How Piñata works

For the birthday person

You own the list. Nobody plans a gift for you inside it where you can see it.

1. Get your setup link. Sign up on the home page and we email it to you. Open it and make your circle: a name for the occasion, and the day of the party if you know it.
2. Add wishes. Send the Piñata WhatsApp number a voice note, a screenshot or a shop link. You check the draft before it goes on your list, or type the wish in yourself. Add a product photo if you have one, and the size or colour that matters.
3. Paste one link. Put the circle link in your WhatsApp group. That link is the whole invite.
4. Let people in. When a friend asks to join, you find the request on your own link and let them in.
5. Wait for the day. You see your wishes, prices and photos. You never see who claimed a gift, who pooled money, or which ideas your friends added.

Changed your mind about a wish? Removing it keeps the friends' records intact. Their tally does not vanish because a wish did.

For friends

Everything below happens behind the birthday person's back. Keep the circle screen out of the group chat screenshots.

1. Open the link, then join. Enter the name you want on the gift card and the number that was invited. If yours is not on the list, you can ask to join and the owner lets you in.
2. Pick a gift. Claim one to buy yourself, or start a pool and be the buyer. A pool has one buyer on purpose: one person holds the money side and does the buying.
3. Put money in. Add what you will pay toward the pool, pay the buyer the way your group usually pays each other, then mark it paid.
4. Add your own ideas. Suggest gifts the birthday person never asked for. Only friends see them. You can add a photo to your own ideas.
5. Write on the card. Add your name and message. Yours stays editable until the card is downloaded.

Piñata keeps the tally and holds no money. Friends pay each other directly.

Money and pools

• Prices default to US dollars. A wish can be priced in rand, euro or pounds instead, and a circle can have its own default. A pool always uses its gift's currency.
• The list shows what has settled, not what was promised. A pledge is a record in Piñata; the money moves between friends, outside Piñata.
• One buyer per pool. When the pool is paid up, the buyer buys the gift and marks it bought.
• If the plan falls through, the pool says so on the gift page. Agree the next step in the group. Piñata does not refund or move money, because it never held any.

The gift card

On the gift page, each contributor writes their own message and the name they want shown, or stays anonymous. Download the card as a picture (there is a print size too), then hand it over with the gift, in person or in the chat, yourself.

Piñata never sends the card. It does not post it, notify anyone, or make a preview image of it. The circle link sits in a group that includes the birthday person, so the card stays a surprise until a person chooses to share it.

After the party, a friend can reveal a secret idea to the birthday person from the gift page. Piñata will not notify anyone when that happens either. The reveal is a person's act, every time.

Dates

• The birthday itself is month and day. A year is optional, and Piñata never turns it into an age.
• The party date is the day the gift is handed over. Friends see it with a countdown. If a friend set that date, the birthday person does not see it or the countdown.
• Either side can update the party date from the circle page. The last person to set it decides whether it stays secret.

AI, and turning it off

A voice note, screenshot or shop link becomes a draft. A person checks and confirms every draft, and nothing is added on the model's say-so. The AI writes gift card puns only if you ask it to, and it never decides what happens next.

Each AI feature has its own switch in Settings: voice notes, photos, links, card puns, and the rest. Turn one off and that feature stops, for you, until you turn it back on. Your product photo is saved as a resized copy with location and camera details removed. A photo from WhatsApp only lands on a gift if it passes a check for people in the frame; if it does not, the gift is still added, without the photo.

Who sees what

• The birthday person sees their wishes, prices, photos, and the sizes and favourites they chose to share. No claims, no pools, no secret ideas, no card messages.
• Friends see the wishes, who claimed what, pool progress in settled money, secret ideas, and card messages. Only people on the invite list get in.
• Nobody outside the circle sees either view. The same link answers both sides, so circle pages are never cached and never show a preview.

The full detail is in the privacy notice.