Terms of Service

Agreement

These terms are between you and Northbrook PBC ("we", "us"), the maker of Ponzu. By using Ponzu (the apps for Mac, Windows, Linux and iPhone, the service they talk to, and this website), you agree to them. If you use Ponzu for an organization, you accept them on its behalf and confirm you are allowed to.

You must be at least 13 to use Ponzu, and at least 16 in the European Economic Area. If you are under the age of majority where you live, a parent or guardian must agree to these terms for you. GitHub, which you sign in with, has its own minimum age.

The service

Ponzu is in beta. Features change, some are not finished, and some may be taken away.

The notices these terms promise by email and, once billing starts, the billing emails Ponzu sends a workspace's admins are part of the service and can't be turned off.

Accounts you connect

GitHub. You sign in with GitHub and install Ponzu's GitHub App on the accounts and repositories you choose. GitHub's terms govern your use of GitHub. Who can see and change a canvas follows who GitHub lets read and push to its repository.
Claude. You connect your own Claude subscription or Anthropic API key. Your use of Claude is under Anthropic's terms and your plan's limits, and turns count against your plan. Ponzu does not resell Claude.

What Ponzu does for you

Ponzu runs an AI agent, Claude Code, for you in a cloud sandbox. The agent writes and runs code there, including your repository's own code, and can reach the internet.
It commits and pushes to the canvas's own branch. Its commits are authored as the canvas's owner, whoever asked for the work. It works in turns that a person in the canvas starts, and also in turns that a failed check or a review of its pull request starts, where it may push fixes and update the pull request.
It opens and updates the canvas's pull request as the person whose turn it is (in a turn a check or a review started, the last person who wrote to it, or else the canvas's owner). It merges, marks ready or turns on auto-merge only in a turn a person started in Ponzu, as that person, and never past your repository's rules on GitHub.
AI output can be wrong, insecure or not what you meant. Review what the agent made before it is merged or used.
You are responsible for what you ask the agent to do, for what is merged on your behalf, including by the agent in a turn you started, and for the repositories and secrets you give it.
The agent runs your repository's code with the secrets you give it. What that code does with them, such as a deploy, a paid service it calls or a message it sends, is yours. We are not responsible for charges or actions at other services that come from it, or for what GitHub or Anthropic do about your account there.

Your content

As between you and us, what you make in Ponzu (canvases, comments, threads, and the code the agent writes for you) is yours. We claim no rights in it.
You give us the permission we need to host it, process it, show it to the people with access to it, and run the service, and no more.
We don't use your content to train AI models. What the agent sends to Anthropic under your own Claude account follows your account's terms and settings with Anthropic, including whether Anthropic may use it to improve its models.
You confirm you have the right to put into Ponzu what you put into it.

Acceptable use

No unlawful content, malware, or attacks on anyone, including us.
Don't use sandboxes to mine cryptocurrency, as proxies, or as general compute that has nothing to do with your canvases.
Don't get around Ponzu's limits or access rules, and don't resell the service.
Don't point the agent at code or services you have no right to use, or use Ponzu to break GitHub's or Anthropic's terms.
Don't use Ponzu if you are in a country, or on a list of people, that the United States does not allow us to serve.
We may stop or suspend sandboxes or accounts that break these rules. When we do, we tell you why by email, if we have your address, unless the law forbids it or telling you would help someone cause harm. If you think we got it wrong, write to hello@ponzu.design and a person will look at it again.

Workspaces

A workspace is a GitHub account (a person's or an organization's) where Ponzu's GitHub App is installed. GitHub decides who is in it.
A workspace's admins set its members' roles and its monthly cap. Once billing starts, the workspace pays for what is used in it.
When a member leaves or deletes their account, the canvases they made in a workspace others are in stay with the workspace.

Fees

Ponzu is free until billing starts. Billing has not started.
Once it starts, Ponzu is pay as you go, at the rates on the pricing page: each member's free credits every month, pooled across the workspace; a card when the free credits run out; and a monthly cap. At the cap, no new turn starts in the workspace until an admin raises the cap or the month resets; a turn that is running finishes. Payment is through Stripe.
Before billing starts, we tell every workspace's admins at least 30 days ahead, by email where we have their address, and on the pricing page. Nothing is charged until an admin adds a card.
Prices do not include taxes. Where the law requires it, we add sales tax, VAT or a similar tax to what you pay.
Fees are not refundable, except where the law requires a refund or we charged you by mistake.
We tell a workspace's admins at least 30 days before a price goes up, by email where we have their address, and on the pricing page. The new price applies from the first month that starts after that.

Feedback

If you send us ideas or feedback, we may use them freely, without owing you anything for them.

Open source

Ponzu's code is open source under the MIT License. That license governs the code. These terms govern the hosted service. You may run Ponzu yourself; we don't support that.

Ending

You can delete your account in the desktop app's Settings › Account. If you are the only admin of a workspace others are in, make someone else an admin first. Our privacy policy says what is deleted and what stays.

We may suspend or close your account, or a workspace's use of Ponzu, if you break these terms, if your use puts other people or the service at risk, or if the law requires it. We tell you as described under Acceptable use. We may also stop offering Ponzu. If we do, we tell you at least 30 days ahead, so you can take what you need: your pushed code is on GitHub, and boards export as PNG or PDF. Threads and comments cannot be exported yet.

When these terms end, what you owe us still applies, and so do the sections Disclaimers, limitation of liability, indemnity and Governing law and disputes. What you made stays yours.

Disclaimers, limitation of liability, indemnity

Ponzu is provided "as is" and "as available". As far as the law allows, we make no promises about it beyond what these terms say: not that it will always work, be free of errors or keep your work safe, nor that what the agent makes will be correct or fit for any purpose. Keep your own copy of anything you cannot afford to lose; your code's copy is on GitHub.

As far as the law allows, neither we nor the people who work for us are liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive damages, or for lost profits, revenue, data or goodwill, arising from Ponzu or these terms. Our total liability for all claims about Ponzu or these terms is limited to the greater of what you paid us for Ponzu in the twelve months before the claim, and one hundred US dollars.

Some places do not allow these limits. There, they apply only as far as the law allows, and nothing in these terms limits a liability the law does not let us limit.

If someone makes a claim against us because content you put into Ponzu breaks the law or someone else's rights, or because you broke these terms, you will cover our reasonable costs and losses from that claim. We tell you about the claim promptly and let you take part in answering it. If you are a consumer, this applies only as far as the law where you live allows.

Governing law and disputes

These terms are governed by the laws of the State of Delaware, without regard to its rules on conflicts of law. Any dispute about Ponzu or these terms goes to the state or federal courts in the State of Delaware, and you and we agree to their jurisdiction. Before going to court, write to hello@ponzu.design so we can try to settle it.

If you are a consumer in the European Economic Area, the UK or another place whose law gives you that right, you keep the protection of its mandatory laws and may bring a claim in its courts.

Changes and contact

When these terms change, the new version is posted here, and every change shows in the repository's history on GitHub. If a change takes away a right you have or adds to what you must do, we tell you at least 30 days before it takes effect, by email where we have your address, and on this page. We may make it sooner if the law or stopping abuse needs it. If you keep using Ponzu after a change takes effect, you accept it; if you don't want to, delete your account. Write to us at hello@ponzu.design.

Last updated November 13, 2026.