Terms of Use
Pelorus · Shadowfax Industries LLC
Last updated: 16 September 2026
1. Pelorus Unlimited
Pelorus Unlimited. Pelorus is free to download and free to use. A one-time purchase called Pelorus Unlimited removes the limits and adds features.
Without Unlimited, Pelorus searches a single engine freely and a limited number of engines at once. Read Aloud, the Pelorus Voices, export, privacy and security features, iCloud sync, and Siri Shortcuts are not limited. Reader is free to use; three of its settings are part of Unlimited: Display Dimming, Focus, and the typefaces beyond Newsreader and the High Legibility faces.
Pelorus Unlimited removes the engine limit and adds custom engines, controls over how results are ranked and filtered, the AI features, and appearance options. The AI features — the AI Synthesis card, Pelorus Insights' interpretation, and Summarize this Page — require Pelorus Unlimited, including when you use the on-device model. The purchase screen in the app lists what is included at the time you buy.
Pelorus Unlimited is a one-time purchase, not a subscription. Your own devices signed in to the same Apple Account have it. The purchase is tied to your Apple Account and can be restored on your other or new devices, so long as Apple continues to allow purchase restoration and you continue to have access to that account. Whenever the purchase is not present, Pelorus continues working at the free tier limits. Settings that required Pelorus Unlimited are kept but stop taking effect, and resume if the purchase returns.
2. Search results come from other companies
Search results come from other companies. Pelorus does not have its own search index of the web. For most search engines, Pelorus loads that engine's own results page through Pelorus' built-in browser and renders the results from it. For some engines, Pelorus uses the engine's API to retrieve results Pelorus can render in any manner. Either way, the results are theirs. Pelorus does not influence, produce, rank, or control other engines and their results, and we are not responsible for the search results they generate.
Search engines can and do change their own pages whenever they like, and without notice. Because of this, an engine that works today may stop returning readable results tomorrow. Pelorus is deliberately structured and engineered to notice these changes and adapt to them automatically whenever feasible; when not feasible, we fix it and push a Pelorus app update through the App Store as quickly as we can. We maintain an Engine Status dashboard on the Pelorus Help website with known working status and degradation levels. But ultimately, neither Pelorus nor any app dependent upon an external search engine can guarantee it will keep working. Although Pelorus is not and does not operate as a bot, engines may also block what they perceive to be automated access, require you to confirm you are human in order to view results, or require you to have or log into an account. None of that is within our control.
2a. Unified Search is ours
Unified Search is ours. Unified Search, its ranking, and most of the analysis Pelorus draws from the results are our own work. You may use them; you may not copy, reverse-engineer, or reproduce them. Among the analysis generated by Pelorus from a Unified Search is the Pelorus Insights panel. Pelorus Insights includes two sections: "What the Results Show", and "What it Might Mean". The former is a calculus of the unified results across the engines that were searched — the mathematical modeling of what pages were found by what engines, relative ranking comparisons across engines, indexes that overlap, and so forth. These are computed data points that make up part of the analysis in Unified Search. The "What it Might Mean" section is AI-generated and only if you have AI enabled, and an on-device or cloud AI provider selected. Their inferred analysis does not belong to Pelorus but is rendered as a part of Unified Search alongside our Pelorus Insights.
What the ranking means, and what it does not. The results page in a Unified Search is a proprietary but transparent model that consolidates and de-duplicates the results of multiple engines. It then re-ranks the merged results by agreement before displaying the results page. This algorithm ranks a page that several search indexes found above a page only one engine returned. The intent is a measure of corroboration, not of truth, quality, or authority. Pelorus does not verify, endorse, or fact-check any search results, ever. A page that every engine agrees on can still be wrong. We are not responsible for the content or accuracy of search results.
We say transparent because Pelorus shows its work. The Explain sheet on the Unified Search card describes how results are gathered, merged and ranked, and why some engines count as one. The info button beside the result counts names the engines that ran in that particular search, which of them counted as indexes, which contributed without counting, and which could not be read at all.
3. Reader and Read Aloud
Reader and Read Aloud. Reader shows a page's content without the surrounding site design. Read Aloud speaks that content using a voice you choose. Both work on content published by someone else: we do not own it, did not write it, and cannot vouch for it. Reader decides what part of a page is the readable content, and it does not always get that right — it may miss content, include something it shouldn't, or fail on a page that is not an article at all. Reader includes an Original Page view you can use when origin-level accuracy matters.
3a. Voices
Voices. Read Aloud can speak the content of a page using the voices built into iOS, or using the Pelorus Voices, an optional download. Pelorus Voices are built on Kokoro-82M, a text-to-speech model published under the Apache License 2.0; the full attribution is in the Acknowledgements screen in the app. The download is yours to install or delete at any time, and Pelorus works fully without it. Synthetic speech mispronounces things, particularly names, technical terms and unusual spellings. It is a reading aid, not a substitute for reading.
3b. AI features
AI features. Pelorus has three AI features: the AI Synthesis card, Pelorus Insights' interpretation, and Summarize this Page. All three run through the AI provider you choose, either the model built into your device, or a cloud provider you supply an API key for.
If you use a cloud provider, that account is yours. You are responsible for it and for what it costs, and your use of it is governed by that provider's terms, not ours. We are not a party to that relationship and we do not see what you send or what comes back.
AI output can be wrong. It can misread a result, state something that is not in the source, or answer confidently about something it has no basis for. Nothing Pelorus generates is advice of any kind — medical, legal, financial or otherwise. Check anything that matters against the sources, which Pelorus cites so that you can verify.
4. What Pelorus is not
Pelorus reduces tracking; it does not make you anonymous. Your internet provider, the websites you visit, and the search engines you use can still see your activity. Nothing in this app is a substitute for a threat model appropriate to your circumstances.
Pelorus includes an option to open a link in your default browser. When you use it, the page leaves Pelorus. That browser keeps its own history, cookies, and cache, and we have no control over any of it. Erase clears what Pelorus stored. It cannot reach anything another app stored.
5. Acceptable use
Do not use Pelorus to break the law, to access material you are not permitted to access, or in a way that violates the terms of the search engines or AI providers you connect to it.
6. Changes
We may update Pelorus and these terms. Material changes will be noted in the release notes. Continued use of Pelorus on any device or platform constitutes acceptance of the current terms.
7. Contact
hello@shadowfaxindustries.com
Shadowfax Industries LLC
6754 Bernal Ave Ste 740
Pleasanton, CA 94566
United States