Privacy policy

Last updated: 5 November 2026

This page says what Notably Better knows about you, why, who helps us run it, and how you can see it, change it or delete it. It is written to be read, not to hide anything.

Who we are

Notably Better is a music practice app run by Andrew Storey, an individual in the United Kingdom. He is the "data controller" - the person responsible for your information. Until October 2026 the app was called The Music Ledger.

For anything about your information, email hello@notablybetter.com.

What we hold about you

Your account: Your first name, surname and email address. If you sign in with Google, Google gives us those three things and nothing else. You can also choose a display name and a picture (your initials or one of our drawings).
How you sign in: If you use an email and password, the password is stored scrambled - we can't read it. If you turn on two-step sign-in, we hold what is needed to check your codes. If you set up a passkey, we hold what is needed to check it - never your fingerprint or face.
What you do in the app: Your practice sessions, the pieces you make, the recordings, YouTube links and documents you add (to a piece, or to the Recordings tool before they are on any piece), where you have marked a recording's start, end and bars, your practice lists and plans, your quiz, drill, scales and range results, the instruments you play, your settings, the bands you join, and a band's logo if you add one as its organiser.
Sharing your Levels with a band leader, if you choose to: For each band, whether you have switched on sharing a summary of your piece Levels with its band leader, and the day you did; and whether a band's organiser has made you its band leader. The band leader sees only averages and lowest-to-highest Levels for the band's own pieces, made from at least 3 players - never your Levels on their own, and never your name. It is off until you switch it on, and you can switch it off at any time.
The right to upload: The date you confirmed that you have the right to upload music, the first time you uploaded any.
Running a band: The date you confirmed you are 18 or over, the first time you set up sharing, invited someone or sent your band a notice.
Notices to a band: If you are in a band, the people who run it - its organisers, the members who can change its music, and its band leader - can send everyone in it a notice in the app, with their name on it. Nobody can reply to it. If you send one, we keep its title and message, your name on it and when you sent it.
Reports: If you report something, what you reported and what you wrote. This is kept after your account is deleted, without your name, as our record of what we did.
Warnings and closed accounts: If we warn you about breaking the terms of use, or close your account, we keep a record of when, why and what we told you.
A teacher's name, if you give us one: You can type in a teacher's name, to log your lessons against. It is kept with your own records and only you see it. The teacher is not told and does not get an account.
When you went through set-up: The date you finished or left the three set-up steps a new member is shown, so they are not shown to you again.
When you last used the app: The date (not the time) you last used the app while signed in, so we can see how many members are using it.
If you ask to join on our website: Your first name, last name and email address, and - if you give them - the band you play with and your instrument, and that you said you are 13 or over or a parent or carer filled it in. We use them only to decide whether to invite you. If you tell us your band and we let you in, we add you to that band here, and its organisers will see your name. If we don't run that band here, we may pass your name and instrument to its organisers, who can choose to invite you - the invitation is sent by us to the email address you gave. We never give them your email address.
Feedback you send: Your message, with the screen you were on, the kind of device and the app version.
When you first sign up: The kind of browser and device you used is sent to us once, in an email saying someone has joined.
The microphone: The tuner and the play-along tools listen through your microphone. The sound is worked on inside your device. It is never sent to us and never stored.
We do not ask for your address, date of birth, phone number or payment details.

Why we hold it

To run the app for you: to sign you in, keep your practice history and pieces, and show them on your devices.
To let you share with a band or a teacher, when you choose to.
To email you when you ask for something - an invite, a password reset, a new email address - and to warn you before an unused account is deleted. We also email you a copy of an urgent notice from us (you can switch that off in Settings, Notifications) and of a notice about how your information is used.
To see which parts of the app, and of our public pages, are used, so we can improve them. This is counted without knowing who you are (using PostHog).
To see how much each tool, screen and button in the app is used, and how many members use it: the app adds one to a count for that day each time a tool is started or finished, a screen is opened or a button is pressed. The counts are kept with nothing about who you are - not your account, not your device, not anything you typed - and are kept as long as they are useful.
To know how many members are using the app, and to delete accounts that are no longer used: the date you last used it.
To know when someone new has joined: the email sent to us when you first sign up.
To understand what you tell us and put it right: the screen, device and app version that come with your feedback.
To be able to show you were told the rules about uploading and about running a band: the dates you confirmed them.
To answer a request to join from our website: your name, email, band and instrument. When you ask, we email ourselves your name, band and instrument (not your email address), so we know to look. If you named a band that uses Notably Better, we may pass your name and instrument (never your email address) to its organisers, so they can invite you if they want to - we then send the invitation to you. We send you nothing until you are invited. If you ask again, we keep what you told us the first time.
To act on a report and show what we did about it: what you reported and what you wrote.

The law calls the first three "performing our agreement with you". The last seven are "legitimate interests": things we need in order to run and look after the app, that you would expect of it, and that do you no harm. We do not sell your information, show adverts, or build a profile of you.

Who helps us run it

These companies store or carry information for us. They may only use it to provide their service to us:

Neon (part of Databricks, USA): holds the database: your account and everything you do in the app.
Vercel (USA): runs the app and stores the recordings, documents and band logos you add.
Vercel AI Gateway (USA): any photo or file of music used to create the detail of a piece will be sent to Vercel to an AI model made by Anthropic (USA), and is not kept. We keep a record of each read - when it was, the kind of file and the piece it made - but never the photo or file itself.
Google (USA): if you choose "sign in with Google", Google confirms who you are and tells us your name and email address.
Brevo (France, data kept in the EU): sends our emails - invites, password resets, notices about your account, and copies of our urgent and important notices. It keeps a record of each one: who it went to, what it was about and whether it arrived. It counts how many emails are opened and how many links in them are followed, but not who by.
Fasthosts (UK): holds our mailbox, so an email you send us is kept there.
PostHog (data kept in the EU): counts which buttons are tapped, and visits to our public pages. It is anonymous: it sets no cookie, stores nothing on your device, and is never told who is signed in.
Have I Been Pwned (Australia): checks a new password against known data breaches. Only the first five characters of a scrambled form of the password are sent - never the password, and nothing about you.
postcodes.io (UK): works out where a town or postcode is, for Instrument support. Our server sends it the postcode or town of a band or a business, or a town you type to look near - never anything about you.
jsDelivr (UK): delivers one small piece of the app's code to your browser. Like any website, it sees your device's internet address when it does.
YouTube (Google): only when you play a YouTube video in the app - one on a piece, or one you have added to the Recordings tool, including when you set where it starts and ends or mark its bars. It plays in YouTube's privacy-enhanced player. We send YouTube nothing about you; what YouTube does when the video plays is covered by Google's privacy policy.

Some of these companies are in the United States. Where your information goes outside the UK, it is protected by the safeguards UK law allows, such as the UK-US data bridge and standard contract terms.

Everything else the app shows - its fonts and icons included - is served from our own site.

Businesses in Instrument support

Instrument support lists repairers, shops and hire businesses, from their own public websites or, for a few we know, with their agreement: the business name, town, what it offers, and the website or Facebook page, phone number and email address it publishes. We use its postcode to work out how far it is, but don't show it. If you run one of these businesses and want your listing changed or taken off, email hello@notablybetter.com.

When you look in Instrument support, we count what was looked for and the area - never who looked. The towns it starts from are the towns of your bands; a town you type is used for that look only and not kept with your account.

Cookies and your device

Notably Better sets no cookies. To keep you signed in and remember your choices, it stores a sign-in token and a few settings in your browser's own storage on your device. Signing out removes the sign-in token.

So that the app works where there is no internet, it also keeps a copy of your own practice information on your device, along with anything you log while offline until it has been sent to us. Signing out, or deleting your account, removes that copy from the device.

So that each member is counted once a day in our usage counts, the app also remembers on your device which tools and buttons you have used today. It is cleared each day and when you sign out, and is never sent to us.

Young players

If you are a young player, this part is for you.

What we know about you: your name, your email address, what you play, what you practise in the app, and any recordings you add yourself. That is all.
Who can see it: you. If you join a band, the people who run it - its organisers - can see your name, never your practice; everyone else in the band sees only how many are in it. If you are a band's band leader, everyone in it can see your name, so they know who a shared summary goes to. If you switch on sharing your Levels with the band leader, they see an average for the band, made from at least 3 players - never yours on its own, and never your name. The person who runs the app can see your account when they need to look after it. Nobody else can.
Notices from your band: the people who run your band are adults. They can send the whole band a notice in the app, but nobody can message you on your own.
Recordings: your band may record a rehearsal so that everyone can practise with it. Only the people in your band can hear it. If you are in a recording and don't want to be, tell a parent, a guardian, your teacher or your band leader - or email us - and we will remove it.
Instrument support: a list of music shops and repairers near your bands. They are businesses outside the app - ask a parent or carer before you get in touch with one. Nobody is told what you looked for.
What we never do: show you adverts, sell what we know, or tell anyone how your practice is going.
How to delete it: go to Account, then My details, then Delete my account. It goes straight away.
Who to ask: a parent, a guardian or your teacher - or email us at hello@notablybetter.com.

The app can be used by young players, for example through a teacher. We hold no more about them than about anyone else, show no adverts, build no profiles, and count usage anonymously. If you are under 13, please use the app with a parent, guardian or teacher who can help you.

How long we keep it

We keep your information for as long as you have an account and use it.

We don't keep accounts that are no longer used. If you have not used the app for 22 months we will email you to say so, and again at 23 months. If the account is still unused at 24 months it is deleted, exactly as if you had deleted it yourself, and we email you to say it has gone. Signing in at any time before then keeps it.

You can delete your account yourself, at any time via: Account, My details, Delete my account. It happens straight away.

Deleted: your name, email address and picture, the notices you sent a band, the date you last used the app, the date you went through set-up, your sign-in details, your own pieces with their recordings and documents, the recordings and YouTube links you added to the Recordings tool, your practice lists and plans, your settings, your feedback, the record of any piece read from a photo or file, any record of a warning, and your place in any band.
Kept, with nothing to say they were yours: the practice sessions and quiz and drill results you logged, as numbers in the app's statistics. Pieces you added to a band stay with the band, and so does a recording you put on a band's piece, and a logo you added to a band. A report you made stays, without your name.
For 31 days: we keep a scrambled marker - not your email address - so that devices you were signed in on stay signed out.
If we closed your account: we keep a scrambled marker of your email address - not the address itself - so that the same address can't be used to sign up again. Email us if you think it should be removed.
A request to join from our website is deleted once we have dealt with it - invited you, passed it to your band's organiser, or said not now - and otherwise after 90 days. If it is passed to an organiser, the notice they get shows in their app for 30 days and is deleted 12 months after that, as other notices are.
If you invite someone, we send them an email and keep the address you typed until they accept. An invite that isn't taken up is deleted after 30 days. Feedback is removed 12 months after it has been dealt with. Notices we show you in the app are deleted 12 months after they stop being shown, along with the record of whether you read or cleared them.
The record of each email we sent you stays with Brevo, and an email you sent us stays in our mailbox, until we delete them. Deleted information can remain in our database provider's short-term backups for up to a day.

Your rights

Under UK data protection law you can ask us for a copy of what we hold about you, ask us to correct it, ask us to delete it, or object to how we use it. Most of it you can see and change in the app - your name and the email address you sign in with (Account, My details). You can download a copy of all of it yourself: Account, My details, Download my information. For anything else, email hello@notablybetter.com and we will answer within one month.

A recording may have other people in it. If you are in a recording in the app and want it removed, email hello@notablybetter.com.

If you are unhappy with how we have handled your information, please tell us first: email hello@notablybetter.com with "Complaint" in the subject. We will let you know we have it within 30 days, look into it, and tell you what we found and what we will do about it.

If you are still unhappy after that, you can complain to the Information Commissioner's Office (ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint).

Changes to this policy

When this policy changes we will change the date at the top. If the change matters to how your information is used, we will also tell you in the app.