CognaType

Terms

Last updated 10 September 2026

The short version

  • CognaType is free, early, and will sometimes break.
  • It is not a medical or psychological assessment and it does not diagnose anything.
  • What you write about yourself stays yours.
  • Do not use it to harm anyone, including yourself.
  • You can leave whenever you like and take your data with you.

These terms apply when you use CognaType at cognatype.com. If you do not agree with them, please do not create an account. If you do create one, you are agreeing to what is below.

What CognaType is

CognaType is a way of describing how a mind works: an atlas of cognitive traits, the domains they sit in, and the patterns they form when several of them line up at once. You can read the atlas without an account. With an account, you can record what you recognise in yourself and see it reflected back as a picture that is yours rather than generic.

What CognaType is not

This is not a medical device, a psychological assessment, a screening tool, or a diagnosis.

CognaType describes attention, sensory load, overwhelm, executive function and other patterns in language that can sound clinical. It is not clinical. Nothing here is produced or reviewed by a licensed clinician, nothing here has been validated as a diagnostic instrument, and recognising yourself in a trait or a pattern tells you nothing about whether you have any condition.

Do not use CognaType to diagnose yourself or anyone else. Do not use it to decide whether to seek help, and above all do not use it to decide against seeking help. It is not a substitute for a conversation with a doctor, a psychologist, a psychiatrist or a therapist, and it should never delay one.

If you are in crisis, or you are thinking about harming yourself, please contact your local emergency services or a crisis line now. In the United States you can call or text 988. This website cannot help you with that and will not try to.

Your account

Accounts are created by signing in with Google. You are responsible for the Google account you use and for anything done through your CognaType account. One account is meant for one person. Do not share it, and do not create an account on someone else's behalf.

You must be at least 16 to have an account.

Using it decently

Short list, and it is the obvious one:

  • Do not try to reach anyone else's data, or test whether you can.
  • Do not attack, overload or probe the site or the services behind it.
  • Do not scrape the site wholesale or republish the atlas as your own.
  • Do not submit feedback or content that is abusive, or that contains someone else's personal information.
  • Do not use CognaType to label, screen, assess or make decisions about other people. It is not built for that and it is not fit for it.

Accounts that do these things can be closed without notice.

What you write stays yours

Everything you enter about yourself, your profile, your responses, the patterns you claim, remains yours. Using CognaType does not transfer ownership of it, and it will not be published, sold or shared. You can take a copy of it, and you can have it deleted. The privacy page says exactly how.

Feedback you send about the site is treated differently, because its whole purpose is to be acted on: it may be read, quoted internally and used to change the product.

What belongs to CognaType

The atlas itself, the trait and pattern writing, the model behind it, the name and the design, are the work of CognaType and are not yours to republish or resell. Reading it, quoting a piece of it with attribution, and sharing a link are all welcome. Copying it wholesale is not.

It is beta, and it will show

CognaType is being built in the open. Features appear, change shape and occasionally disappear. Pages break. The site may be unavailable without warning, and there is no uptime commitment of any kind.

Your data is looked after carefully, but keep your own copy of anything you would be upset to lose.

Money

CognaType is free today. Nothing is being sold and there is nothing to pay for. Paid tiers are planned. If and when they arrive, they will be described plainly before anyone is asked for anything, and this page will carry real terms covering payment, cancellation and refunds. Nothing you have now will be taken away and put behind a payment.

Ending it

You can delete your account at any time by asking, and everything attached to it goes with it. See the privacy page.

Accounts may be closed if they are used in the ways listed above, or if CognaType shuts down. If the service is ever discontinued, account holders will be given notice and a chance to export their data first.

No warranty, and limits on liability

CognaType is provided as it is, with no warranty of any kind, express or implied. It is not guaranteed to be accurate, available, or fit for any particular purpose.

To the fullest extent the law allows, CognaType and Jody Gates are not liable for any indirect, incidental or consequential loss arising from your use of the site, or from any decision you made because of something you read on it. Some places do not allow limits like this, in which case the limit is whatever that jurisdiction does allow.

Changes to these terms

These terms will change as the product does. The date at the top says when they last did. If something changes materially, particularly anything to do with money or with your data, you will be told rather than left to find out.

Contact

Write to support at cognatype dot com. A real person reads it.

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