Terms of Service

You must be at least 16 years old to use JLS. You are responsible for keeping your account secure and for activity that happens under it. Please give accurate information when you sign up and keep it current.

JLS is a small, independent app run from Japan, and for now we’re not able to welcome learners in the United Kingdom, the European Economic Area, or Switzerland. Offering the service there responsibly under the GDPR means putting local representation in place first, and we’d rather do that properly than rush it. It’s something we hope to set up as JLS grows, so we can open the doors to those regions too. Until then, if you live in one of them, please hold off on creating an account for now.

You can create an account with an email address or by signing in with Apple or Google. You are responsible for the security of your login and for keeping your contact details current. Tell us promptly if you think your account has been compromised.

When using JLS, you agree not to:

• copy, scrape, redistribute, or resell the curriculum, audio, or other content;
• reverse-engineer, interfere with, or attempt to disrupt the service;
• use the app to break the law or infringe anyone else’s rights; or
• access the service through automated means except as we expressly allow.

The JLS curriculum, lessons, audio, and software are owned by Marcus Saito and protected by intellectual property laws. We grant you a personal, non-transferable, non-exclusive license to use them for your own language study. Your own data, such as your study progress, remains yours; how we handle it is described in our Privacy Policy.

JLS offers free content and an optional paid subscription, Full Access. You can subscribe on our website or through the App Store in the JLS iOS app. How you are billed, how you cancel, and how refunds work depend on where you subscribed, as described below.

Paid plans renew automatically at the end of each billing period until you cancel. When you cancel, your access continues until the end of the period you have already paid for.

One subscription is enough: Full Access bought either way unlocks the same content on the website and in the app. If you have both a website subscription and an App Store subscription, you can cancel either one, and Full Access continues while the other is active.

The website price of Full Access is US$5.00 per month or US$48.00 per year, plus any applicable taxes. On the website, Full Access is purchased through our payment processor (Stripe); the price and billing interval are shown to you before you buy.

A website subscription renews at the then-current website price. You can cancel it at any time from Settings. If we change the website price, we will give you advance notice and the change will apply only to future billing periods.

Full Access bought in the JLS iOS app is billed by Apple through your Apple Account, under Apple’s terms, at the price shown in the app before you buy. App Store prices are set for each country or region, so they differ between storefronts and may differ from the website price. Payment is charged to your Apple Account when you confirm the purchase.

An App Store subscription renews automatically unless you cancel it at least 24 hours before the end of the current period. To cancel it or change how you pay, open the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad and go to [your name] > Subscriptions. An App Store subscription cannot be cancelled from the Settings screen in JLS. If the App Store price changes, Apple tells you before the new price applies.

Deleting your JLS account does not cancel an App Store subscription. If you no longer want to be charged, cancel it in your device’s Settings app as well.

If you already have an App Store subscription, Restore Purchases in the app re-links it to your JLS account, for example after you reinstall the app or sign in on a new device.

If you are not satisfied with a Full Access subscription you bought on our website, contact us at support@jls.studio within 14 days of a charge and we will review your request in good faith. Refunds are generally not provided for periods you have already used, and we may decline repeated or abusive requests.

Refunds for App Store purchases are handled by Apple, not by JLS. You can request one at reportaproblem.apple.com, and Apple decides it under Apple’s terms. We are not able to refund App Store purchases ourselves.

Nothing here limits any non-waivable refund or cancellation rights you have under the consumer law that applies to you.

JLS is provided on an “as is” and “as available” basis. It is a study aid, and we do not guarantee any particular learning outcome, score, or level of fluency. We may add, change, or remove features, and we may occasionally have downtime for maintenance or for reasons beyond our control.

To the fullest extent permitted by law, JLS is provided without warranties of any kind, whether express or implied, including any implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, and non-infringement. We do not warrant that the service will be uninterrupted, error-free, or secure.

To the fullest extent permitted by law, we will not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, or punitive damages, or for any loss of data, profits, or goodwill, arising from your use of JLS. Our total liability for any claim relating to the service is limited to the greater of (a) the amount you paid us in the 12 months before the claim, or (b) US$100.

These limits do not apply to liability that cannot be excluded or limited under applicable law, such as liability for fraud, willful misconduct, gross negligence, or personal injury. Nothing in these terms removes or limits rights you have under the mandatory consumer protection law that applies to you.

You agree to cover reasonable losses we incur from your breach of these terms, your misuse of the service, or your violation of the law or another person’s rights.

You may stop using JLS and delete your account at any time from Settings. We may suspend or end access to accounts that violate these terms, misuse the service, or create legal risk, and we will give notice where it is reasonable to do so.

Deleting your account ends a website subscription, but it does not cancel an App Store subscription; cancel that in your device’s Settings app as described above.

We may update these terms as the service evolves. When we make material changes, we will update the effective date above and, where appropriate, notify you in the app. Continuing to use JLS after an update means you accept the revised terms.

These terms are governed by the laws of Japan, without regard to conflict-of-law rules. If you have a concern, please contact us first at support@jls.studio so we can try to resolve it directly; most issues can be settled this way within 30 days.

If a dispute cannot be resolved informally, it may be brought in the courts of Japan. This does not prevent you from bringing a claim in a small-claims court, or in the courts of your own country of residence where the law gives you that right, and it does not remove any mandatory consumer protection that applies to you.

We are not responsible for delays or failures caused by events beyond our reasonable control, such as outages of cloud or network providers. If any part of these terms is found unenforceable, the rest remains in effect. These terms are the entire agreement between us about JLS. Our failure to enforce a term is not a waiver of it. You may not transfer your rights under these terms; we may transfer ours in connection with a sale or reorganization of the service.

Questions about these terms? Email us at support@jls.studio. For required seller information under Japanese law, see our Commercial Transactions Disclosure.