1 Our services and your account
These terms cover the Hemmingway website, desktop and mobile apps, web app, API, Autopilot and Hemmingway Unlocked. “We” means Hemmingway AI (Pty) Ltd, the operator above, which is responsible for all services covered by these terms. Any future change of operator is subject to section 13.
By accepting these terms or using Hemmingway, you agree to them. A separate written agreement takes priority where it expressly changes these terms. Downloaded model weights have their own licence, as explained below.
You must be at least 18, meet any higher local age requirement and be legally able to contract and use the service. Do not allow minors to use your account or bypass age or location controls. We may require age verification; our Privacy Policy explains the information involved. If you act for a business, you confirm you may bind it. You must comply with applicable sanctions and local law.
Give a working email address and protect your password, sign-in codes and API keys. Personal accounts are for one person and must not be shared, sold or transferred. Business, API and partner use may serve others within the agreed scope. Tell team@hemmingway.io promptly about suspected unauthorised access. You are responsible for authorised activity and reasonable credential security, not a compromise caused by our failure.
2 Plans and payment
The pricing page and checkout state the price, currency, taxes, billing period, included services and limits. Standard Hemmingway plans use Stripe. Unlocked memberships use Patreon. Their payment services have their own terms; we remain responsible for supplying what you buy from us. Access to one service does not include another unless the offer says so. We do not receive your full payment-card details.
Subscriptions renew monthly or annually as selected, until cancelled. Cancel a Stripe-billed Hemmingway plan in Settings or on the Manage page. Cancel a Patreon membership through Patreon. Follow the billing provider identified on your receipt. Deleting an account or chats does not cancel billing. Access normally continues until the end of the paid period. Cancellation does not itself entitle you to a refund for that period; legal rights and the refunds promised below still apply.
Failed payments may be retried. Continuing failure, reversal or refund may end paid access or return the account to Free.
We give at least seven days’ email notice of a subscription price increase, and longer where required by law or payment-provider rules or necessary to give you a reasonable opportunity to cancel. The increase takes effect no earlier than the next renewal after that notice period. Patreon-billed memberships also follow Patreon’s repricing rules, including its 31-day price lock for existing members where applicable. You may cancel before the increase takes effect.
Free access is a trial whose allowance and duration we may change. Tester codes, promotional codes and free periods have no cash value and may end under their stated conditions. This does not remove rights attached to a paid purchase.
Cancelling your subscription stops future renewals. Access normally continues until the end of the paid period. We do not offer a general money-back guarantee or refunds merely because you cancel renewal or stop using the service. This is subject to statutory rights, applicable payment-provider rules and any refund expressly promised in these terms or at purchase.
Statutory withdrawal is separate from cancelling renewal. Where applicable, EU and UK consumers ordinarily have 14 days from entering a service contract to withdraw without giving a reason. Other mandatory cancellation or withdrawal rights remain available. To withdraw, send a clear statement to team@hemmingway.io before the deadline, identifying your account and purchase. You may also use the online withdrawal function at [location or link, where required]. We acknowledge online withdrawal submissions by email without undue delay, including their content and submission time. No particular wording is required.
If you expressly request service to start during a statutory withdrawal period, we may deduct a proportionate payment for service supplied before your withdrawal, but only where we have provided the required information, obtained your express request and the law permits the deduction. For time-based subscriptions, the calculation uses the agreed subscription price and the elapsed part of the subscription period. Separately metered API services use the agreed usage rates where permitted by law.
We do not impose a cancellation penalty or deduct payment-processing or refund fees from a statutory refund. We refund the amount due within 14 days of receiving withdrawal notice, using the original payment method unless you agree otherwise. Starting use does not itself waive withdrawal rights. Any loss of the right after full performance requires the express consent and acknowledgement required by law.
We may decline future purchases or restrict accounts where there is evidence of fraud or deliberate abuse, such as false payment claims, stolen payment details or new accounts created to evade restrictions. A legitimate cancellation, withdrawal or refund request is not abuse. These measures do not remove statutory rights or allow us to withhold a refund that is legally due.
3 API access and partners
API credit is prepaid. Each purchase expires 12 months after purchase; the oldest credit is used first. Credit is not money or transferable without permission; refunds apply where law or these terms require. You pay for authorised API usage and usage resulting from your failure to protect a key, subject to law and our responsibility for our failures. We may set or change rate limits.
Personal subscriptions are priced for one person’s work. We may limit excessive use, account sharing, unauthorised resale or automation outside your plan, explaining why where practicable. API requests, approved partner services and Autopilot automation are permitted within their agreed limits; this personal-use rule does not prohibit them.
Approved partners, including model marketplaces and API platforms, may offer the API to their customers under a written agreement. The resale restriction below does not apply within that agreement. Our Privacy Policy explains requests received through partners. For partnerships, contact team@hemmingway.io.
4 Rules for every service
Do not use Hemmingway to:
- Break the law, infringe others’ rights, or create, request or distribute sexual content involving anyone under 18 or depicted or role-played as under 18.
- Facilitate violence, trafficking, abuse, terrorism or other serious criminal harm; provide actionable instructions for making weapons or explosives, increasing weapon lethality, malicious software or unauthorised access; or encourage or instruct suicide or self-injury.
- Harass, threaten, stalk, defame or exploit others; disclose private information unlawfully; or promote hatred or violence against protected groups.
- Deceive through impersonation, scams, phishing, spam or unsolicited bulk messages.
- Present output as checked professional advice when it has not been checked, or make consequential decisions about a person’s rights, employment, finances, housing, insurance, credit or education without appropriate human review.
- Bypass safeguards or usage limits, evade suspension, disrupt the service or access other people’s data or our systems without permission.
- Use output to train another AI model, or collect output in bulk for that purpose, without our written agreement.
- Copy, resell or rebrand the hosted service without our written agreement, including an approved partner agreement.
These rules allow ordinary discussion, prevention, education and lawful fiction that mentions a crime or difficult subject. Additional rules apply to Unlocked below. An output generated by the model is not permission to break these rules.
5 Additional rules for Hemmingway Unlocked
Unlocked is a text-only writing and chat service that permits adult fiction. “Unlocked” does not mean unrestricted. Sexual scenarios must concern fictional adults who freely consent and have the capacity to consent.
You must not request, submit, generate or distribute:
- Sexual content involving anyone under 18 or depicted or role-played as under 18.
- Incestuous sexual scenarios between parents or guardians and their children (biological, adoptive, step or foster), siblings (full, half or step), grandparents or great-grandparents and their descendants, or aunts or uncles and nieces or nephews; or sexual activity with animals. This incest rule does not prohibit consensual fictional adult scenarios involving cousins or in-laws.
- Sexualised rape, coercion, exploitation, trafficking or inability to consent; consensual non-consent sexual roleplay; or graphic enactments of sexual assault.
- Sexual content depicting identifiable real people, including celebrities, impersonations or synthetic depictions.
- Non-consensual mutilation of a person or body part, or material encouraging real-world torture, physical abuse or serious violence.
Consensual BDSM between fictional adults is permitted within these rules. Literary depictions of injury or death are not prohibited merely because they contain violence.
Non-graphic, non-erotic and non-glorifying references to sexual assault or other abuse in a larger narrative are permitted, including survivor accounts, investigations and thrillers. Education, reporting and prevention are also permitted within these boundaries. A fictional setting, consent asserted outside a coercive sexual scenario, or a later revenge plot does not override the restrictions.
6 Reports and enforcement
Anyone may report a concerning response, prohibited use or depiction of themselves to team@hemmingway.io. Describe what happened, the approximate time and any request identifier shown. You may include a short relevant text excerpt unless you believe the excerpt itself is illegal to share. Do not forward suspected illegal attachments; describe the concern first. A report is voluntary and does not give us access to other chats on your device.
We investigate and resolve content complaints within five business days and communicate the outcome. Confirmed illegal content is immediately removed or disabled wherever we control access. We contain reproducible failures and correct the affected controls before restoring them. We cannot remotely erase copies held on users’ devices.
Sexual depictions of identifiable real people are prohibited even if consent is claimed. We remove or disable access to confirmed prohibited material wherever we control it; we do not rely on consent to keep such material available. We follow any mandatory removal or appeal procedure that applies. Our Privacy Policy explains complaint records and necessary disclosures.
We may refuse requests or restrict, suspend or end access for breaches, suspected serious abuse, security concerns or legal or supplier requirements. For ordinary remediable breaches, we normally explain the issue and allow a reasonable opportunity to fix it. Urgent or serious cases may require immediate action without warning. No payment provider’s warning or remedy period is guaranteed. Contact support to appeal; we consider appeals where practicable and may withhold details to protect an investigation or comply with law.
7 Your material and AI output
Your material stays yours. You must have the rights and permissions needed to submit it, including other people’s messages. You give us only the permission needed to provide the features you choose and carry out the limited support, safety and legal processing described in our Privacy Policy. This does not authorise publication of private material. We do not train our models on your chats, memory or People, whether saved to your account or held on your device.
To the extent we acquire transferable rights in output, we assign them to you. Commercial use is permitted subject to these terms and others’ rights. Output may be similar to another user’s, inaccurate, unprotected by copyright or subject to third-party rights; we do not promise exclusive ownership.
AI can invent facts, misunderstand context and make consequential errors. Check important output before relying on, sending or publishing it. Hemmingway is not professional advice or an emergency service. Obtain qualified advice for decisions where an error could cause harm.
8 Autopilot and connected accounts
Autopilot is off until you enable it. For accounts you connect, it reads incoming messages and acts under your rules. Some rules send replies from your account without asking each time. Review those rules, monitor results and turn Autopilot off or disconnect an account whenever you wish.
You authorise actions taken within your settings and remain responsible for your instructions and lawful use. Autopilot may misunderstand, reply inappropriately, choose the wrong recipient or fail to act. These risks do not remove our responsibility for our own breach or failure to exercise reasonable care.
Connect only accounts and information you are entitled to authorise us to process. Where you determine the purposes and means of processing other people’s information, you are responsible for the resulting controller obligations; our own legal role depends on the processing involved. Respect applicable notices, permissions and objections.
Connected services have their own terms, including limits on automation. You must follow those applicable to your use. Their providers may change or withdraw access. We use other infrastructure and payment providers identified in our Privacy Policy. We remain responsible for our own provider selection, configuration, instructions and other obligations under applicable law.
9 Storage and privacy
Our Privacy Policy explains account data, saved chats, local modes, API requests and connected-account processing. Storage differs by feature; a local-history setting does not mean the model runs on your device.
Unlocked’s chat history is stored on your device, while messages and relevant conversation context are processed remotely using rented GPU infrastructure. Keep copies of important work; we cannot recover device-only history.
10 Software and model rights
The apps, website, branding and service remain ours or our licensors’. You may use them while complying with these terms. Do not copy or reverse-engineer them beyond what applicable law allows.
Model weights are separate from the hosted service. Hemmingway-1 weights are released under the Creative Commons Attribution–NonCommercial 4.0 licence. Downloading, running, fine-tuning and sharing must comply with that licence; commercial use requires a separate written agreement. Other releases have the licence stated with them. For commercial licensing, contact team@hemmingway.io.
We may use feedback without payment or an obligation to implement it. Do not include confidential material unless we have agreed to receive it confidentially.
11 Service changes and responsibility
We may add, change or retire features; beta features may be unreliable. If a paid service is permanently discontinued, we give as much notice as reasonably practicable and stop future charges for that service. Refunds or credits for service not supplied, including unused prepaid API credit, are handled as required by applicable law and the relevant payment-provider rules. Nothing in these terms removes mandatory remedies for unavailable or defective service.
You may stop, cancel subscriptions with the billing provider and delete your account in Settings. Export important work first. Deletion follows the Privacy Policy. Any refund due when access ends is handled under the provisions above and applicable law.
We exercise reasonable care but do not guarantee uninterrupted, error-free service, particular outputs or continued compatibility. No specific service level applies unless agreed in writing.
Nothing limits liability for death or personal injury where it cannot lawfully be limited, fraud, intentional misconduct, gross negligence or other non-excludable liability. Subject to that, and only where lawful, we exclude indirect losses and business losses of profit, revenue, goodwill or opportunity. Our aggregate liability is limited to the amount you paid for Hemmingway in the 12 months before the event giving rise to the claim, including payments through Patreon or an authorised intermediary. This does not cap promised refunds or mandatory consumer remedies. Provider involvement does not itself exclude our responsibility.
12 Business claims
If you use Hemmingway for business, you will reimburse reasonable third-party claims and costs caused by your unlawful use, infringement of others’ rights or material breach of these terms. This excludes loss caused by our own breach or fault. We must promptly notify you, reasonably mitigate loss and allow appropriate participation in the defence. Settlements imposing obligations on you require your reasonable consent. This clause does not apply to consumers.
13 A future change of operator
We may transfer operation of Hemmingway and this agreement to another legal entity. No transfer is required or scheduled by these terms. Before a transfer, the new operator must legally exist and agree in writing to assume this agreement, including existing subscriptions, prepaid API credit, outstanding refunds and obligations arising before transfer.
Before a transfer, we give at least seven days’ advance notice of the new operator’s full legal name, registration details where applicable, country, address, contact details and transfer date, and update these terms and the Privacy Policy. Required customer consent and payment-provider permission must be obtained before transfer takes effect. Paid benefits and rights will not be reduced. You may cancel before transfer for a proportionate refund of unused prepaid subscriptions and unused API credit.
The current operator remains responsible until a lawful handover. A transfer does not automatically release existing obligations, accrued claims or mandatory rights. Branding alone does not change your contracting party. Personal-data transfers must comply with the Privacy Policy and applicable law. These safeguards also apply to a sale or reorganisation. You may not transfer your agreement without our consent, except where law permits.
14 Changes to these terms and disputes
We give at least 14 days’ email or in-app notice of material adverse changes, except urgent legal or security changes, which we explain promptly. You may cancel before an adverse change takes effect for a proportionate refund of unused prepaid subscriptions and unused API credit. We obtain fresh acceptance where required; otherwise continued use after the effective date accepts the change.
Notices use team@hemmingway.io, your account email or the service. An unenforceable clause does not invalidate the rest. Not enforcing a right does not waive it. Events beyond reasonable control excuse delay only where lawful; we must reasonably mitigate disruption, preserving refund and consumer rights.
These terms and any applicable written service agreement govern our contract. The law of South Africa applies, without removing mandatory consumer protections. For business users, disputes go to the competent courts of South Africa, subject to mandatory law. Consumers keep the right to bring proceedings in their own country wherever applicable law provides it. Contact team@hemmingway.io first so we can try to resolve a problem.