Privacy and cookies
What versus.deals collects, what stays on your device and the choices you have. Last updated 16 October 2026.
In short
- You can sign in with your email, without a password, to keep your lists on every device and manage price alerts. There are no newsletters or payments.
- Price alert and Pro waitlist emails start only after you confirm by email, and every one has a one-click unsubscribe link.
- Google Analytics runs only if you accept it in the cookie banner. Until then nothing is requested from Google.
- Your shortlist, saved products and saved comparisons are kept in your own browser, and copied to your account only if you sign in.
- We count product and comparison activity as anonymous daily totals, without a cookie.
- Links to Amazon and eBay are affiliate links. What those sites collect is covered by their own privacy policies.
Who is responsible
versus.deals runs this website. For any privacy question or request, email contact@versus.deals.
Google Analytics (only with your consent)
If you choose Accept analytics, your browser loads Google Analytics 4 (measurement ID G-MPDY4THDC9) from googletagmanager.com. Google then sets its _ga and _ga_MPDY4THDC9 cookies on versus.deals. Google’s default lifetime for these cookies is up to two years.
Google Analytics records how the site is used: pages viewed, how you arrived, and browser, device and approximate location information that Google derives from your connection. Advertising storage, ad personalisation and ad user-data signals are sent to Google as denied. See Google’s privacy policy and how Google uses information from sites that use its services.
If you choose Reject analytics, or make no choice, Google Analytics is not loaded. You can change your mind at any time with Cookie settings in the footer of every page. Rejecting after accepting stops Google Analytics for the rest of the visit and deletes its _ga cookies from versus.deals.
Accounts, price alerts and the Pro waitlist
What we store. Your email address; each price alert (the product, UK or US market, any target price, and the price and date of the last alert we emailed); whether you want the weekly summary; your Pro waitlist place and the features you ticked; and, once you sign in, copies of your shortlist, saved decisions and saved products so they match on every device. To stop anyone flooding an inbox, we also keep the times of confirmation and sign-in emails sent to your address in the last 24 hours.
Where. In private files on our server. Files are named with a keyed hash, not your address. One-time links and sign-in sessions are stored only as one-way hashes, so the stored data cannot be used to sign in.
Emails. Confirmation, sign-in, price alert and weekly summary emails are sent through our email provider, which receives your address and the email for delivery only. Alerts use only exact-model eBay prices our server has checked; they never include tracking pixels. Each one has a one-click unsubscribe link.
How long. An address that never follows its confirmation or sign-in link is deleted after 7 days. Sign-in links last 30 minutes and confirmation links 7 days, and each works once. A session lasts 30 days or until you sign out. Unsubscribing removes all your alerts, the weekly summary and any waitlist place. Deleting your account in My decisions removes your address, alerts, waitlist place, synced lists and sessions straight away. Otherwise your account is kept until you delete it.
| Cookie | Purpose |
|---|---|
versus_session | Keeps you signed in for 30 days. Set only when you sign in or confirm an alert; HttpOnly, so page scripts cannot read it. Strictly necessary for the account you asked for. |
versus_signed_in | Tells this browser to sync your lists. It holds only the value 1, no identifier, and is removed when you sign out. |
Neither cookie is used for analytics or advertising.
Stored only in your browser
These use your browser’s local storage. They are not cookies and are not sent to us, except where noted. Clearing this site’s data in your browser removes them.
| Key | What it holds |
|---|---|
versus-analytics-consent-v1 | Your analytics choice and when you made it, so the banner does not appear on every page. This is needed to respect your choice. |
versus-shortlist-v1 | The products on your shortlist. |
versus-shopping-v1 | Products you save, up to 12 recently viewed products and searches you save. |
versus-decisions-v2 | Comparisons and setups you save on My decisions, including any prices you type in. To show current prices for them, the product IDs (not your notes or prices) are sent to our /api/offers endpoint, which does not store them. |
versus-sync-v1 | Only when you are signed in: which version of each list this browser last synced, so changes on another device are not overwritten. |
versus-session-prices-v2:… | Prices you type into a comparison. This uses session storage and is removed when you close the tab. |
Anonymous activity counts
To show which comparisons people are exploring, the site sends a small message to /api/activity when you view a product or comparison, add a product to a shortlist, click a product in the Finder or follow a retailer link. It contains only the action and the product IDs. No cookie is sent with it.
We store daily totals for the last seven days. To avoid counting the same action twice, we also keep a one-way hash of your network address, the day and the action, made with a private key. It cannot be reversed into an address and is deleted with the day’s totals after seven days. We do not store IP addresses, user-agent strings, search text or a browsing history. Nothing is sent from automated browsers, or when your browser sends Do Not Track or Global Privacy Control. More detail: How popular comparisons work.
Search, corrections, messages and email
Search. What you type in the site search is sent to our /api/search endpoint to find matching products. It is not stored.
Correction suggestions. The corrections form sends the product, the specification, your proposed value, a source link and any note you add. We store exactly that, with the time received, for editorial review. Your network address is not written to the review queue; to limit abuse, a hash of it is held in the server’s memory for up to an hour. Please do not include personal details in the note.
Contact form. The contact form sends the topic, your name, your email address, your message and any link you add. We store exactly that with the time received, your browser’s user-agent string and a one-way hash of your network address made with a private key (to spot repeated abuse; it cannot be reversed into an address). Messages are kept in a private inbox on our server, read only to reply to you and deleted after a year. If email forwarding is switched on, a copy is also delivered to our mailbox through our email provider. To limit abuse, a hash of your network address is also held in the server’s memory for up to an hour.
Email. If you email us, we receive your email address and message and use them only to reply.
Amazon and eBay links
Buying links go to Amazon UK and Amazon US (Amazon Associates) and to eBay UK and eBay US (eBay Partner Network). They carry our affiliate tag so the retailer can credit us with a commission. When you follow one, you leave versus.deals and the retailer’s own privacy and cookie policies apply, including the cookies it uses to attribute a purchase. The retailers do not give us your name or contact details.
eBay prices on the site come from eBay’s API, requested by our server. No information about you is sent in those requests.
Hosting, fonts and images
Pages, fonts and product photographs are served from versus.deals itself; the site does not load Google Fonts or other third-party content before you consent. As with any website, your browser’s network address is necessarily used to deliver each page. Our web server configuration does not enable access logging.
Legal basis and your rights
Google Analytics relies on your consent, which you can withdraw at any time. The anonymous activity counts, correction review, contact-form messages and replies to email rely on our legitimate interest in running and improving an accurate comparison site.
Price alert, weekly summary and Pro waitlist emails rely on your consent, which you withdraw with the unsubscribe link. Your account, sign-in and synced lists rely on providing the service you asked for.
Under UK data protection law you can ask for access to, correction or erasure of personal data we hold about you, and object to or restrict its use. If you have an account or alerts, you can see and delete them yourself in My decisions. Email contact@versus.deals with any request. You can also complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office.