Community Guidelines

What Photerra is for

Every spot on Photerra is a photograph at a precise coordinate — somewhere a person actually stood. That is the whole product. It is why a Photerra trip can only be built from places that exist, and it is what these guidelines protect.

So the test for anything you post is simple: would this help another traveler find and see this place?

Photograph places, not people

Photerra publishes the exact coordinate of every spot you add. That is deliberate — it is how someone else finds the view. It also means you should think about what else is in the frame.

• Don't post identifiable people who haven't agreed to it — especially not children.
• Don't post anyone's home, or the inside of a private residence, as a spot.
• Don't post another person's private information: their address, their phone number, where they live, their documents.
• Never use Photerra to track, follow or locate a specific person.

Post photos you took

Photerra is a first-hand map. Post your own photographs, of places you went.

• No photos you found online, bought, or took from someone else's account.
• No AI-generated or heavily synthesised images presented as a real place.
• Editing is fine — colour, crop, exposure. Inventing a place is not.

Real coordinates only

A wrong coordinate sends a stranger to the wrong place. Treat it as the most important part of the post.

• Don't deliberately mislabel where a photo was taken.
• Don't create spots for places that don't exist, or duplicate a place you've already mapped just to inflate a count.
• If you notice a spot of yours has the wrong location, edit it — you can move the pin at any time.

Never allowed

These are removed on sight, and accounts that post them are closed.

• Any sexual content involving a minor. We report this to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children and preserve records as US law requires.
• Intimate images of a person shared without their consent, including synthetic or AI-generated depictions. If this has happened to you, use our NCII report form — it is handled as a priority.
• Sexual content, graphic violence, or gore.
• Hate speech, harassment, threats, or content that incites violence against people or groups.
• Content that promotes or facilitates illegal activity.
• Spam, fake accounts, bought engagement, or manipulated affiliate links.

Getting there safely and legally

A spot is an invitation. Don't invite people somewhere they shouldn't be.

• Don't post spots that require trespassing on private property, or entering a closed, restricted or condemned area.
• Don't post spots that require someone to climb, cross or enter something dangerous to reach.
• Respect posted rules at parks, reserves, sacred sites and protected habitats — including bans on drones, off-trail access, and photography.
• If a place is fragile, say so in the description. A well-known spot loved to death stops being a spot.

How we review

Every uploaded photo is screened automatically before it becomes publicly visible. Screening looks at the image itself; it does not read your captions or your account. Most photos clear in under a minute and you'll see them appear on your map.

A photo that the screen flags is hidden from public surfaces while it is reviewed. It stays visible to you. Screening is not perfect in either direction — it sometimes flags something ordinary, and a person can always look again.

If your photo is removed

You'll get a notification saying one of your photos couldn't be published. We deliberately keep that message short and generic: a detailed explanation of exactly which signal fired is an instruction manual for anyone trying to get around it.

You can ask us to look again. Email info@photerra.com from the address on your account and tell us roughly when you uploaded it and what it showed. A person reviews it. If we got it wrong, we restore it — and that correction feeds back into how we screen.

Removing a photo does not remove your account. Repeated or severe violations do.

Reporting something

If you see something here that breaks these guidelines, report it from the spot, guide or profile itself — the report goes to us with the content attached. We review reports and act on the ones that need it.

For non-consensual intimate imagery, use the dedicated NCII form rather than an in-app report; it routes to a priority queue.

For copyright, email legal@photerra.com with the detail described in the Terms.