Account and Purchases

The page for the questions that are about you rather than about SSH: what the ZestSSH account is, whether a purchase made on one platform carries over to another, what signing out does, how to change or delete the account, and where the privacy policy and terms live. Prices and the free-tier limits are on Plans & Limits; this page covers the account side.

What is a ZestSSH account and do I need one?

A ZestSSH account is the Google or Apple account you sign in with. There is no ZestSSH username, no ZestSSH password, and no separate registration: on Android and iOS the app signs you in with Sign in with Google or Sign in with Apple, and on Windows, macOS and Linux Sign in opens zestssh.com in your browser where you use the same Google or Apple sign-in, after which the app keeps a session token in your system’s secure storage.

You need an account for exactly two things:

the hosted ZestSSH Cloud sync backend (the Juiced purchase), because the service has to know whose encrypted blob it is storing
linking a purchase to your devices, so that one purchase unlocks the app everywhere you sign in

You do not need an account to use the app, to save unlimited connections, to make encrypted local backups, or to sync to storage you run yourself (WebDAV, S3, Google Drive, or your own ZestSSH server). Until you sign in, the service does not know who you are.

Does my Play Store or App Store purchase carry over to the desktop app?

Yes. A purchase is made once and unlocks ZestSSH on every platform, as long as you are signed in with the same ZestSSH account on each device. There is no separate desktop licence and no per-device fee.

How it works, so the steps make sense:

On Android and iOS the purchase goes through Google Play or the App Store and is verified by RevenueCat. When you are signed in, the app links that RevenueCat customer to your ZestSSH account id, so the purchase is recorded against your account rather than only against the phone.
The desktop apps have no store. Each time you sign in, and again at every launch, the desktop app asks api.zestssh.com which products your account owns. The service looks that up with RevenueCat, which reports purchases from every store on one account (App Store, Google Play and web checkout together), and answers with two flags: Squeezed and Juiced. Nothing about your device is sent beyond the app version.

To use a mobile purchase on desktop:

On the phone where you bought it, open Profile and sign in with Google or Apple, if you have not already. Signing in is what links the purchase to the account.
On the desktop app, open Settings, go to your account (Profile) and sign in with the same Google or Apple account.
Squeezed and Juiced unlock as soon as the check completes. If the app still shows Free, open the Upgrade screen and press Restore purchases (it is the same action as “I already purchased”), which asks the service again.

Once a desktop has seen your tier it remembers it, so a later launch with no network keeps the features you paid for instead of dropping to Free.

I bought on my phone before ever signing in

A purchase made on a phone that has never signed in sits on an anonymous store profile that only that phone knows about. The desktop app can only see purchases that are linked to an account, so on desktop it looks as if you own nothing.

Fix: sign in on that same phone (Profile, then Google or Apple). The app links the anonymous profile’s purchases to your account where it can, and then restores them. Then sign in on desktop and press Restore purchases.

If Restore Purchases on the phone answers “No purchases found on this profile. If you previously purchased on this device, your purchase may be linked to a previous profile”, the purchase is not lost, it is unlinked. Email [email protected] with your store order number and the email you sign in with, and the purchase is relinked to your account.

Does a purchase made on zestssh.com work on my phone?

Yes, the reverse direction works the same way. Buying for desktop happens on zestssh.com/upgrade, which asks you to sign in with the same Google or Apple account the app uses before it opens the Stripe checkout; the purchase is tied to that account, never to a device. When the payment completes, the service grants the lifetime entitlement to your account, and any device that signs in with that account picks it up: the desktop app on the next launch or Restore purchases, the phone once you sign in there (use Restore Purchases on the Upgrade screen if it does not appear immediately).

Do I need to buy ZestSSH again for another platform?

No. Squeezed, Juiced and the bundle are each bought once and work on Android, iOS, Windows, macOS and Linux. The only requirement for a purchase to follow you is being signed in with the same ZestSSH account on each device. Mobile store purchases are additionally tied to the Google Play or Apple ID account they were bought with, so on a new phone install from the same store account and press Restore Purchases.

How do I restore my purchase on a new device?

New phone or tablet: install ZestSSH from the same Google Play or App Store account, open the Upgrade screen and press Restore Purchases. If you were signed in when you bought, signing in on the new device restores it too.
New computer: sign in with your Google or Apple account. If the tier does not appear right away, open the Upgrade screen and press Restore purchases.
If neither works and you know you paid, email [email protected] with the order number (from Google Play, the App Store, or the Stripe receipt) and the address you sign in with.

Can I get a refund?

Purchases made through Google Play or the App Store are refunded under the store’s own policy; request the refund from Google or Apple, because the payment is on your store account rather than with ZestSSH. A purchase made directly on zestssh.com (processed by Stripe) can be refunded within 30 days of purchase: email [email protected] from the address you bought with. Refunding a purchase removes the features it unlocked.

How do I change the email on my account? (not supported)

There is no setting to change the email address, because the account has no email of its own: your identity is the Google or Apple account you sign in with, and ZestSSH shows the address that account reports at sign-in. Nothing in the app edits it, and there is no ZestSSH password to change either.

What you can do instead:

Use a different Google or Apple account. Sign out, then sign in with the other account. That is a different ZestSSH account: purchases stay with the account (or store account) they were bought on, and hosted sync data stays with the account it was created under. Move your data yourself by exporting an encrypted backup first and importing it after you sign in with the new account, then set sync up again.
Move a purchase to another account. Email [email protected] from the address you bought with, naming both accounts and the order number. Store purchases (Google Play, App Store) belong to the store account and cannot be moved by ZestSSH.
Change the address inside your Google or Apple account. That is done with Google or Apple, not in ZestSSH.

If I sign out, do my connections disappear?

No. Signing out only ends the account session on this device; the app’s own description of the action is “Locks synced data on this device. Nothing is deleted.”

What sign-out does:

ends the Google or Apple sign-in session (on desktop it also forgets the stored session token, name, email and avatar)
drops the sync key the app was holding in memory and resets the sync setup state on this device, so after you sign back in you reconnect sync and may be asked for your sync password
stops hosted ZestSSH Cloud sync until you sign in again, because the service needs a signed-in account to accept a push or pull

What sign-out does not touch:

your connections, identities and keys, snippets, groups, Networks, port-forward rules and settings: all of it stays in the encrypted local database on this device
local .zest backups
sync to your own storage (WebDAV, S3, Google Drive or a custom server), which never used the ZestSSH account
the encrypted data on ZestSSH Cloud, which stays exactly as it was and comes back when you sign in again
your purchase, which remains on your account; if paid features show as locked while you are signed out, signing back in restores them

Sign back in at any time from Profile (Settings on desktop) to reconnect. Sign-out is also not how you leave the service: to remove your data from ZestSSH Cloud use Purge Data in the sync settings, or Delete Account below.

Where is my account signed in? Can I sign out a lost device?

Open your Profile (Settings on desktop) and look under Devices: every device signed in to your account is listed with its platform and when it signed in. Choose Sign out next to a device to sign it out, or Sign out everywhere to sign out every device, this one included, if a device is lost or you think someone else signed in. Either may ask you to sign in again first. Signing a device out ends its access to your account; the hosts and keys already on it stay on it. See Signed-in Devices.

How do I delete my account?

Open your Profile (Settings on desktop) and choose Delete Account in the danger zone. You type your email address to confirm and sign in again (on desktop, in your browser); if ZestSSH Cloud holds synced data for the account, you also enter your sync password. Sync then turns off on this device, and the server deletes your account, your encrypted sync data, the records about them and your sign-in, all at once, and checks that nothing is left. It cannot be undone. The app then shows “Server data has been deleted” and gives you a last chance: delete everything on this device too (connections, keys, passwords, settings, and the automatic backups, session logs and transcripts ZestSSH saved), or keep it. If you sync to storage you run yourself, its encrypted data is deleted as well; the store itself stays yours. Purchase records are kept for accounting: a purchase made on zestssh.com belongs to the deleted account, while App Store and Google Play purchases stay with your store account.

Is there a student, education or family discount? (not offered)

No. ZestSSH has one price for everyone: Squeezed is $9.99, Juiced is $24.99 and the bundle is $29.99, each a one-time purchase with no subscription. There is no student, education, non-profit, volume or family pricing, and no promo codes are published. Regional store pricing and tax can make the amount you see differ, but that is the store, not a discount programme.

ZestSSH does not offer family sharing of purchases. A purchase belongs to the account it was made with: the Google Play or Apple ID account for mobile store purchases, or the ZestSSH account (your Google or Apple sign-in) for a purchase on zestssh.com. Each person who wants the paid features buys them on their own account. You can use your own purchase on as many of your own devices as you like by signing in with the same account.

Email [email protected]. ZestSSH complies with the GDPR and the CCPA, and you have the right to access, correct or delete your personal data; a request by email is how you exercise it. There is very little to hand over, because the app collects no analytics or telemetry, so it helps to know what exists:

If you never signed in: nothing. The service does not know who you are, what servers you connect to, or how you use the app.
If you signed in: your email address and an account id, and a record of which products your account owns.
If you use hosted ZestSSH Cloud sync: the encrypted sync blob, which ZestSSH cannot read, plus the operational metadata needed to run the service: the blob size and when it last changed. An optional profile photo, if you set one.
Your signed-in devices: each one’s platform and when it signed in, so you can sign it out.
If you set up two-step sign-in: a keyed hash of each of your recovery codes, never the codes themselves. Your authenticator’s secret is held by Firebase Authentication, not by ZestSSH. See Two-step sign-in.
No activity log: the service keeps no record of your syncs, sign-ins or account changes and stores no IP addresses.
If you sent an in-app bug report or suggestion: the report lives in the public ZestSSH Discord; the service keeps only short-lived rate-limit counters and a block list of opaque account ids, never email addresses.

A copy of your data therefore means the items above; your connections, keys, snippets and settings are on your own devices, and you export them yourself as an encrypted backup. Data you synced to your own storage is yours to manage there.

To delete, you do not need to write: Delete Account in the app (Profile, or Settings on desktop) removes the hosted data and the sign-in account at once, and offers to wipe the device too; Delete all local data or uninstalling removes everything local. Email [email protected] to have an in-app report removed from Discord (quote the reference shown on the post), or for anything the app cannot do itself.

Where can I read your privacy policy and terms of service?

Both are also linked from inside the app, under Settings > About on mobile and in Settings on desktop. When either document changes materially, the app shows a one-time notice on the next launch with a link to the updated text.

In one line each: ZestSSH has no analytics, no telemetry, no crash reporting and no ads; the app transmits nothing about you unless you sign in or use a feature that needs a third party; sync is end-to-end encrypted on every backend and ZestSSH cannot read it; every paid tier is a one-time purchase with lifetime updates and no subscription; a purchase made directly on zestssh.com can be refunded within 30 days, store purchases follow the store’s policy; you must be at least 13 to use the app.

Does the free version have ads? How do I remove the ads?

There are no ads to remove. ZestSSH has no ads in any tier, on any platform, and no ad network in the app. The free tier is the full client with a few caps (4 concurrent sessions on desktop, 2 on mobile, 3 terminal themes, 5 monitored hosts); paying for Squeezed lifts those caps and unlocks the Pro features, and Juiced adds the hosted sync backend. Nothing you pay for turns off advertising, because there is none.