HeyPolo

The FAQ on HeyPolo’s website states that HeyPolo is its own company, HeyPolo Inc., founded in 2025. Both the Apple App Store and Google PlayGoogle PlayGoogle Play is a digital content distribution service operated by Google, centered on the Google Play Store, the app store for Android devices. Its predecessor, Android Market, launched in October 2008 alongside the first Android phone, and in March 2012 it merged with Google Music and the Google eBookstore and was renamed Google Play. As the main distribution channel for Android apps, its commissions, billing rules, and review practices have drawn controversy, including the Epic Games antitrust lawsuit in the United States and penalties under the European Union’s Digital Markets Act.Open the full entry list HeyPolo Inc. as the app’s developer, and Google Play gives a developer address in Mission Viejo, CaliforniaCaliforniaCalifornia is a U.S. state on the Pacific coast; its capital is Sacramento and its largest city is Los Angeles. California was admitted to the Union on September 9, 1850, as the 31st state. Its population at the 2020 Census (April 1, 2020) was 39,538,223, the largest of any state.Open the full entry, United StatesUnited StatesThe United States is a federal country in North America made up of 50 states, the District of Columbia as the seat of government, and territories such as Puerto Rico and Guam; its capital is Washington, D.C. The Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. The 2020 census (April 1, 2020) counted a resident population of 331,449,281, and the 435 seats of the House of Representatives are apportioned among the states on the basis of the census.Open the full entry.⁠[1][2][3]

The public LinkedInLinkedInLinkedIn is a social networking platform for professionals. It was founded in 2002 by Reid Hoffman and others, launched in 2003, and listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 2011; after Microsoft acquired it for approximately $26.2 billion in 2016, it became a wholly owned Microsoft subsidiary. Its revenue comes from membership subscriptions, advertising, and recruitment solutions.Open the full entry profile of Edvinas ŠeršniovasEdvinas ŠeršniovasEdvinas Šeršniovas is a business executive and entrepreneur, one of the four co-founders of the international money transfer company TransferGo, and the chief executive of HeyPolo, a family safety and location-sharing app.Open the full entry shows that he has been HeyPolo’s full-time chief executive officer since October 2025; the team list on the “About us” page of HeyPolo’s website links to this profile.⁠[4][5]

On March 23, 2026, Surfshark announced HeyPolo on its blog, describing the app as designed around consent and control rather than passive monitoring. Users can create unlimited groups (family, friends, coworkers or travel companions), invite others by link, and choose per group whether to share an exact location, an approximate location or nothing, as well as who can see it, when and for how long; one subscription covers the account holder, and everyone else joins for free.⁠[6]

The app was available on Google Play and the Apple App Store at launch; users can set start and end times for sharing, after which tracking stops, and can always see who is viewing their location; location data is encrypted in transit, and the company pledged never to sell, monetize or exploit users’ location data. TechRadar wrote that the app draws on the privacy expertise of the Surfshark and Incogni teams.⁠[7][8]

Prices at launch: Tom’s Guide listed a one-year plan at $3.99 a month ($47.88 upfront before tax) and a rolling monthly plan at $5.99 a month, with a 30-day money-back guarantee; TechRadar mentioned a promotion of 40% off 12-month plans, from $3.59 a month ($43.08 upfront); GB News listed UK prices of £5.99 a month or £47.88 a year and a 30-day free trial for new users.⁠[7][8][9]

At the launch, chief executive Edvinas Šeršniovas said: “As a father myself, I wanted to create an app that could help me ensure my family’s safety”; he also said: “People want safety, but they don’t want to sacrifice their autonomy or feel controlled by those they trust,” and “We are changing the perception that location sharing must equal surveillance.”⁠[8][9]

George Phillips of Tom’s Guide positioned HeyPolo as an alternative to Life360 and to AppleAppleApple is a public technology company founded in 1976 and headquartered in Cupertino, California, United States. Its business includes the iPhone, Mac, iPad, wearables, and services such as digital content, payments, and cloud storage. The company builds its product system through in-house hardware, operating systems, and services.Open the full entry’s and Google’s “Find My” apps, and wrote that HeyPolo is a separate product with its own development team that Surfshark does not directly control. He judged that the app looked like a considerable privacy improvement at first glance but was unlikely to appeal to committed privacy seekers, and noted that VPN companies such as Surfshark, NordVPN and ExpressVPN were expanding into broader privacy suites; he also wrote that it was unclear whether location data is still collected in Private Mode and that Tom’s Guide had asked Surfshark and HeyPolo to confirm.⁠[7]

Tom’s Guide compared the privacy policies of HeyPolo and Life360: HeyPolo’s policy ran to about 4,509 words with a Hemingway readability grade of 8, Life360’s to about 9,949 words with a grade of 14. At the time HeyPolo was paid-only, with a one-year plan at $3.59 a month ($43.08 upfront before tax), a 30-day money-back guarantee and a 7-day free trial; Life360 offered a free version, with paid plans from $7.99 a month.⁠[10]

The article wrote that HeyPolo collects group membership details, trip information, and arrival and departure times, and, with separate consent, motion and fitness data, while its website and analytics collect device identifiers, IP addresses and advertising IDs; it shares data with analytics, email, storage and payment providers and with group companies, but says it never sells or trades data. HeyPolo said that it does not share geolocation, trip history or movement data with any third-party marketing or analytics partners, which makes location-based targeted advertising “technically and contractually impossible.”⁠[10]

HeyPolo’s senior product manager Šarūnas Šereika confirmed that data is protected by SSL/TLS encryption in transit; the article also wrote that data is encrypted with AES-256 at rest and protected by firewalls and security audits. Under its privacy policy, most data is kept while the account is active and for two years after the last login, payment data for 10 years, geolocation and motion data until consent is withdrawn, and anonymized aggregate data indefinitely.⁠[10]

George Phillips concluded that both apps collect substantial personal data and neither is risk-free; Life360 collects more data and may share precise location data with third parties, while HeyPolo’s sharing controls and clearer privacy policy make it the more private option; he recommended HeyPolo over Life360 and considered its options particularly useful when setting up family groups and concerned about children’s information and whereabouts.⁠[10]

In June 2026, 9to5Google (June 10), 9to5Mac (June 13) and Android Authority (June 30) ran promotional articles for HeyPolo labeled as sponsored content. The 9to5Google sponsored post listed a price of $3.99 a month or $47.88 a year, a 7-day free trial and a 30-day money-back guarantee, and described an “Emergency Access” feature that gives a designated person one-time access to a user’s live location in an emergency, as well as recording of driving speed and habits; the Android Authority sponsored post wrote that the map updates as often as every five seconds, that prices start at $1.99 a month, and that a live compass points toward a group member.⁠[11][12][13]

On August 19, 2026, HeyPolo published a press release on its website (datelined Vilnius, Lithuania, August 20, 2026) announcing that it had earned the Mumsnet Rated badge after testing by members of Mumsnet, the UK parenting community: 83% of testers would recommend it to friends or family, 92% said it gave them greater peace of mind about their family’s safety, and 83% found it easy or very easy to set up; among testers who had used other location-sharing apps, more than half felt HeyPolo was better. Testers most valued real-time location, arrival and departure alerts, and a compass for finding each other. The release describes HeyPolo as coming from the Surfshark group and created by the team behind privacy tools such as Surfshark and Incogni.⁠[14]

In the release, Edvinas Šeršniovas said: “As a parent myself, it means a lot to be recognised by fellow parents in the Mumsnet community.”⁠[14]

The related page on the Mumsnet website is labeled an advertisement feature created by HeyPolo and was last updated on September 1, 2026. It states that 50 Mumsnet users tested the app; 83% would recommend it (the threshold for the badge is 80%), 91.5% said it gave them greater peace of mind, 83% found it easy to set up, 77.6% were satisfied with the overall experience, and 71.4% agreed the subscription offered good value; the price was £3.99 a month. Testers praised the real-time location sharing and the arrival and departure alerts, while some found the sign-up “clunky” and wanted a simpler way to add family members and quicker location updates.⁠[15]

In his review for TechRadar, Krishi Chowdhary summed HeyPolo up as “A privacy-first location tracker that puts control back in your hands,” calling it affordable and non-intrusive and noting its SOS emergency alerts, but found that it lacks screen-time management and app or website blocking and is limited to location tracking. The review listed prices of $5.99 a month on the monthly plan and the equivalent of $1.99 a month on the annual plan, with one plan covering the whole family on unlimited devices and a 30-day money-back guarantee; no free trial is offered on the website, but 3-day or 7-day trials are available when subscribing through the Apple App Store or Google Play.⁠[16]

The review wrote that HeyPolo’s real-time location updates about every five seconds, that location history is kept for seven days and then deleted automatically, and that support offers live chat with a human agent from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. CDT; it cited app-store ratings of 4.35 stars on Google Play and 4.9 on the App Store.⁠[16]

Ahead of National Teen Driver Safety Week (October 18–24, 2026), HeyPolo issued a press release encouraging parents and teens to review driving habits together, drawing on 2024 crash data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). The release described the app’s Driving Safety Score, which reviews speeding, phone use, harsh braking, rapid acceleration and cornering, and which the company says families should use to start conversations rather than to punish; it also described crash detection, location sharing and arrival alerts.⁠[17]

As of November 2026, HeyPolo’s website describes it as a family safety and location-sharing app for iPhone (iOS 17 or later) and Android (Android 10 or later), with real-time location sharing (an Exact mode that updates every five seconds, a General area mode, and a Private mode that switches sharing off), arrival and departure alerts, location history, SOS alerts, severe-weather alerts, crash detection, speed monitoring, a Driving Safety Score, low-battery alerts, a compass, emergency contacts, and calls that ring through silent mode or Do Not Disturb, aimed at kids, teens, teen drivers, aging parents, couples and friends. The website says the app is free to download with a 7-day free trial, that one subscription covers the whole family however many people are added, and that there is a 30-day money-back guarantee; it also says that HeyPolo does not sell users’ location data to advertisers, insurers or data brokers.⁠[1]

The “About us” page on the website is headed “Location sharing shouldn’t feel like surveillance,” states the vision that consent should be the default rather than a premium feature, and lists the team: chief executive Edvinas Šeršniovas, engineering manager Algirdas Dumskis, senior product manager Šarūnas Šereika and chief marketing officer Sinead Lambert.⁠[5]

As of November 2026, the app is listed on the Apple App Store as “HeyPolo: GPS Location Sharing” in the Lifestyle category, rated 4+, free with in-app purchases (options including $11.99 and $14.99 a month and $47.99 and $69.99 for 12 months), with a rating of 4.7 from 99 ratings and English as its only language; the privacy label provided by the developer lists identifiers (“Identifiers”) as data used to track the user. The version history lists 25 versions from 1.32.0 to 1.54.0, most of them about a week apart. On Google Play the app of the same name has more than 10,000 downloads and a rating of 4.3 stars from 205 reviews, is rated for ages 3 and up, and was last updated on August 28, 2026.⁠[2][3]

The FAQ on HeyPolo’s website answers “No” to “Is HeyPolo owned by Surfshark?” and says the app was built by the team behind Surfshark and runs as a separate product with its own team; the FAQ on the “About us” page says HeyPolo is developed by the same team as Surfshark and “operates as a separate product with its own product development team.” The copyright line in the website footer reads “Copyright © 2026 HeyPolo / Surfshark.”⁠[1][5]

HeyPolo’s “About us” page says that Surfshark has protected the privacy of 4 million users in more than 100 countries for over eight years and that privacy was built into HeyPolo from day one. Surfshark’s website lists HeyPolo under “Other products” in its header and footer, and the navigation of its launch blog post places HeyPolo alongside IncogniIncogniIncogni is a personal data removal subscription service launched by Surfshark that sends, and regularly repeats, deletion requests to data brokers and people search sites on users’ behalf; its operating company, Incogni Inc., was established in 2022. A Deloitte limited assurance report published in 2025 said it covered at least 420 brokers as of July 2025.Open the full entry, Saily and Ironwall. The leadership listed on Surfshark’s website includes chief executive Dovydas GodelisDovydas GodelisDovydas Godelis is the chief executive of the cybersecurity company Surfshark, succeeding its founder Vytautas Kaziukonis in March 2026. He has worked at the company for more than seven years, starting in marketing and later serving as head of growth and chief operating officer.Open the full entry and chairman of the board Vytautas KaziukonisVytautas KaziukonisVytautas Kaziukonis is the founder of the cybersecurity company Surfshark. He served as its chief executive from 2018 and became chairman of the board in March 2026, focusing on the company’s long-term vision.Open the full entry.⁠[5][18][6]

HeyPolo: Official website: https://heypolo.com/ (opens in a new window).⁠[1]

Facebook: Public account: https://www.facebook.com/heypolocom (opens in a new window).⁠[19][1]

Instagram: Public account: https://www.instagram.com/heypolocom/ (opens in a new window).⁠[1]

LinkedIn: Public profile: https://www.linkedin.com/company/heypolo (opens in a new window).⁠[1]

TikTok: Public account: https://www.tiktok.com/@heypolo.com (opens in a new window).⁠[1]

Surfshark: Official website: https://surfshark.com/ (opens in a new window).⁠[18]