Privacy

One Life · last updated 26 October 2026

One Life is a game you play in your browser. This page says exactly what it keeps, what it never keeps, and how to have anything about you deleted.

Your life in the game

While you are playing, the life you are living is stored in your own browser so you can close the tab and come back to it. Nothing about it leaves your device unless you sign in.

If you sign in with your email, a copy of that life is also stored in your account, so you can carry on from another device. It holds the state of the life and the pages you have read. It is deleted when the life ends, and replaced when you start another.

Signing in

Signing in is optional, and only exists so a life can follow you between devices. If you do sign in:

• Your email address is stored, and used only to sign you in and to hold your save.
• There is no password. We email you a link and a six-digit code.
• Your email is never shown to other players, never sold, and never used for marketing.

Sign-in and saves are handled by Supabase, which stores this data on our behalf.

Play statistics

If statistics are switched on for this copy of the game, it sends anonymous information about how lives go: how far they get, which moments people meet, where they stop. This is used to make the game better.

• No names, and nothing you type.
• No IP addresses or precise location.
• Nothing that identifies you across other websites.
• Not linked to your account or your email in either direction.
• How long the game was on screen during a visit, and counts of things like shares, saves and sign-ins — never what was shared or who you are.
• If you arrived from a link we shared on a social platform, one word for which platform it was (for example "tiktok"), and nothing else about the visit.

It is switched off if your browser sends a "do not track" or Global Privacy Control signal, and there is a "turn off" link on the game's first screen.

The Hall of Lives

If you are signed in, the last screen of a life lets you put that life in the Hall of Lives, a public page anybody can read. Nothing goes there unless you press the button, and what goes there is exactly the preview you are shown: the name you gave the life, its years and age, the country, the title of its book, up to three facts, how it ended, its stars and Life Fulfilled, and your level title. Never your email, a handle, or anything you typed about yourself. The same button takes it down again, and asking us to delete your account removes it.

Playing with other people

None of these needs you to sign in, and none of them sends anything you typed about yourself.

• Sending a life to a friend. The link itself carries the start of the life, the character's name, your handle if you have set one, and the answers that life gave to its questions. It is not stored anywhere: whoever has the link has that, and nothing else.
• Asking a friend. When you press "ask a friend", the scene up to that decision, its choices, and the character's first name and age are stored so your friends can vote. It is open for two days and deleted within a week. Your friends see the scene, the choices and the number of votes, never who voted, and never what happens next.
• Decisions that travel (since v36.8). An ask also stores which decision it is, a short line for each choice saying what it costs, and the life as a "play this life" code, so a friend can see, after they vote, what the choices cost and start the same life. When anybody (a friend on the page, or a player in the game) answers a decision, that answer is counted once per browser for that decision, so the page can say what percentage of people chose each answer. To follow how a dilemma travels, the game keeps, for 400 days, which ask a link belonged to and whether the link was opened, voted on, sent on, or led to a life being started, each against the browser's random device word. No account, email, name or IP address is part of it, nobody can read who chose what, and the game's makers see only totals. The play counting follows the same "do not count me" choices as the statistics.
• Link previews. When a friend's link is pasted into a messaging app, the app reads the preview from our site: the dilemma, its choices and the character's first name and age, which is what the link shows anyway.
• Talk About It without signing in. Anybody can now read the moments players shared and react to them. Comments, posting and comparing lives still need you to sign in.
• Flowers in the Hall, and "right now". You can leave one flower on a life in the Hall. While a life is on screen, this browser is counted in "lives being lived right now", and once a day in how many people answered a question; only the counts can be read. This counting follows the statistics setting above: if you turned statistics off, or your browser asks not to be tracked, it is never counted.

To do these things without an account, the game makes up a random word and keeps it in your own browser. It lets a vote be changed instead of counted twice, and a flower be left once. It is not your email, an account, an IP address or the statistics id, and nobody is ever shown it. Clearing your browser's data for this site removes it.

Players together: game names, profiles and asking each other

If you are signed in, you can make a game profile so other players can see you are playing and ask each other for help. Nothing is shown until you make one, and you can remove it at any time.

• What other players see. The game name you choose, a glyph you pick, what you are open to (money, help, dating), and the life you are playing as plain facts: the character's first name and age, country and city, the kind of game, their job title, one word for their relationship and one for their money, and how many lives you have lived. Never your email, your real name, your account, or anything you wrote about yourself. You can switch off "Show me in Who's playing".
• Asks and answers. An ask between players (money, help with a hard decision, a date, paying back) is kept with its set reply, the scene and choices if it was a request for help, and a short note if one was written. Notes are limited to 140 characters and cannot carry links, email addresses, phone numbers, @handles or requests to talk somewhere else. Asks expire after three days and are deleted after about six weeks.
• Dating is between characters only. It is possible only if both players switched it on and confirmed they are 18 or older, and both characters are 18 or older in the game. Nothing about the real people is shared. Players who have not switched it on are never shown who has.
• Block and report. Blocking someone hides you from each other and stops every ask both ways. A report keeps the reason, your optional note and the note being reported, so we can act on it; nobody else can read reports.

Removing your game profile deletes it with your asks, answers and blocks; any couple your character was in ends, and the other player is told only that it ended. Reports are kept so we can act on them, and are deleted with your account.

The world: the square, chat and the help desk

With a game profile you can stand in the square: the players who are on now, each shown as their game name and the character they are playing (first name, age, city), grouped by the character's stage of life. From there you can talk in two rooms — The square and Help (how the game works, and "what would you do?" questions sent from a scene) — or chat one to one with another player who said yes.

• Your age, as a band. Your profile asks how old you are: under 13, 13 to 17, or 18 or older. It is kept only to apply the rules below and is never shown to anybody. Under 13: you can look at the square but cannot chat, be messaged, or appear in it. 13 to 17: the rooms, and one-to-one chat with other 13–17 players only. 18 or older: the rooms, and one-to-one chat with other adults only. There is never one-to-one chat, or any ask, between an adult and a player under 18. You can lower your band at any time; it can be raised only a year after it was set.
• What is kept. Room messages (up to 280 characters, with your game name) for 7 days; one-to-one messages for 30 days; who is online now (the last time the game said you were here). Never your email, your real name, or where you are.
• What cannot be sent. Links, email addresses, phone numbers, @handles, asks to talk somewhere else, abuse, and — in the rooms, and in chat between 13–17 players — personal details (where someone lives, their school, their age, photographs, meeting up) and sexual words. A message about hurting yourself is not posted; you are shown where to find a free, private helpline.
• Who can ask you to chat. You choose: anybody the age rules allow, only players you have chatted with before, or nobody. A block hides you from each other and closes any chat.
• Reports. Every message and every player has Report. A report keeps a copy of the words, the reason and who reported, so we can review it; nobody else can read reports. A message reported by three different players is hidden at once; a player reported by five different players in a day cannot post for a day while we look. We can hide messages, mute a player for a week, or end their access to chat. Reports are deleted 90 days after they are reviewed.

Rewards

The rewards page reads your level from your own browser to show what you have earned. It sends nothing anywhere, with one exception you choose: claiming the signed copy of Simply Broken at level 10. The claim form sends your name, the postal address to send the book to, and, if you give it, your handle in the game — and, if you are signed in, which account it came from, so an account claims once. Nobody can read a claim through the site; only we can, to post the book. The address is deleted automatically as soon as the book is marked as sent. To have a claim deleted before then, write to us.

Cookies and tracking

The game stores data in your own browser so it can remember your life, and if you sign in it stores a sign-in token the same way.

Children

One Life deals with adult life — work, money, illness, loss — and is not intended for children under 13.

Deleting your data

Ending a life inside the game removes it from your account. To have your account and everything attached to it deleted, email hello@playonelifegame.com and it will be done.

Changes

If this page changes, the date at the top changes with it.

Contact

hello@playonelifegame.com