Privacy: what leaves your browser
What stays in the browser, what each feature sends and to whom, the rows Direct Connection takes off the server path, and what the hosted app measures.
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Alibaba CloudAnthropicAzure OpenAIAWS BedrockCerebrasCohereDeepseekGoogle GeminiGroqLM StudioLocalAIMetaWhat stays in the browser, in two stores:
| Store | What it holds |
|---|---|
| Local storage | API keys and models, all settings and configuration |
| IndexedDB | chats and larger local files; on the hosted app also persona, ramble and notification entities |
Direct Connection works only with your API key stored in the browser, and with an AI service that permits direct browser calls (CORS). Where it cannot be used, requests route through the Big-AGI fast edge servers instead - everything still works, within the standard upload size and time limits.
One row per feature, the ones that never reach Big-AGI grouped at the bottom:
| Feature | Route |
|---|---|
| Chat message - text, history, system prompt * | browser -> Big-AGI edge -> AI service |
| Attachments - the bytes travel inside the message * | as the chat message: inlined into the request body, no separate upload endpoint |
| Attach from Google Drive | browser -> Google, direct: your tab downloads it with your Google token, our servers never see the file |
| Files the model made * | browser -> Big-AGI edge -> AI service, on your key |
| Model list refresh * | browser -> Big-AGI edge -> AI service |
| Voice input, recorder engines - hosted app | browser -> the transcription vendor, always: audio files never traverse our server |
| Voice output, hosted voices | text -> Big-AGI edge -> the voice vendor |
| Attach a link, page browsing | URL -> Big-AGI server -> the page: a browser we run fetches it, so the site sees our address, not yours |
| YouTube transcript | video id -> Big-AGI edge -> YouTube; Direct Connection does not move this row |
| Web search | query -> Big-AGI edge -> the search API |
| Location for web search - off until you turn on Location | coordinates -> nominatim.openstreetmap.org; only the city, region, country and timezone it returns ride the model request |
| Image generation | prompt and any input images -> Big-AGI edge -> the image vendor |
| PlantUML diagrams - drawn as soon as the block appears | the diagram source -> plantuml.com, from your browser |
| Publish or share a conversation - hosted app | the conversation is copied to our server when you ask for a link - an explicit act |
| Product analytics | hosted app only - see Analytics |
| Voice input, browser engine | your browser's own speech service (in Chrome, Google's), never Big-AGI |
| Voice output, browser voice | local only - your browser's own speech synthesis, no network to us |
| Attachment conversion - PDF text, PDF to images, OCR, DOCX and HTML to Markdown | local only - the PDF and OCR engines run in your browser |
| Chat search | local only - keyword matching over your local text, no embeddings, no server query |
| Token count and cost estimate | local only - the tokenizer runs in your browser |
* skipped with Direct Connection on, per service: the Big-AGI edge drops out and your browser calls the AI service itself.
On Open the two rows marked hosted app change. Every microphone is your browser's own speech service, and a share link exists only where the operator configured storage for it.
Upload size and time limits on the server path live on Context and limits.
Analytics
Analytics need keys compiled into the build, and an Open build has none, so a self-hosted instance reports nothing. What your instance reports has the detail. The hosted app runs four systems:
| System | What it sends |
|---|---|
| PostHog, in the browser | Events the app defines - feature used, model, timings - plus the library's own automatic capture: page views, clicks, JavaScript errors. A recorded click carries the text of the element clicked. Served from our own domain, under /a/ph |
| PostHog, at the edge | Two events per generation, aix_chat_generate_started and aix_chat_generate_completed: which AI service and model, token counts, timings, how the turn ended, and your IP address. Keyed to your account; signed out, to anonymous |
| Google Analytics 4 | Page views, plus five account events sent from our server: sign_up, login, begin_checkout, purchase, subscription_renewal |
| Vercel Analytics | Page views, from the hosting platform |
The events the app defines carry metadata only; the rule in code is "never transcript text, titles, or topic labels". The same rule withholds vendor error text, because an error string can echo a fragment of a key. The identity attached to the events is deliberately thin: no email address, no display name, no picture, no storage figures, no per-device identifier.
Account events are the one exception on email. The server may attach a SHA-256 hash of it, withheld for the European Economic Area, the UK and Switzerland. The plaintext address never leaves that function. Arriving from an ad writes agi.att, a first-party cookie on .big-agi.com that holds the click id for 90 days, read again at checkout. big-agi.com/privacy is the disclosure of record.
The hosted app has no analytics switch today.
Read the literal request
The AI Inspector captures the exact JSON body that left your browser for a turn. That body holds the assembled system prompt, the history as sent, the model and its parameters. A transport chip names the route it took, Direct Connection or Edge Server.
Chats, personas, rambles and notifications stay on this device and browser only, unless you subscribe to Pro: cloud backup and multi-device sync (1 GB). On Open there is no sync. Disabling sync never deletes local data.
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