Is Gauth AI Safe or a Scam? TikTok’s US Venture Now Runs It

The App Store page for Gauth still names a Singapore company, GauthTech Pte. Ltd., as the seller. Gauth’s US terms of service say something different. That document, last updated January 22, 2026, states that Gauth is operated by TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC, the company set up to run TikTok in the United States.

January 22, 2026 is also the day the TikTok joint venture was announced, according to Variety. A year earlier, on January 19, 2025, Apple pulled Gauth from the US App Store alongside TikTok under the law aimed at ByteDance’s apps. So this is a homework app that has already been switched off once for American students, and has since changed hands on paper.

Our verdict is Caution. Gauth is a real, heavily used study app. It isn’t a scam. Parents and students should still know five things before paying: who runs it, what happens to the homework you upload, the age rules, how the free trials convert, and how often reviewers say the answers are wrong.

We read the US and international terms, both privacy policies, the honor code, both store listings and Gauth’s Trustpilot page on October 9, 2026. We didn’t install the app or subscribe, so the accuracy section below leans on other people’s reviews.

What is Gauth AI?

Gauth (formerly Gauthmath) is a homework helper. You photograph or type a problem and it returns a worked answer, mostly for math and science. A paid tier, Gauth Plus, adds stronger AI models and access to human tutors. Google Play showed more than 100 million downloads, and the US App Store showed 4.8 stars from 1.5 million ratings.

Who owns Gauth AI now? A short timeline

• April 2024: Forbes reports that Gauth belongs to ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company, and has reached number two in the Education charts.
• January 19, 2025: Apple removes Gauth from the US App Store together with TikTok, CapCut and Lemon8. TechCrunch published Apple’s list. Gauth later came back; we couldn’t find a dated announcement of when.
• January 22, 2026: the TikTok joint venture is announced. Variety lists Oracle, Silver Lake and MGX at 15% each, with ByteDance keeping 19.9%. Gauth’s US terms and US privacy policy carry the same date.
• October 2026: both store listings still show GauthTech Pte. Ltd. as developer. The App Store page gives the same [email protected] address as the US terms.

The opening of Gauth’s US Terms of Service, naming TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC as operator, screenshot taken October 9, 2026.

How we found that document: Gauth’s website showed us its international terms, which say American users are covered by separate US terms. The US version sits on the same document server under a matching file name. We couldn’t load Gauth’s site from an American connection, so we can’t show the page as a US visitor sees it.

Is Gauth AI safe? What happens to the homework you upload

We saw no malware concern: the app comes through both official stores. The real questions are about data. The US privacy policy, also dated January 22, 2026, says Gauth collects your prompts, uploaded files and voice recordings, plus your email, device identifiers, IP address and approximate location.

• Your information is used to train and improve Gauth’s machine learning models.
• Some of what users submit may be visible to other users and to search engines. The terms go further and let Gauth publish your content in a searchable format.
• The license you grant over uploads is worldwide, irrevocable and royalty-free. It covers modifying the content and selling it.
• Information is shared with a second company, named in the policy as TT Commerce & Global Services LLC, and its affiliates. The policy doesn’t say where US users’ data is stored.
• The policy itself tells users not to put confidential or sensitive information into the AI.

For a worksheet, none of that matters much. It matters for a photo that shows a name, a school, a student ID or a face. Crop before you upload. In its favor, the policy says the platform doesn’t sell personal information or share it for cross-context behavioral advertising where the law restricts that. Deletion requests go to [email protected].

Is Gauth safe for kids? Four different age limits

The stores rate content, and Gauth’s content is math. The terms decide who may hold an account. Read together, they mean a child under 13 shouldn’t have an account at all, and a teenager can’t buy Gauth Plus. The subscription has to be an adult’s. That makes the adult the person who has to remember to cancel it.

What Gauth Plus costs: ten price tags in the App Store

Gauth’s website shows no price list. The US App Store listing does, as in-app purchases, and it had ten entries when we read it. Grouped by price:

Two things follow. A year of the same Gauth Plus can cost $49.99 or $143.88, depending on which offer the app shows you. And several free trials sit on the quarterly and annual plans, so the first charge after three days can be $31.99 or $99.99 and not $11.99. ChatOn AI showed us the same pattern of one plan at many prices.

The listing also says renewal is charged within the 24 hours before a period ends, and that auto-renewal must be switched off at least 24 hours before that. On a three-day trial you have about two days to decide.

Gauth AI reviews: 4.8 in the app stores, 2.3 on Trustpilot

Both stores show 4.8 stars from well over a million ratings each. Trustpilot shows 2.3 from 86 reviews, 57 of them one-star, with no company replies to the negative ones in its figures. That’s a tiny sample, and people usually arrive at Trustpilot to complain.

The 20 newest reviews there ran from October 16, 2025 to September 3, 2026:

• 6 said the answers were wrong or contradicted themselves. One student wrote that leaning on it in an exam cost them the exam.
• 5 were about billing: charges after a trial, or a subscription that wouldn’t cancel. One American reviewer described paying $11.99 a month for more than two years, about $324, because the cancel screen kept returning an error.
• 3 were about ads before each answer, paywalls or limits on the free version.
• 5 were positive, several from UK students using it for Sparx Maths homework.
• 1 was a lukewarm three stars from a parent.

Gauth’s own terms concede the accuracy point. They describe its content as a guide, not an authoritative source, and say its methods may differ from the ones your course expects.

Is Gauth AI legit or a scam, and is using it cheating?

It’s legit: a real product with human tutors behind the paid tier and a nine-figure download count. The reviews that say “scam” are about billing people couldn’t stop. Take those seriously. They don’t make the app a fraud.

Cheating depends on your school. Gauth’s honor code tells students not to use it during a test or exam, or on work a teacher has said to do unaided. Neither document says how that is enforced. If an assignment bans AI help, Gauth is AI help. Students worried about detection software should also read our JustDone AI review.

How to cancel Gauth Plus and ask for a refund

1. iPhone or iPad: Settings, your name, Subscriptions, Gauth, Cancel Subscription.
2. Android: Google Play, profile icon, Payments and subscriptions, Subscriptions, Gauth, Cancel.
3. Inside Gauth: the terms point to Privacy and Settings, then Premium Services.
4. Afterwards, look at the store’s subscription list. If Gauth still shows as active there, it hasn’t been canceled, whatever the app told you.
5. Refunds: the terms give no refund for the unused part of a period and send store purchases back to the store. For Apple that means reportaproblem.apple.com. For Google it’s your Play order history.

The store paths are Apple’s and Google’s standard subscription settings, and the in-app path is from Gauth’s terms as read on October 9, 2026. None was tried on a live subscription. Our Coursiv review covers another learning app with strict refund rules.

The fine print for US users: disputes go to California courts, with no arbitration clause, and you have one year to bring a claim. Liability is capped at $100 or what you paid in the past 12 months, whichever is greater. Given January 2025, weigh a year paid up front against the chance of another interruption.

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