Terms of Service

Last updated: 22 October 2026

⚠️ Important — keep your own copies

AbcMusicStudio is a practice and notation tool, not a backup service. You are responsible for keeping your own copies of your music.

  • On the Local Free tier your tunes exist only in the browser on the device you are using. We hold no copy and cannot recover them — not from a backup, not on request, not ever.
  • Browsers delete this storage on their own: clearing browsing data, private browsing, “clear site data”, reclaiming space when a disk fills, some cleanup and privacy tools, and reinstalling or switching browser all wipe it, usually without warning.
  • On Cloud we store your music on our servers and back it up, but a restore recovers the state at the time of the last backup — recent work can still be lost, and no storage system is immune to failure.

Use Export regularly and keep the file somewhere you control. If losing a tune would matter to you, do not let the only copy live in one place.

1. Who we are

AbcMusicStudio (“the Service”) is operated by AbcMusicStudio, 41 Rue du Levain 44190 CLISSON France, siren : 422 384 438 (“we”, “us”).

Contact: contact@abcmusicstudio.org

2. What the Service is

AbcMusicStudio is a web application for musicians working with tunes written in ABC notation. It lets you write and edit ABC, display and print sheet music, hear tunes played back, practise with a metronome, backing tracks, a tuner and a phrase-based learning mode, attach audio, image and PDF files to your tunes, and organise everything in folders.

Searching for and playing YouTube videos inside the Service uses the YouTube API Services. By using those features you agree to be bound by the YouTube Terms of Service; the Google Privacy Policy applies to what YouTube collects.

The Service is provided as-is, for personal and professional musical use. It is a practice and notation tool, not a backup service, a publishing platform, or a music distribution service.

3. Accounts

You need an account to store tunes. You are responsible for keeping your password confidential and for everything done under your account.

You must give a valid email address. We use it to sign you in, to send account-related messages (password resets, subscription notices), and — only if you asked for it — occasional product updates.

Shared group accounts (Bands and Courses) are created by a leader or teacher, who sets a shared name and password and is responsible for who receives them. Members of a read-only course account cannot modify the shared repertoire.

You must be at least 16, or have the consent of a parent or guardian.

4. Plans and pricing

Local Free. Free of charge. Your tunes are stored in your browser on the device you are using, not on our servers. See section 6 — this has real consequences for your data.

AbcMusicStudio Cloud. A paid subscription. Your tunes are stored on our servers, reachable from any device, with version history, shared Bands and Courses spaces, and automatic backups.

Supporter. The same as Cloud, at a higher price, for people who want to fund the project’s development. It adds priority consideration for feature requests, early access, and a direct feedback channel. It is limited to a fixed number of places.

Current prices are shown on the site before you pay, in your local currency where supported, and are the prices that apply. We may change prices for future billing periods; we will tell you by email before a change affects you, and you can cancel before it takes effect.

5. Payment, billing and cancellation

Payments are processed by Paddle.com Market Ltd, which acts as the merchant of record for every purchase. Paddle handles payment, invoicing and sales tax, and their Buyer Terms apply to the transaction alongside these Terms. We never see or store your card details.

Subscriptions renew automatically at the end of each billing period until cancelled. You can cancel at any time from the Configuration page. Cancelling stops future renewals; your subscription continues to the end of the period you have already paid for, and the account then moves to the Local Free tier.

Refunds are covered by our Refund Policy.

6. Your content, and what happens to it

Your tunes, recordings, files, comments and profile text remain yours. We claim no ownership of them. You grant us only the technical permission needed to store, back up and display that content back to you, and to the people you deliberately share it with.

You are responsible for having the right to upload what you upload. ABC notation of a traditional tune is generally free to share; a recording, a PDF or an arrangement may not be. Do not upload material you have no right to.

Risk of data loss

Local Free accounts: your data lives in your browser, and only there. It is held in browser-managed storage on the single device and browser profile you are using. It is never sent to us, so we cannot read it, recover it or restore it — there is nothing on our side to restore from. It is deleted, in full and usually without warning, by any of the following:

  • clearing browsing data, history or “site data”;
  • browsing in a private or incognito window, which discards storage on close;
  • the browser reclaiming space when the device runs low on disk;
  • privacy, “cleaner” or antivirus tools that clear site storage;
  • uninstalling, reinstalling or switching browser, or using a different browser profile;
  • opening the site from a different address than usual, since browsers keep storage separate per address;
  • device loss, reset or failure.

Attachments — audio, images and PDFs — are stored the same way and are lost the same way.

Cloud accounts are stored on our servers and included in our regular backups. That is materially safer, but it is not a guarantee: backups are taken periodically, so a restore returns your repository as it stood at the last backup and work done since then may be lost; a deletion you make is real, and once the recovery window in our Privacy Policy has passed it cannot be undone; and no hosting, storage or backup system is immune to failure. Version history lets you go back through a tune’s own past versions — it is not a backup of your account.

Shared spaces (Bands and Courses) are shared for deletion too: content removed by someone with write access is removed for everyone.

In every tier, keeping an independent copy of anything you would not want to lose remains your responsibility. The Export function is there for exactly that, and takes seconds.

Public profiles are opt-in. Nothing is published until you enable one and mark individual fields as public.

7. Acceptable use

Do not use the Service to store or share unlawful material, to infringe copyright, to attempt to gain access to other users’ data, to disrupt or overload the Service, or to resell access to it.

We may suspend or close an account that does these things. Where we can, we will warn you first and give you a chance to export your data.

8. Availability

We aim to keep the Service running and to keep your Cloud data safe, but we do not promise uninterrupted availability. The Service may be unavailable during maintenance, and features may change as it develops.

9. Liability

Nothing in these Terms excludes liability that cannot lawfully be excluded.

Subject to that: the Service is provided without warranties beyond those implied by law, and our total liability to you for any claim is limited to the amount you paid us in the twelve months before the claim.

In particular, and to the extent the law allows, we are not liable for the loss, deletion or corruption of your content, including: content stored only in your own browser on the Local Free tier, which we never hold and cannot recover; work done since the most recent backup of a Cloud account; content you or a member of a shared space deleted; and loss caused by your own device, browser or network. Section 6 explains how each of these happens and how to protect yourself against them. We do not undertake to act as your only copy. ok do that

10. Ending the agreement

You can stop using the Service at any time, cancel a subscription from the Configuration page, and ask us to delete your account by writing to contact@abcmusicstudio.org.

We may close an account for a serious or repeated breach of section 7, or with 30 days’ notice if we discontinue the Service. If we discontinue it, we will give you a reasonable opportunity to export your ABC score data first.

11. Changes to these Terms

We may update these Terms. For material changes affecting paying subscribers we will give notice by email before they take effect. Continuing to use the Service after that means you accept the updated Terms.

12. Governing law

These Terms are governed by the law of France, and the courts of France have exclusive jurisdiction, without affecting any mandatory consumer protections you enjoy where you live.

Questions about any of this? contact@abcmusicstudio.org