The Short Version
AfriWidget uses a very small number of cookies. One is required for the site to remember whether you clicked Accept or Decline on the cookie banner. The others come from Google Analytics and Google AdSense, and you can turn them off whenever you like. No cookie ever contains the numbers you enter into a calculator.
- One functional cookie remembers your cookie choice.
- Google Analytics cookies help us count visits in aggregate.
- Google AdSense cookies help decide which ads to show.
- You can decline the analytics and advertising cookies from the banner.
- Every tool still works perfectly if you decline everything.
What This Policy Covers
1. What a Cookie Actually Is
A cookie is a small text file that a website asks your browser to store. It usually contains a short string of letters and numbers, plus an expiry date. It is not a program. It cannot run on your device, cannot open files, cannot install software, and cannot carry a virus. It just sits there until either the website asks to read it again or the expiry date passes and it is deleted.
Cookies are used on almost every modern website, and they serve many different purposes. Some are helpful, some are essential, and a few have given the whole idea a bad reputation by being used for aggressive cross-site tracking. We want to be clear about which type we are using and why.
There are two main kinds of cookie worth knowing about:
- First-party cookies are set by the website you are actually visiting. On AfriWidget, that means cookies set by afriwidget.com.
- Third-party cookies are set by a different company whose service is embedded in the page. On AfriWidget, that means cookies set by Google (through Analytics and AdSense).
Cookies can also be either session cookies (which disappear the moment you close your browser) or persistent cookies (which stay on your device for a set period). The functional cookie we set is persistent, because its whole point is to remember your preference next time you visit.
2. Why AfriWidget Uses Cookies
We use cookies for three reasons, and only three reasons:
- To remember whether you accepted or declined the cookie banner, so we do not keep asking you on every page.
- To count visits to the site in aggregate, so we can see which tools are useful and which ones need work.
- To display advertisements through Google AdSense, which is how we cover the cost of running the site without charging users.
That is the complete list. We do not use cookies to build a profile of you, to remember what you typed into any calculator, to track you across other websites on our own account, or to sell your behaviour to data brokers. If we ever wanted to add a new type of cookie, we would update this page first and tell you clearly what changed.
3. The Three Types of Cookie We Use
Strictly necessary cookies
These are the cookies that keep the site working. On AfriWidget there is exactly one, and it does one job: remembering whether you have already responded to the cookie banner. Without it, you would see the banner on every page you visit, which would be annoying and would not help anyone.
Analytics cookies
These come from Google Analytics 4. They help us understand how many people visit AfriWidget, which pages are the most popular, how long people tend to stay, and roughly which country they are visiting from. All of that data is aggregated — we see totals, not individuals.
We have deliberately enabled IP anonymisation, which means the last part of every visitor's IP address is stripped before the data reaches Google. That makes it impossible to use the analytics data to identify a specific person.
Advertising cookies
These come from Google AdSense. They help Google decide which advertisements to show you. If you have personalised ads enabled in your Google account, the ads may reflect topics you have shown interest in elsewhere. If you have personalised ads disabled, you will still see ads, but they will be generic rather than targeted.
We do not pick the ads. We do not see your personal ad profile. We only receive a share of the revenue Google pays for displaying them.
No other companies set cookies here. We do not run Facebook Pixel, TikTok Pixel, Twitter Pixel, LinkedIn Insight Tag, Hotjar, Mixpanel, or any other third-party tracker. If a future feature ever requires one, we will say so on this page before it goes live.
4. Cookies and Your Calculator Inputs
This is the section we most want people to read, because it addresses the worry that most people have when they see the word "cookie".
When you use a calculator on AfriWidget — whether it is a GPA calculator, a loan calculator, a BMI tool, or anything else — the numbers you type are processed entirely inside your browser. They are held in your device's memory while the page is open and then they are gone. None of those numbers are ever written to a cookie, to local storage, to session storage, or to any server.
The one exception to local storage is your cookie consent preference itself, which is stored as a simple "accepted" or "declined" value so the banner does not keep reappearing. That value has nothing to do with the numbers you have entered anywhere on the site.
You can verify this yourself in about thirty seconds. Open your browser's developer tools, switch to the Application or Storage tab, and look at the cookies and local storage entries for afriwidget.com. You will see a small handful of entries, all of which relate to consent and to Google's services. You will not see anything resembling the inputs you typed into a calculator.
5. How to Decline or Delete Cookies
You have several ways to control cookies on AfriWidget and across the web.
Through our banner
The first time you visit, a small banner appears at the bottom of the screen with two buttons: Decline and Accept All. If you click Decline, we will not load the analytics or advertising cookies. All of our tools still work exactly as normal, because none of them depend on those cookies.
If you change your mind later, click the "Manage Cookie Preferences" button at the top of this page. It clears your saved choice and shows the banner again so you can pick afresh.
Through your browser settings
Every modern browser lets you view, block, and delete cookies. The exact menu varies, but the general location is under Settings → Privacy or Preferences → Privacy. Look for an entry called "Cookies and site data" or similar. From there you can:
- Block all cookies (this may break some websites).
- Block only third-party cookies (this disables the analytics and advertising cookies but keeps our functional one).
- Delete all cookies when you close your browser.
- Allow cookies only for websites you trust.
Through Google's own controls
Google provides its own tools for managing the cookies its services set:
- Visit adssettings.google.com to control personalised advertising on your Google account.
- Visit tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout to install the official Google Analytics opt-out browser add-on.
- Visit optout.aboutads.info or optout.networkadvertising.org to opt out of interest-based advertising from multiple networks at once.
Through browser extensions
Extensions such as uBlock Origin, Privacy Badger, and Ghostery can block analytics and advertising scripts across the sites you visit. AfriWidget works perfectly with all of them. Blocking advertising scripts will not affect any of our tools in any way.
6. Do Not Track and Other Browser Signals
Some browsers include a "Do Not Track" (DNT) setting that is meant to tell websites the visitor does not want to be tracked. In practice, there is no agreed technical standard for what a website should do when it receives a DNT signal, so different sites handle it differently. AfriWidget does not currently change its behaviour based on DNT signals.
The honest reason for this is that complying with DNT in one country but not another would be misleading. Instead, we give you direct control through the banner and through the browser options described above. That way the decision stays in your hands regardless of what the browser is signalling behind the scenes.
We will revisit this position if an industry-wide standard for DNT compliance is ever adopted.
7. Cookies on Mobile Devices
Everything on this page applies equally on phones and tablets. Mobile browsers such as Chrome on Android, Safari on iOS, Samsung Internet, and Firefox Mobile all let you view and clear cookies from their settings menus.
One thing worth knowing on mobile: many browsers now block third-party cookies by default. If yours does, the analytics and advertising cookies described above will not be set at all, and you will see our banner only for the functional cookie. That is completely fine. Our tools work the same either way.
If you clear your browser's cookies on your phone, your saved consent preference will also be cleared, and the banner will appear again the next time you visit. That is expected behaviour, not a bug.
8. Changes to This Policy
If we ever add a new cookie, remove one, or change what a cookie does, we will update this page and change the "Last Updated" date at the top. If the change is significant — for example, if we were to introduce a new type of tracker that we have never used before — we would also mention it clearly on the homepage so that regular visitors do not miss it.
Small wording tweaks do not trigger a homepage notice, but every change, however small, shows up here first.
9. How to Contact Us
If you have any question about cookies on AfriWidget — what we use, why we use it, or how to turn something off — please get in touch. A real person reads every message.
Cookie questions:privacy@afriwidget.com — usually answered within one to two working days. You can also use the contact page if you would prefer a form.
10. Plain-Language Glossary
Cookie
A small text file a website asks your browser to store. It cannot run code, cannot open files, and cannot carry a virus.
First-party cookie
A cookie set by the site you are actually visiting. On AfriWidget, that is us.
Third-party cookie
A cookie set by a different company whose service is embedded in the page. On AfriWidget, that is Google.
Session cookie
A cookie that disappears the moment you close your browser.
Persistent cookie
A cookie that stays on your device for a set period, until you delete it or it expires.
Local storage
A separate browser feature that lets a site save small amounts of data on your device. We use it only to remember your cookie choice, and for nothing else.
IP anonymisation
Stripping the last part of an IP address before recording it, so the resulting number cannot be traced back to a specific person or device.
Aggregated data
Information presented as totals or averages rather than as individual records. "500 people visited this week" is aggregated. "John visited at 3pm" is not.
Do Not Track (DNT)
A browser setting that asks websites not to track the visitor. There is no agreed standard for how sites should respond, which is why behaviour varies.
Final Note
Thank you for reading to the end. Most people do not read cookie policies, and we tried to make ours worth the time. If any part of it was unclear, or if you spot something that could be said more simply, please tell us. The best version of this page is the one a first-time visitor can understand in one sitting, and that is the version we keep working toward.
— The AfriWidget Team