Is Cal AI safe to use?

Cal AI integrates 10 third-party SDKs spanning infrastructure, analytics, and advertising. Its App Store privacy label declares cross-app tracking via Identifiers and Usage Data. However, it reports that no collected data is linked to your identity. It includes 2 advertising or attribution SDKs. Whether this is acceptable depends on your personal privacy preferences.

What permissions does Cal AI need?

Cal AI requests 8 iOS permissions: App Tracking Transparency, Camera, Microphone, Contacts, Photo Library, HealthKit (Read), HealthKit (Write), and Speech Recognition.

What data does Cal AI collect?

According to its App Store privacy label, Cal AI declares cross-app tracking via Identifiers and Usage Data. It collects Purchases, Contact Info, User Content, Identifiers, Usage Data, Sensitive Info, and Diagnostics not linked to your identity.

How many SDKs does Cal AI have?

Cal AI integrates 10 third-party SDKs. 1 for advertising, 1 for attribution, 3 for analytics, and 5 for infrastructure.

Does Cal AI use Google SDKs?

Yes. Cal AI includes 4 Google or Firebase SDKs: Google Ads Conversion, Firebase Analytics, Google App Measurement, and Firebase Firestore. These are used for ads, analytics, and cloud services.

Does Cal AI use App Tracking Transparency?

Yes. Cal AI requests the App Tracking Transparency permission, which means it asks for your consent to track your activity across other companies' apps and websites.

Does Cal AI access your camera or microphone?

Cal AI requests access to both your camera and microphone. The developer says camera access is for "We need your camera in order to analyze your food". Microphone access is for "This will enable you to log food with voice. We don't store any data while using your microphone". These permissions are only active when you grant them in iOS Settings.

Does Cal AI access your contacts?

Yes. Cal AI requests access to your contacts. The developer states: "We need access to your contacts to invite people to join Cal AI.".

Does Cal AI run in the background?

Yes. Cal AI registers 4 background modes, which means it can perform certain tasks when you're not actively using it.

What are some alternatives to Cal AI?

Other health & fitness apps include 75 Days Challenge , 75 Hard , Calo , AllTrails , MenuFit , and BetterHelp . Each app takes a different approach to health & fitness and varies in its data collection and SDK usage.

Health & Fitness · Privacy report

Cal AI - Calorie Tracker

Free · ★4.8 · Viral Development LLC

Is Cal AI safe?

It collects a lot of your data, and shares it with trackers.

Our take. Cal AI carries 5 third-party trackers and its own label declares it links 0 categories of your data to you. It collects a lot itself, and shares a lot with outside companies.

Privacy footprint · vs 109 health & fitnessModerate

Trackers from other companies5 · some

typical health & fitness: 6

Data the app links to you0 types · some

typical health & fitness: 5 · from its own privacy label

What it collects about you

Cal AI links 0 categories of your data to you.

From the developer's own App Store privacy label. These are the kinds of data Cal AI ties to your identity, and it also declares it shares data to track you across other apps.

Who else is inside

It carries trackers from 4 companies.

Third-party SDKs found in the app, matched to the company that publishes each. Present in the code; we do not observe what they transmit.

🏢Other third partiesadvertising

A third-party SDK.

SDKs

🇮🇱AppsFlyerAttribution · Israel

Marketing attribution and audience analytics.

SDK

🇺🇸GoogleAnalytics

Firebase, AdMob and Google analytics SDKs, built to record how you use the app and serve ads.

SDK

🏢Analytics SDKAnalytics

A product analytics platform.

SDK

How it compares

Where it sits among health & fitness.

Every one of these apps we have scanned, on the two measures above: third-party trackers it carries (across) and data it links to you on its own label (up). Toward the top right is more invasive.

Each dot is one health & fitnes app. Cal AI sits to the lower left, lighter than most.

Other signals

Two more flags.

Each is a fact read straight from the app. The same checks run on every app we scan. Only the ones that apply here are shown.

It declares cross-app tracking

Its own App Store label says it tracks you across other companies apps and websites using your advertising identifier.

It sends analytics to a company in Israel

AppsFlyer is a Israel company. Its analytics SDK is built into the app.

The evidence

What it's built from.

All 10 SDKs in the app, grouped by what they are for. 5 are third-party trackers.

1advertising

1attribution

3analytics

5standard libraries

5 of the 10 are third-party trackers. The rest are the app's own code and standard open-source building blocks.

Show the full SDK list

Other third partiesadvertising

Google Ads Conversion · Google App Measurement

AppsFlyerAttribution · Israel

AppsFlyer

GoogleAnalytics · USA

Firebase Analytics

Analytics SDKAnalytics

Mixpanel Session Replay

Standard libraries5 · on-device

The app's own code plus open-source interface, storage and networking libraries.

How we know this

Counterspy downloads the app from the App Store and statically analyzes its compiled binary. Embedded SDKs are matched against a signature database and resolved to the company that operates each. We also read the developer's App Store privacy label, which lists the data the app says it collects and links to you. We do not run the app or intercept its traffic, so we report capabilities present in the code and the developer's own disclosures, not proven transmission. We assess privacy and data collection, not malware, security flaws, or developer intent. Reports are automated and never edited for payment. Scan v3.2.10, 2026-04-01.

Third-party trackers are advertising, analytics and attribution SDKs detected by static signature matching. Presence shows a capability is compiled in, not that it ran or transmitted data.
"Data the app links to you" is the count of data categories the developer declares as Data Linked To You in its App Store privacy label. Labels are self-reported and not verified by Apple.
Comparison across the 109 health & fitness in our corpus. Trackers: median 6. Data linked to you: median 5.