How 4EverInTouch works

Getting started

1. Create your account

1. Tap Pick your family plan.
2. Type your name, your email, and a password of 8 or more characters.
3. Tap Create account.

Already have one? Sign in with the same email and password.

2. Start a vault

1. Go to Name your family vault.
2. Give it a name, like “The Bennett Family”, and a line at the top if you like.
3. Save it. That’s it — you now have a private vault, and you are its keeper.

3. Who can do what

• Keeper — looks after the vault. Invites family, can remove anything, connects other families, and chooses what is shared.
• Look, listen, and add their own (a contributor) — can see everything and add new memories. They can remove only what they added themselves.
• Look and listen (a viewer) — can see and hear everything, but cannot add.

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Inviting family

1. Open your vault and scroll to Invite the family (keepers only).
2. Type their name and email.
3. Choose Look and listen or Look, listen, and add their own.
4. Tap Send invitation.

Under Invitations you can see who has joined and who is still waiting, and take back an invitation that hasn’t been used.

Married into the family? Bring your side too

When a wife, husband, son-in-law, or daughter-in-law joins your vault, they don’t have to leave their own family’s stories behind.

1. They open the vault and tap Start my side of the family (it’s on the vault page, and under Connected families).
2. They choose which person in the tree is them, name their family’s vault (for example, “The O’Brien Family”), and tap Start my family’s vault.
3. They become the keeper of that new vault, so they can invite their own parents, aunts, uncles, and cousins.

• The new vault is linked to yours through them, so the two family trees join.
• Memories stay private to each family unless a keeper chooses to share one. Sealed envelopes are never shared.
• Does their family already have a vault? Then instead, the two keepers use Connect our families.

Good to know: the Start my side of the family form under Connected families appears once your family tree has at least one person in it — so add yourselves to the Family tree first.

Step by step: Start my side of the family · Connect our families

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Adding photos, video, voice & stories

Keepers and contributors can add. Open the vault and scroll to Leave something.

1. Under What are you leaving? choose Photographs, Moving picture, Voice note, or Letter or advice.
2. Give it a title, and say who it is from.
3. For photographs, you may pick several at once — together they make an album. Please describe them for people who cannot see them.
4. For a voice note, record right there on your phone or computer, or upload a recording.
5. Add “When was it?” and “For when…” (like “For when you get married”) if you like. These are optional.
6. Tap Save to the vault.

Stuck for an idea? Try the questions or Interview mode inside your vault. You can also find things later with Search and the Timeline.

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Sealed letters

A sealed envelope is a letter that stays closed until a day you choose.

1. In Leave something, choose Sealed envelope (open later).
2. Say who it is for.
3. Choose when it opens: on a date, or on a day in a life (for example, “Wedding day”).
4. Write the letter and seal it.

• Until then, everyone in the vault sees only the outside — the title, who it’s for, and when it opens. It stays hidden from everyone in the vault until it opens, even the family. How sealing works.
• For a “day in a life” envelope, the keeper taps Mark “…” as happened when the day comes, and it opens.
• Sealed envelopes are never shared with connected families.

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Family tree

1. In your vault, open Family tree.
2. Add each person by their full name and tap Add to the tree.
3. Connect two people: choose who is the parent of or spouse or partner of whom, then tap Save connection.
4. You can also tag people in memories, so you can find every photo of Grandma in one place.

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Connecting in-laws’ families

Every family keeps its own vault. When families join by marriage, the vaults can be connected — the family trees meet, while each family’s memories stay their own.

Start my side of the family

For someone who married into a family and wants a vault for the family they grew up in. Anyone in a vault can do this.

1. In the vault you married into, open Connected families.
2. Under Start my side of the family, choose which person in the tree is you.
3. Name your family’s vault (for example, “The O’Brien Family”) and tap Start my family’s vault.

You become the keeper of the new vault, you appear in both trees, and the two families are connected through you straight away.

Connect our families

For two families that each already have a vault — for example, your daughter married someone whose family has one.

1. The keeper opens Connected families and finds Connect our families.
2. Type the other family’s keeper’s email and a short note, then tap Send connection request.
3. Requests are not emailed right now. You’ll see a link — send it to the other keeper yourself.
4. They sign in with that email, open My families, choose which of their vaults to connect, and tap Accept and connect (or No thank you).

Linking the shared person

Often the same person is in both trees — like your daughter, who is in yours and in her husband’s family’s tree. Tell us they are one person:

1. In Connected families, find the linked family.
2. Choose the person in our tree and the same person in theirs.
3. Tap Match these two people. (Keepers only. Tap “unlink” to undo.)

Now the combined tree shows them once, labeled as the person who links the families.

What’s shared, and what stays private

• Shared with connected families: the family tree — names and how people are related — plus any photos your keeper marks as a Family photo.
• Private: everything else — letters, voice notes, videos, photos, and stories — unless your keeper chooses to share a particular one.
• Never shared: sealed envelopes.
• Connections reach one step only. If your family connects to the Nguyens, and the Nguyens connect to another family, that other family does not see your tree.
• People in a connected family cannot open your vault — they see your tree and only what you’ve shared.

Sharing an album or a memory

1. The keeper opens Sharing.
2. Under What we share, find the memory and tap Share under the family’s name.
3. For photos, you can instead mark them as a Family photo, which shows them alongside the tree to every connected family.
4. Changed your mind? Tap Shared — stop. It disappears for them right away.

What other families share with you appears under Shared with us.

Disconnecting

Either family’s keeper can open Connected families and tap Disconnect. The trees stop being visible to each other, and anything that was shared stops being visible too. Each family keeps its own vault exactly as it was.

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My families page

Tap My families at the top of any page. You’ll find:

• Families asking to connect — requests waiting for you to accept or decline.
• Vaults you belong to — every family vault you’re in, plus the connected families whose tree you can see.
• All of us, together — one combined tree of every family you’re connected to, with each person labeled by their family and shared people shown once.

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Plans, limits & if a plan ends

• Every vault starts on Free. Pick a plan any time on Pick your family plan. Nothing is charged today; paid plans aren’t switched on yet.
• Nothing is ever deleted because you reached a limit (you can still delete things yourself). You’ll see an option to upgrade before adding more.
• If a plan ends, the vault becomes read-only: everyone can still look and listen, the keeper or a successor can download everything, and sealed letters already written still open. Adding is paused until someone picks a plan, and nothing can be removed (and no books ordered) while it’s paused, so your memories stay safe. Removing works again once it’s renewed.
• Anyone in the vault can take it over and pick a plan; the keeper or the vault’s legacy contact confirms.
• A legacy contact (optional, in Settings) is someone we can gently check in with if we can’t reach the keeper. They don’t get into the vault.
• All the details: Plans & policies: Our Promise to Your Family.

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Privacy & safety

• Your vault is private. Only the people you invite can see it. There is no public feed, no likes, and no comments.
• Families are kept apart by the database itself, not just by the screens — a connected family sees only your tree and what you choose to share.
• Photos and recordings are stored privately and shown through short-lived links.
• You can turn on an authenticator app in Account security.
• If something happens (inside your vault) lets you name successors who can take over as keeper.
• Read the full privacy notice.

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Questions people ask

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