Hello,
I’m building a community run/walk application where members can voluntarily connect their own Strava account. Before implementing the Strava integration, I’m trying to understand whether the proposed competition model is compatible with the API Policy effective June 1, 2026.
The application has fewer than 9,999 connected athletes. Members explicitly opt into monthly and annual mileage challenges.
The proposed flow is:
- each athlete authorizes access only to their own Strava activities;
- qualifying Run/Walk activities contribute distance toward that athlete’s competition total;
- other participating members would see the athlete’s cumulative mileage and rank, not their routes, GPS, heart rate, pace, or individual Strava activity details;
- the application could delete underlying activity records after the permitted cache period and retain only derived competition totals/results if that is allowed.
I’m trying to reconcile a few sections of the current policy:
1. Cross-user display
Section 2.3 says Strava Data related to one user may only be displayed to that user.
Section 6.1 appears to contain an exception for applications with an athlete capacity of 9,999 or less.
Does that exception permit an expressly consenting athlete’s derived cumulative mileage and competition rank to be visible to other opted-in participants, or does §2.3 still prohibit this?
2. Derived totals and the seven-day rule
Section 6.2 limits retention of Strava Data to a seven-day cache.
If the underlying activity data is deleted within that period, may an application retain a derived monthly total or finalized competition result for longer?
For example, could the application retain “42.6 miles this month / rank 12” without retaining the underlying activities?
3. Longer competitions
Is there a supported pattern for competitions lasting a month or a year if activity data cannot be retained beyond seven days?
4. Disconnect / revocation
Section 7.4 requires deletion of Strava Data and Personal Data derived from Strava Data after authorization is revoked.
Would that require deleting an athlete’s historical competition totals and ranks as well? Could a fully anonymized, no-longer-user-linked result remain?
I’ve seen several related discussions here, but I haven’t found an authoritative Strava answer reconciling §§2.3, 6.1, 6.2 and 7.4 for this type of opt-in competition.
If anyone has gone through Strava review with a similar community challenge or leaderboard, I’d especially appreciate hearing what Strava required.
Thanks!