MyRoshi contains no violence, no sexual content, no profanity, no gambling and no advertising. We have nevertheless set a minimum age of 18. This page explains why, for anyone deciding whether the app is right for them or for someone in their care.
Two different numbers are involved and they are worth separating. The store age rating is calculated by Apple and Google from a content questionnaire; we answer it honestly and accept whatever it produces, and it may well be lower than 18, because the app really does contain nothing of the kind those questionnaires ask about. The minimum age is ours to set, and it is 18. What follows is why, and none of it is about content.
Every talk in MyRoshi — each dokusan and each teisho — is written fresh by an AI and spoken in a synthesised voice. Nothing is pre-written, and no human reviews a talk before you hear it. The app draws on the classic zen literature and on what you have told it, but its words are generated, not vetted.
Understanding that, and holding it lightly, asks a degree of maturity. A younger user may reasonably take a warm, confident, personally-addressed voice for an authority it is not.
The heart of the app is dokusan: you say what is actually going on in your practice and your life, and the teacher answers that. The subject matter is therefore open-ended and unfiltered by us. Practitioners bring grief, fear, doubt, illness, the death of people they loved, and long stretches of not knowing why they are sitting at all.
The zen tradition itself meets these things directly. Its literature is frank about mortality, impermanence and the exhaustion of one’s usual consolations. That frankness is the point, and it is written for adults.
MyRoshi is a companion to a meditation practice. It does not diagnose, does not treat, and is not a substitute for professional care of any kind. It is also not monitored: no one is reading your reflections and no one will notice if you are in trouble — by design, since everything you write is stored encrypted under a key we never keep.
If you are in crisis or considering harming yourself, please contact your local emergency services or a crisis line in your country (in the US, call or text 988; internationally, see findahelpline.com). Please do not rely on this app.
Koans, the precepts and ordination belong to a teacher you sit with in person. MyRoshi is deliberately built not to assign them, and it will not pretend to a relationship it cannot hold. Knowing where that line falls — and why it matters — is part of what this app assumes of its user.
MyRoshi is run from India. Under the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023, a child is anyone under 18, and a child’s data may only be processed with verifiable parental consent. We have not built a way to obtain that consent, and we do not intend to: the honest reading of everything above is that this is not the right app for someone under 18, and a consent form would not change that.
A paid subscription is a contract, so it is purchased through the Apple App Store or Google Play by the adult who holds the store account. See our Terms for the details.
If you are a parent, a teacher, or a store reviewer with a question about any of this, write to admin@myroshi.com and we will answer it.