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Terms of use

Meta

Meta Terms of Service

C

Risk score

42of 100

Open the original (new tab)Company page

In short

  • These Terms grant Meta a broad, sub-licensable license to your content and allow them to change the rules with continued use.
  • You agree that your posts can be shown in ads alongside your name and profile picture without payment.
  • The agreement limits their liability to $100 or what you paid and requires legal disputes to happen in California courts.

What you accept

If you tap Agree

Everyday words for the material promises and rights you give up. Each line includes a quote from the document.

  1. 01

    You are agreeing to give Meta a worldwide, sublicensable license to use, modify, and share your photos and videos so they can run their services.

    This product

    “you grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, and worldwide license”
  2. 02

    You are agreeing that we can show your name and profile picture next to ads to prove you are interested in their products.

    Other products, stores, or brands

    “You give us permission to use your name and profile picture and information about actions you have taken on Facebook next to or in connection with ads... without any compensation to you.”
  3. 03

    You are agreeing to resolve all disputes in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California or state court in San Mateo County.

    This product

    “any claim... shall be resolved exclusively in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California or a state court located in San Mateo County.”

What it can cost you

Downsides we could quote

Quoted clauses that can affect your privacy, money, or right to go to court — including terms that follow you to other products.

Highest-cost clauses first

High cost

Broad license to user content

You are agreeing to let Meta share and sell the rights to your content through sublicensing.

“you grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, and worldwide license to host, use, distribute, modify, run, copy, publicly perform or display, translate, and create derivative works of your content”

What that means: You lose control over who else sees or uses your creative work, even if you delete it from your own profile.

The terms explicitly allow Meta to sublicense your content to other companies and make changes to it, which is far broader than just hosting your files.

Medium cost

Tracking you across apps

You are agreeing to let Meta track your activity across the internet to improve ad targeting.

“We use data about the connections you make, the choices and settings you select, and what you share and do on and off our Products - to personalize your experience.”

What that means: Your browsing habits on other websites are monitored and used by Meta to target you with ads.

Meta collects data on your activity outside its apps to build a profile for advertising and service personalization.

Medium cost

Unilateral changes with little or no notice

You are agreeing to be bound by any future updates as long as you keep using the app.

“Once any updated Terms are in effect, you will be bound by them if you continue to access or use our Products.”

What that means: You may suddenly be bound by stricter privacy or usage rules without clicking 'I Agree' again.

The company does not require active re-consent; simply keeping the account open means you accept new rules.

Medium cost

Liability shifted onto the user

You are agreeing to hold Meta harmless for most damages and limit your recovery to $100.

“Under no circumstance will we be liable to you for any lost profits... Our aggregate liability... will not exceed the greater of $100 or the amount you have paid us in the past twelve months.”

What that means: If their service error causes you significant financial loss, you cannot sue for more than $100.

Meta caps its financial responsibility for damages caused by service failures or negligence at a very low amount.

Lower cost

Difficult or incomplete deletion

You are agreeing to wait up to 90 days for full erasure from Meta's servers.

“After the content is deleted, it may take us up to another 90 days to remove it from backups and disaster recovery systems.”

What that means: Your deleted data may remain in backup files for three months after you request deletion.

While immediate deletion is possible for views, complete removal from technical backups has a defined delay period.

People also accept these terms in

The same company terms often apply on these apps or devices. This is a lookup aid, not a claim we caught this company.

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Whatsapp
  • Meta Quest
  • Oculus

If these terms already apply to you

Keep this list. Fineprint cannot undo or cancel something you already agreed to at the company.

We cannot see Agree on their site. With Premium, tap “I accepted these terms” if you already agreed to what Meta asks.