Community Guidelines

Humble Badge

Effective Date: May 1 2026 Last Updated: May 1 2026

Earn it. Share it. Respect the journey.

Humble Badge is a place to celebrate the things you actually do—the summits, the rides, the personal bests, the slow learning of a new place. The community works because people are honest, kind, and thoughtful about the world we share. These guidelines describe what that looks like in practice.

These guidelines work alongside our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. Where the Terms of Service speak in legal language, these guidelines speak in plain language. Both apply.

The four pillars

1. Earn it — be authentic

Every badge in Humble Badge represents a real thing you did. That's the entire point of the platform. Faking achievements isn't just against the rules; it dilutes the meaning of every other badge in the community.

Do:

• Earn badges for activities you actually completed
• Take your time on multi-stage achievements (a thru-hike isn't a weekend)
• If a verification fails, try again rather than work around it

Don't:

• Use GPS spoofing apps, location simulators, or modified location data
• Edit photo metadata, FIT files, or HealthKit data to cross thresholds you haven't actually crossed
• Earn badges for trips you didn't take, even if a friend did
• Create accounts to "test" badges and then keep the earns

If we determine a badge was earned through fraud, we'll revoke it. Repeated or systematic fraud will result in account termination.

Example — good: You hike halfway up Mount Si, turn back due to weather, and don't tap "earn" on the summit badge. Next month you make it to the top and earn it then.

Example — not okay: You drive to the Mount Si trailhead, tap "earn" on the summit badge from the parking lot. Even if no one else notices, you'll know — and so will we, because the GPS doesn't match.

2. Share it — be kind

The activity feed, the hearts, the friend connections — these exist so people can cheer each other on. They don't exist for criticism, gatekeeping, or putting other people down.

Do:

• Celebrate other people's achievements, especially first-timers
• Heart genuinely — react to things you actually appreciate
• Use your display name to be known, not to hide

Don't:

• Harass, threaten, or demean other users
• Comment on someone's pace, fitness level, or "real" outdoor credentials
• Impersonate someone else, including outdoor athletes or guides
• Create accounts to harass people you've fallen out with elsewhere
• Post sexually explicit, hateful, violent, or deceptive content

Different people are at different stages of their outdoor lives. Someone's first 1-mile hike took as much courage as your fiftieth summit. Treat the community accordingly.

Example — good: A new user posts their first earned badge — a 2-mile loop near their home. You heart it. That's how this community grows.

Example — not okay: Commenting that the trail "doesn't count" or that "real" hikers do something else.

3. Respect the journey — care for the outdoors

Humble Badge celebrates time outside, which means we have a responsibility to the places that make these achievements possible. The outdoors is not a backdrop; it's a finite, often fragile resource that survives only when people use it carefully.

Do:

• Follow Leave No Trace principles — pack out what you pack in, stay on durable surfaces, give wildlife space
• Respect trail closures, seasonal restrictions, and private property boundaries
• Tread lightly on sensitive ecosystems and during fragile seasons (mud season, fire season, nesting periods)
• Honor the cultural and indigenous histories of the places you visit

Don't:

• Share GPS coordinates of sensitive sites — archaeological resources, raptor nests, sensitive species habitat, off-trail features that could be damaged by crowds
• Encourage trespassing on private land or closed areas
• Create custom badges that point users toward fragile or restricted places
• Geotag locations that local communities or land managers have asked people not to broadcast

When in doubt, share less precision. A photo of a wildflower meadow is wonderful. A photo of a wildflower meadow with the exact GPS coordinates is how that meadow gets trampled by next season.

Example — good: You earn a badge for finding a remote alpine lake. You share the badge but describe the experience generally — "in the North Cascades" — without coordinates or specific routes.

Example — not okay: Posting a custom badge titled "Secret Lake at [exact coordinates]" that turns a quiet place into a queue.

4. Represent honestly — descriptions match reality

When you describe an earn — in the notes, the description, the badge name you create — be accurate. Other users learn from what you post. Brag truthfully or don't brag at all.

Do:

• Write descriptions that match what actually happened ("hiked the easy variation due to snow")
• Acknowledge group efforts — say who you were with when it's relevant
• Update or correct details if you realize you got something wrong

Don't:

• Inflate distances, elevations, or times
• Take credit for routes you didn't lead or activities a partner did
• Use misleading hashtags to surface your earn in unrelated contexts
• Create custom badges that misrepresent the underlying activity

Example — good: "Mt. Adams summit attempt — turned back at Lunch Counter due to wind, came back two weeks later for the top." Two badges, both accurate.

Example — not okay: Posting one badge for "Mt. Adams summit" when you only made it to Lunch Counter the first time.

A note on photos that include other people

Photos often capture more than just you. Be thoughtful about who's in your shot before you share publicly.

• If your photo shows other adults — fellow hikers, climbing partners, people in the background — consider whether they'd want to be in a public post. When in doubt, ask, or crop.
• For photos that include children: we strongly recommend not including children's names or recognizable photos in publicly shared content. Once content is public, you can't fully control where it goes. Crop, blur, or post privately.
• If someone asks you to take their image down, do it.

What if...?

Some common questions. We'll add to this list as new ones come up.

What if I earned a badge but the verification failed because of bad GPS? Try again. If you've genuinely earned it and verification keeps failing, contact support and we'll look into it. Don't work around verification with spoofing tools — that's the wrong fix and we'll catch it.

What if I want to share a badge for a hike I did with my kids? Wonderful. Share it. We just recommend not including your kids' names or recognizable faces in public posts. A photo of the trail, the view, or the gear works just as well.

What if I find someone else has earned a badge they obviously couldn't have? Use the in-app reporting feature. Tell us what you saw and why it doesn't add up. We'll investigate. Don't publicly call them out; that's not how we resolve things here.

What if I'm the first person to find a cool spot and want to make a badge for it? Think about whether the spot can handle attention. Iconic, well-managed places (named summits, popular trails, established routes) are great candidates for custom badges. Quiet, fragile, or undocumented places usually aren't. If a land manager has asked people not to broadcast a location, please respect that.

What if someone hearts my badge in a way that feels creepy or unwanted? Block them in the app. If the behavior continues across accounts or escalates, report it. We take harassment seriously regardless of how subtle it looks.

What if I made a badge description that turned out to be wrong? Edit it. Honest mistakes are normal; leaving them uncorrected isn't.

What if my account gets suspended and I think it was a mistake? For non-severe issues, we'll let you know what happened and give you a chance to respond before terminating. If you think we got it wrong, reply to that notice with your side. We'll look again.

What we do when guidelines are broken

We try to be fair and proportionate. Most issues resolve with a conversation. Severe ones don't.

For most violations, we'll:

1. Reach out to explain what we noticed
2. Give you a chance to respond, fix the content, or appeal
3. Take a measured action — content removal, feature restriction, or warning

For severe violations — fraud at scale, harassment, content that endangers minors, content that violates law — we may act immediately and without notice. Our Terms of Service describes the full mechanics.

These guidelines will evolve

Humble Badge is just getting started. As the community grows, we'll see edge cases we haven't anticipated, and we'll update these guidelines accordingly. When we make material changes, we'll let you know.

If you have suggestions, questions, or want to flag something these guidelines don't cover, write to us at [community@humblebadge.com].

Thanks for being here. The community is what makes the badges mean anything at all.

Humble Badge LLC, Seattle WA USA