Aurora terms of use

These Terms of Use ("Terms") govern your use of the iOS app Aurora: Forecast & Alerts (the "app") and of the website aurora.report, including its pages, tables, maps, images and data files (the "website"). Together they are "Aurora". Aurora is made by Sterk Vekst AS, org. nr. 931 436 678, 9601 Hammerfest, Norway ("Sterk Vekst", "we", "us").

By downloading or using the app, or by using the website, you agree to these Terms and to the Aurora privacy policy. If you don't agree, don't use Aurora.

For Aurora, these Terms replace the general Sterk Vekst Terms of Use. Our other apps keep those terms.

In short

• A forecast, not a guarantee. Aurora estimates the chance of seeing the northern lights. It is often wrong, because the aurora and the weather can't be predicted with certainty.
• Not a safety or weather-warning service. Your safety outside at night, in the cold and on the roads, is your own responsibility.
• Don't plan money around it. Don't book, cancel or change a trip, tour, flight or night out based only on Aurora. We don't refund travel costs or missed sightings.
• Paid through Apple. Subscriptions renew automatically until you cancel them in your Apple Account settings.
• Liability is limited to the fullest extent the law allows (see sections 12 and 13).

1. What Aurora is

The app shows tonight's chance of seeing the northern lights for your location or a chosen destination: a percentage, a label such as Excellent or Low, a confidence level, the best viewing hours, a short multi-night forecast with cloud cover, a darkness and moonlight outlook, destination search and optional alerts. Access to the app requires a subscription.

The website is free. It shows forecasts, history, camera and airport statistics, moon and darkness calendars, articles and downloadable data for selected destinations, and links to the app.

Aurora is a planning aid for personal use. It is not a travel agency, tour operator, booking service, weather service, weather-warning service, emergency service or safety authority.

2. Forecast disclaimer

Please read this section carefully. It's the most important part of these Terms.

• Forecasts are probabilistic estimates. They are calculated by software from space-weather data, cloud forecasts, darkness and moonlight, all of which are themselves forecasts or measurements with errors. The aurora is a natural phenomenon that can't be predicted with certainty, and conditions can change within minutes.
• Every output can be wrong. Percentages, labels, confidence levels, viewing hours, "next chance" dates, cloud figures, moon times, alerts and anything else Aurora shows may be inaccurate, late, incomplete or wrong for your exact location, time or night. A high forecast doesn't mean you'll see the aurora, and a low forecast doesn't mean you won't.
• Alerts may be late or never arrive. Alerts depend on our servers, third-party data, Apple's notification service, your device, its settings, battery, signal and focus modes. We don't guarantee that any alert is sent, delivered or delivered in time, and alerts catch only part of the nights with aurora.
• Past results are not a promise. Accuracy figures we publish, such as how often an Excellent night had visible aurora, describe tests on past winters in specific places. They are not a guarantee of future performance, and they don't apply to places where we haven't tested the forecast. The website says where that is the case.
• Data can be missing or stale. If a source is unavailable, Aurora may show an older forecast or no forecast. Website pages are rebuilt automatically about once an hour and may be out of date when you read them.
• You decide whether to go out. Always look at the sky yourself and check current official sources before acting on a forecast.

3. Safety

Watching the aurora usually means being outside at night in winter, often far from towns. You are solely responsible for your own safety and for the safety of anyone in your care.

• Winter nights in the north can bring extreme cold, wind chill, frostbite, hypothermia, ice, snow, avalanche terrain, darkness, wildlife and sudden changes in weather. Dress and plan for the conditions, tell someone where you're going, and turn back when conditions are unsafe.
• Follow official weather warnings and local advice, such as those from MET Norway (yr.no), the Norwegian Public Roads Administration, Varsom and the equivalent authorities where you are. They override anything shown in Aurora.
• Never stop, park or walk unsafely on or beside a road to watch the sky, and never use the app while driving.
• Respect private land, closed areas, local rules and other people.
• Aurora doesn't monitor where you are and can't help in an emergency. In an emergency, contact local emergency services (in Norway: 112 police, 113 ambulance, 110 fire).

4. Travel and money decisions

Don't make bookings, cancellations, refunds, travel plans or other financial decisions based only on Aurora. Forecasts more than a day or two ahead are especially uncertain. Tours, flights, accommodation, transport and car hire are provided by third parties under their own terms, at your own risk. We are not responsible for travel costs, lost bookings, missed sightings or any other loss that results from relying on a forecast.

5. Who may use Aurora

The app may be used by people aged 13 or over. Users under 18 need permission from a parent or guardian, especially for purchases. You must also be allowed to use Aurora under the laws that apply to you. Aurora is offered for personal, non-commercial use only, except for reuse of website data as described in section 7.

6. Your licence to use the app

We grant you a personal, limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable and revocable licence to use the app on Apple devices that you own or control, for your own non-commercial use, in accordance with these Terms and the App Store Usage Rules.

You may not:

• copy, modify, distribute, sell, rent, sublicense, reverse engineer or decompile the app, except where the law expressly allows it;
• bypass, disable or interfere with subscriptions, paywalls, rate limits or security measures;
• access our servers, forecast service or alert service other than through the app or the public website, or use them to build, feed or resell another product or service;
• resell, republish or commercially exploit the app's forecasts or alerts.

The app, its software, design, forecast model, name, logos and content belong to Sterk Vekst AS or our licensors. All rights not expressly granted to you are reserved.

7. Using the website and its data

You may read, link to and share the website's pages freely.

• Figures, tables and data files we publish (for example the CSV and JSON downloads and the history tables) are licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0), as described on the methodology page. If you reuse them, credit "Aurora (aurora.report)" with a link, and say if you changed them. The licence comes without any warranty: if you reuse our data, you are responsible for how you use and present it, and you must not present our forecasts as guarantees.
• Everything else on the website, including the text, articles, design, maps, images, share images, the app's screenshots, the Aurora name and logo, is owned by Sterk Vekst AS or our licensors, unless stated otherwise. All rights are reserved. Short quotes with a link back are fine.
• Automated access by search engines, AI and research crawlers to the public pages is welcome. Don't overload the website, get around its protection, or use it in a way that harms its operation.
• Third-party data shown on the website (for example from MET Norway, NOAA SWPC, GFZ Potsdam, the UEC Tromsø camera dataset and the Iowa Environmental Mesonet) remains subject to its own licences and is credited on the site.

8. Subscriptions, payments and refunds

• Prices, periods, trials and what's included are shown in the app before you buy. They may vary by country, change over time and differ depending on the answers you give during setup.
• All payments are processed by Apple and charged to your Apple Account. We never see your payment details.
• Subscriptions renew automatically at the end of each period, including Weekly, unless you cancel at least 24 hours before the period ends. Free trials turn into a paid subscription unless you cancel at least 24 hours before the trial ends. Manage or cancel in your Apple Account settings. Deleting the app doesn't cancel a subscription.
• You can restore purchases inside the app. Aurora has no accounts, so access is tied to your Apple Account through Apple.
• Refunds are handled by Apple under Apple's policies; request them at reportaproblem.apple.com. We can't issue refunds for App Store purchases ourselves.
• If you are a consumer in the EU/EEA, you normally have a 14-day right to withdraw from purchases made at a distance. By starting to use a subscription immediately after purchase, you agree that the service begins at once and acknowledge that you lose the right of withdrawal once it has begun, as permitted by law. This doesn't affect Apple's own refund process.
• A subscription gives you access to the app's features as they are during the period. It doesn't buy a particular accuracy, a sighting, or a minimum number of alerts.

9. Changes to Aurora and to these Terms

We may add, change or remove features, destinations, data sources, forecast methods, alerts, pricing and plans, and we may pause or discontinue the app or the website, temporarily or permanently. If a change materially reduces what you have paid for during an active subscription period, you may contact Apple for a refund under Apple's policies and applicable law.

We may update these Terms, for example when we add features or when the law changes. The date at the top shows the latest version. Where a change is significant, we will take reasonable steps to tell you, for example in the app. If you keep using Aurora after a change takes effect, you accept the updated Terms.

10. Third-party services and links

Aurora relies on third parties, including Apple (App Store, payments, notifications and maps), RevenueCat (subscriptions), Supabase (forecasts and alerts), PostHog (app analytics), Cloudflare (website hosting and analytics), and public data from MET Norway, NOAA SWPC, GFZ Potsdam and others. We are not responsible for their outages, errors, changes or discontinuation, or for third-party websites, tours, bookings or apps you open from Aurora. Their own terms and privacy policies apply.

11. AI-assisted content

We use AI-assisted tools to help develop Aurora and to research, draft, translate and structure some content, such as articles, help texts and translations. We review this content, but it may still contain errors. It is not professional advice.

12. Disclaimer of warranties

To the fullest extent permitted by law, the app, the website and all forecasts, alerts, data and other content are provided "as is" and "as available", without warranties of any kind, whether express, implied or statutory, including warranties of accuracy, reliability, timeliness, completeness, fitness for a particular purpose, merchantability, availability and non-infringement.

We don't guarantee that Aurora will be uninterrupted, timely, secure or error-free, that any forecast or alert will be correct or delivered, that defects will be corrected, or that you will see the northern lights. You use Aurora at your own discretion and risk, and you are responsible for your own decisions and actions, inside and outside the app.

13. Limitation of liability

To the fullest extent permitted by law:

• Sterk Vekst AS and its owners, employees, contractors and service providers are not liable for any loss or damage arising from or related to your use of, reliance on, or inability to use Aurora or any of its content. This includes travel, tour, accommodation, transport or booking costs, missed or wasted trips, missed sightings, lost time, loss of data, profits or savings, damage to equipment or vehicles, and any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary or punitive damages, even if we were told such loss was possible.
• Where we are liable despite the above, our total liability for all claims relating to Aurora is limited to the amount you paid for your Aurora subscription in the 12 months before the claim arose, or NOK 100 if you paid nothing. The website is provided free of charge.

Nothing in these Terms excludes or limits liability that cannot be excluded or limited by law, including liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for gross negligence or intentional misconduct, or your mandatory rights as a consumer under the law of the country where you live. If the law where you live doesn't allow a particular exclusion or limitation, it applies to you only to the extent that law allows.

14. Indemnity

To the extent permitted by law, you agree to compensate Sterk Vekst AS for claims, losses and reasonable costs resulting from your breach of these Terms, your misuse of Aurora, or your reuse of our data in breach of section 7. This doesn't apply where the law doesn't allow such an obligation for consumers.

15. Suspension and termination

You may stop using Aurora at any time by deleting the app and cancelling any subscription in your Apple Account settings. We may suspend or end your access to the app, the website or a feature if you seriously or repeatedly break these Terms, misuse the service, or put our systems or others at risk. Sections that by their nature should survive, including sections 2 to 4, 6, 7 and 12 to 18, survive termination.

16. Apple-specific terms

If you downloaded the app from Apple's App Store:

• These Terms are an agreement between you and Sterk Vekst AS only, not with Apple Inc. ("Apple"). Sterk Vekst, not Apple, is solely responsible for the app and its content.
• Your licence is limited to using the app on Apple-branded products that you own or control, as permitted by the App Store Usage Rules, except that the app may also be used by other accounts in your Family Sharing group or through volume purchasing.
• Apple has no obligation to provide maintenance or support for the app.
• If the app fails to meet any applicable warranty, you may notify Apple, and Apple will refund the purchase price, if any. To the maximum extent permitted by law, Apple has no other warranty obligation for the app.
• Sterk Vekst, not Apple, is responsible for handling any claims relating to the app or your use of it, including product liability claims, claims that the app does not meet legal or regulatory requirements, and claims under consumer protection, privacy or similar laws.
• If a third party claims that the app or your use of it infringes their intellectual property rights, Sterk Vekst, not Apple, is responsible for investigating, defending, settling and discharging that claim.
• You confirm that you are not located in a country subject to a U.S. Government embargo or designated as a "terrorist supporting" country, and that you are not on any U.S. Government list of prohibited or restricted parties.
• You must comply with any applicable third-party terms when using the app.
• Apple and its subsidiaries are third-party beneficiaries of these Terms and may enforce them against you.
• Where Apple's Standard Licensed Application End User License Agreement applies, these Terms supplement it. If they conflict, these Terms apply to the extent permitted by Apple's rules.

17. Governing law and disputes

These Terms are governed by Norwegian law. If you are a consumer, this doesn't deprive you of the protection of the mandatory laws of the country where you live.

Please contact us first so we can try to resolve any problem. Consumers in Norway can also contact the Norwegian Consumer Council (Forbrukerrådet). Disputes will be decided by the Norwegian courts, with the court for the registered office of Sterk Vekst AS as the agreed venue, unless mandatory consumer law gives you the right to bring proceedings where you live.

18. General

If any part of these Terms is found invalid or unenforceable, the rest remains in force, and the invalid part is replaced by a valid one that comes as close as possible to its purpose. If we don't enforce a right, we haven't waived it. You may not transfer your rights under these Terms. We may transfer ours to a company that takes over Aurora or our business, without reducing your rights. These Terms, together with the privacy policy, are the entire agreement between you and us about Aurora. If these Terms are translated, the English version prevails.

19. Contact

Sterk Vekst AS, org. nr. 931 436 678, 9601 Hammerfest, Norway.

• Support: [email protected]
• Privacy: [email protected]
• App help: aurora.report/help