Getting started with ForkMark

1. Signing in or signing up

If you've already installed ForkMark (from TestFlight, the Play Store beta, or the App Store), you can create an account and start right away:

1. Open the app → tap Create an account.
2. Enter your email and a password.
3. That's it. Accounts created in the app are approved automatically, and you land in the Journal tab.

Requesting beta access on the web

Signing up at beta.forkmark.app is different. That form is how we hand out beta invites, so the team reviews each request by hand:

1. Fill in the form. It creates your ForkMark account with the email and password you choose.
2. Your request shows as pending in the beta portal until an admin approves it.
3. When you're approved, we email you the TestFlight / Play Store invite. Sign in to the app with the same email and password.

2. Logging a restaurant in Journal

Your private record of every place you've eaten. Entries and their photos are stored on your phone, not on our servers. Nobody else sees them unless you choose to share a specific place as a recommendation.

1. Open the Journal tab (the fork icon, bottom-left).
2. Tap the + in the top-right corner.
3. Fill in the restaurant name (required), the date, and a rating from 1–5 stars.
4. Optional fields: cuisine, price range ($ to $$$$), what you ordered, what you liked or didn't, would-you-return toggle, tags, and notes.
5. Tap Add Photo to attach pictures from the camera or your library. Journal photos stay on this device. They aren't uploaded or synced.
6. Tap Save Entry. The entry appears at the top of the list.

Tap any entry to view detail, edit, or share. You can also recommend the place (see section 5). That shares the place and your note without exposing the rest of your journal.

To power the shared restaurant pages (e.g. "4 ForkMark users have been here"), the app sends the restaurant's name and address, plus a small per-restaurant summary: your entry count, rating total, and visited / want-to-try flags. Your notes, photos, and dates stay on your phone.

3. Saving places in Try List

For places you've heard about but haven't tried yet. Think of it as a bookmark folder for restaurants.

1. Open the Try List tab.
2. Tap Add Restaurant.
3. Enter a name and optional cuisine, location, priority, and notes ("why do I want to go here?").
4. Save. The item appears with a colored priority stripe.

Tap Navigate on any card to open driving directions in your maps app. Places you picked from search go straight to the exact spot; ones you typed by hand are looked up from the address you gave.

Once you've been, tap the green check on the card. ForkMark offers to convert the try-list item into a full journal entry so you don't have to type everything twice.

4. Spinning Discover for tonight's pick

Can't decide? Spin the wheel and ForkMark picks a real restaurant near you that's open right now.

1. Open the Discover tab.
2. Choose Use GPS (grant location once, then it's instant) or enter a ZIP code.
3. Optional: tap a food-type chip (Pizza, Sushi, Burger…). Adjust the distance slider, price cap, and the Open now only toggle (on by default).
4. Tap the orange Spin the wheel! button. The wheel animates while we search.
5. On the result card: Save to Try List, Open in Maps, or Spin Again to pick a different option without re-searching.

5. Adding friends & sharing recommendations

ForkMark is more fun with people. Friend connections are explicit and mutual. There's no follower-style following.

Ways to friend someone

1. Username search. Open Profile → Friends icon (top-right) → Add Friend → type their @username.
2. Share Code. Generate a 6-character code from the Share Code tab, send it to a friend any way you like (text, AirDrop, IRL).
3. Redeem. If someone sent you a code, paste it into the Redeem tab to instantly become friends.
4. From your contacts (optional). Find Friends → Contacts asks for contacts permission, then checks which of your contacts are on ForkMark. Only your contacts' email addresses and hashed phone numbers are sent for matching. Raw numbers and names never leave your phone, and the list isn't stored.

Want friends to find you by phone number? Add it on the Add Friend screen. It's kept in a private discovery index (matched by a hash of the number), and you can remove it any time.

Top friends

Tap the star on a friend tile to mark them a Top Friend (up to 5). Their recommendations pin to the top of your feed.

Recommendations

Give a place a thumbs-up (or thumbs-down) from a journal entry or a restaurant's page, add an optional note and photos, and pick who sees it:

• Friends: you plus the friends you had when you posted. Unfriending someone later removes the post from their feed automatically.
• Public: any signed-in ForkMark user can see it, and it can appear in the public discovery feed.
• Private: only you.

6. Hands-free: voice & CarPlay

The two moments ForkMark is most useful are the two moments you shouldn't be holding a phone: someone tells you about a place while you're driving, and you're in the car deciding where to eat.

Saving a place by voice

Say:

“Hey Siri, add a spot to my ForkMark try list”

Siri asks which restaurant, you say the name, and it confirms. The app never opens. Next time you do open ForkMark, the place is waiting on your Try List. On Android, ask Google Assistant the same way.

You have to say “ForkMark” in the phrase — that's an Apple rule, not ours. If you'd rather say something shorter, make your own phrase in the Shortcuts app and it can capture the restaurant name in one go.

CarPlay

A CarPlay version of your Try List — pick a saved place, get directions — is on the way. It isn't in the current release yet.

7. Profile, settings, & preferences

The Profile tab is your home base for everything that isn't a tab of its own.

• Edit Profile — display name, username, bio, home city, birthday, pronouns, dietary preferences, favorite cuisines, default privacy, social handles. Username is unique and required for friends to find you.
• Stats card — entry count, average rating, top cuisines.
• Language — English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Korean, Japanese, Chinese.
• Theme — System, Light, or Dark.
• Help & Support — in-app ticket flow (see below).
• Replay tutorial — brings back the on-app coach marks.
• Sign Out — clears your local cache so a second person on the same phone can't see your data.

8. Deleting your account

You can delete your ForkMark account yourself, from inside the app, at any time. You don't need to email us and there's no waiting period.

1. Open the Profile tab and scroll to the bottom.
2. Tap Delete Account.
3. Read what's about to be removed, then type DELETE to confirm.
4. If you sign in with an email and password, enter your password once more.

For security, the app may ask you to sign in again before deleting.

Can't open the app?

Request deletion from your account page or email support@tournamentsense.com. An admin runs the same full deletion of your cloud data within 30 days. We can't reach your phone, so uninstall the app to remove the journal stored on it.

Just want to step away for a while? Sign Out (right above Delete Account) leaves everything intact and signs you back in later.

9. Getting help when stuck

Profile → Help & Support opens our ticket flow.

1. Tap New ticket.
2. Choose a category — Bug, Account, Feature request, or Other.
3. Type a one-line subject and a longer description.
4. Submit. The ticket lands in our queue and we email a reply when we have one.
5. Reply directly in the in-app thread — no email back-and-forth.

Prefer email? support@tournamentsense.com.

10. Permissions & privacy

• Location: only used inside Discover when you choose GPS. Never stored, never shared.
• Camera / Photos: only when you tap Add Photo. Journal photos stay on your device. Photos you attach to a recommendation or use as your avatar are uploaded.
• Contacts: only if you open Find Friends → Contacts. Emails and hashed phone numbers are sent for matching and not stored.
• Notifications: friend request alerts and support replies. Optional.
• Journal entries & try-list items: stored on your device. Only you see them. The only thing that syncs is the restaurant's name/address and a small per-restaurant summary (entry count, rating total, visited / want-to-try) for the shared catalog.
• Recommendations: Friends (friends at the time of posting), Public (any signed-in user), or Private (only you). You choose each time.
• Account deletion: immediate and self-service under Profile → Delete Account (see section 8). Or request it from your account page or by email, and an admin completes the same deletion within 30 days.
• Backups: cloud data is backed up daily and kept for 14 days. Your on-device journal is not backed up by us.

Read the full Privacy Policy and Terms of Service any time.