a medical device.
Start with one thing you want to understand
Pick one thing, give it a month, and see what turns up. Free — and free for good if you join now.