Terms of Service

Version 2026-09-06 · effective 6 September 2026. Replaces the version dated 2 September 2026; what changed is listed at the end. Members are asked to accept this version before they next join or register an app.

Developer Pact is a pact: you test my app for a minute a day, I test yours, and both of us can see whether the other is still there. These terms say what each side is promising, what the platform does with that, and what it does not promise.

1. Who this is between

These terms are between you and the operator of Developer Pact, an individual developer reachable at multi.app.software@gmail.com. "The platform" means developerpact.com, the service behind it and the developerpact SDK. You accept these terms by clicking "I accept" on the platform; the version and time are recorded on your account.

You must be at least 16, and old enough to enter a binding agreement where you live. One account per person: sign in with the Google account whose address you can act on, and do not operate an account for someone else.

2. The words

Member

Anyone with an account. A member can be an owner, a tester, or both.

App

An Android app a member registers, on a Google Play closed testing track, carrying the SDK.

Link

Two members bound to each other. On a link each member may be testing the other's app.

Testing

One member testing one app: it starts when you click "Test this app" and ends when it is completed, left, dropped or released.

Active day

A local calendar day on which the app, installed from Google Play, was in the foreground for at least the app's threshold (60 seconds unless the owner set more, up to 180).

On track

A testing paired from Google Play at least 14 days ago, still open, with at least 10 of those 14 days active.

3. What an owner promises

When you register an app and members join it, you promise to:

• List your testers on the closed track. Put the address the platform shows you on your Play Console tester list (or admit them to your Google Group) promptly. A tester left unlisted for 7 days is released without penalty to them, and it is recorded against you.
• Keep the app on the closed track, with a published release, for as long as you have open testings.
• Do not remove a tester from the list before production. Not when you drop them, not when they leave: removing an address gains nothing and can lower Google's own count of your opted-in testers. The only removals the platform will ever ask you for are a deleted account or a closed app.
• Reciprocate within 3 days. When a member who has an open app of their own joins yours, the platform opens a testing of their app for you. Pair it within 3 days of them listing you. If you do not, they may leave your app without penalty and "did not reciprocate" is recorded on your account.
• Drop only through the platform. If you want a tester gone, use "Drop" on your ledger, with the reason the platform records, so that both sides get the same evidence table and the seat is reopened properly. Do not un-list, block or otherwise push a tester out around the platform.
• Register only apps you control. Your own package, on your own Play Console account, not already in production.

4. What a tester promises

When you click "Test this app", you promise, for the term shown on that page (17 days from pairing unless the owner set otherwise), to:

• Opt in and stay opted in to the closed test in Play, with the same Google account you gave the platform as your Play address. Opting out resets Google's 14-day counter for the owner and is invisible to the platform.
• Install through the link the platform gives you, so the install can be paired to your testing, and keep the app installed for the whole term.
• Open the app for about a minute a day. That is the whole of the daily obligation. Missing a day is not a breach; going quiet for the app's silent span (3 days in a row unless the owner set otherwise) makes you eligible to be dropped.
• Leave honestly. If you cannot continue, click "Leave" on the app's page. It ends the testing, tells the owner, and reopens the seat. Uninstalling or opting out instead leaves the owner guessing and is what the platform exists to notice.
• Be one real person on one real device. No emulated or scripted presence, no tampering with the SDK, its tokens or its requests, no second account.

You may also, as a tester, take the seat of someone who left or was dropped; a replacement starts its own 14 days.

5. What the platform does

• It measures. The SDK reports a random install id and each day's foreground seconds; the platform turns that into active days, states (fine, at risk, silent) and flags. Everything it can and cannot tell is written up at developerpact.com/sdk.
• It shows. The owner sees, per tester, the same table the tester sees about themselves; the tester sees whether the owner is testing back. Reliability is shown as raw counts with their denominators, never as a score.
• It never drops anyone on its own. A drop is an owner's decision, made on the ledger, after a dialog that says what it costs. The platform's only automatic endings are the ones that protect the other side: a tester never listed after 7 days, a seat never paired after 7 days, a term that ran its course, an owner who reached production, an app that was closed, an account that was deleted, and a "not on the list" report the owner left unanswered for 48 hours.
• It reminds. Plain-text e-mails about your own testings — a missed day, a partner gone quiet, a deadline, a seat to fill. Digests are at most one a day and can be switched off by kind at developerpact.com/me; e-mails about something that just happened to your testing cannot.
• It prepares your Google summary. When you apply for production, an anonymised engagement summary (Tester 1, Tester 2, …) you can paste into the form.

6. What the platform does not do

• No ratings or reviews. The platform never asks for, offers, exchanges or counts ratings, reviews or upvotes, and will not host that trade. Incentivised reviews are against Google Play's policies; so is asking for them here.
• No install-count manipulation. Testers are real people testing real apps; there is no way to buy, batch or inflate installs, and no attempt to make one look like something it is not.
• No incentive other than reciprocity. There is no credit, no points, no payment and no prize. The only thing you get for testing is being tested back, and the only thing you lose by not testing is that record following you.
• No guarantee of any Google outcome. Whether Google counts a tester, when its 14 days are satisfied, whether it grants production access and how long it takes are Google's decisions. Twelve testers on track here is evidence you can show; it is not approval.
• No guarantee that people behave. The platform observes and reports; it cannot make anyone keep an app installed, and it says on /sdk exactly what a determined person could still fake.

7. Acceptable use

Do not:

• fake presence — emulators standing in for devices, scripted or replayed requests, or arranging with another member to cover for each other;
• hold more than one account, or run one for someone else;
• register an app you do not control, an app already in production, or anything unlawful, malicious or against Google Play's policies;
• use other members' names or addresses for anything but the testing you share, or contact them about anything else;
• probe, scrape, overload or circumvent the service, its limits or its SDK.

The platform may end the testings of, hide from suggestions, or close the account of a member who does any of this, and will say why.

8. Your app is your responsibility

You remain solely responsible for the app you register: its content, its legality, its own privacy policy and Data safety form, its store listing and its compliance with Google Play's policies. Other members install it on their real phones on your word that it is safe. You grant the platform the right to show your app's name, package name and rules to members, and you grant those members the right to install and use it for testing during the term. The platform's Data safety wording for the SDK is at developerpact.com/sdk/data-safety; declaring it is your job.

9. Your record

What happens on your testings is recorded on your account as counts: tests completed, drops received, links ended early, not reciprocating, owner-choice drops, never listed, and days delivered out of days owed in the last 30. Other members see these when deciding whether to test with you. Receiving two drops in 30 days hides you from replacement suggestions for 14 days; it does not stop anyone inviting you directly. The platform does not turn these into a score.

10. Ending things

• A testing ends when the term runs out, when the owner has production access, when you leave, when the owner drops you, or when it is released for one of the reasons in section 5.
• An app ends when its owner closes it; its open testings are released without penalty to anyone.
• Your account ends when you delete it at developerpact.com/me. Every testing you hold, on both sides, is released as "account deleted" with no penalty; partners are told and offered replacements. The privacy policy describes what is deleted and what is anonymised.
• The service may end. Developer Pact is run by one person, free of charge. We may change, suspend or shut it down at any time; if it shuts down, members with open testings will be told by e-mail at least 14 days ahead where that is at all possible, and the export at /me stays available until then.

11. No warranty, and limits on liability

The platform is provided "as is" and "as available", without warranty of any kind, express or implied, including any warranty of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, accuracy, availability or non-infringement. An outage on our side is handled by not counting those days against anyone, and that is the extent of it.

To the fullest extent the law allows, the operator is not liable for indirect, incidental, special or consequential loss, nor for lost revenue, lost release windows, delayed or refused Google Play approval, lost data, or the acts or omissions of other members. Because the service is free, any liability that cannot be excluded is limited to the amount you paid to use it, which is nothing.

Nothing here excludes liability that cannot lawfully be excluded, including for fraud, or for death or personal injury caused by negligence.

12. Privacy

What the platform and the SDK collect, who processes it, how long it is kept and how to export or delete it are set out in the Privacy Policy, which is part of these terms.

13. Changes to these terms

When these terms change, the version at the top changes and the platform asks you to accept the new version before you next join an app or register one, showing you what changed. Testings you already hold continue under the promises you made when you joined; nothing you accepted becomes stricter without your click.

14. Contact

Questions, disputes over app ownership, account closure and data requests all go to multi.app.software@gmail.com.

What changed in this version

• The pact is now between pairs of members (a link), not a fifteen-person cohort. Credit, cohorts, salvage and the evidence ladder are gone.
• An owner's promises are spelled out for the first time: list, keep the app on the track, never remove a tester from the list before production, reciprocate within 3 days, drop only through the platform.
• A tester's promises are reduced to what is measured: opted in, installed, about a minute a day, honest leaving.
• The platform never auto-drops; the automatic endings are listed and each one protects the other side.
• "What the platform does not do" is explicit: no ratings or reviews, no install-count manipulation, no incentive but reciprocity.
• Acceptance is recorded per version on the account instead of "continuing to use the platform is acceptance".

Not affiliated with Google

Developer Pact is independent and is not endorsed by, sponsored by or affiliated with Google LLC. Google Play and Play Console are Google's services and trademarks, named here only to describe what this platform does.

Contact: multi.app.software@gmail.com · Version 2026-09-06