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Your term

What happens when my term ends?

Updated September 2026

At the instant a fixed term ends, a sweep on the server marks it complete and cancels anything still open under it, such as an exit request or a handover. The block does not come off. Home changes its word to TERM COMPLETE, turns its readout around to count what you held, and offers one card: start a new term. Stopping is a separate, quieter choice, and only when you make it does the server grant the release.

What the server does at the end instant

A sweep runs every five minutes. When it finds a fixed term whose end instant has passed, it marks that term complete in one write and, in the same write, cancels every exit request still open under it and every handover still in flight. Your phone is then woken and told, so the app can catch up whether or not you had it open.

The one thing that write does not do is grant a release. That field is deliberately cleared rather than set, which is what keeps every shield applied after the end date. An ongoing term never reaches this at all: it has no end instant, so nothing counts toward one.

A term, from the pledge to what comes after it A line runs from left to right. It starts at the pledge, then the seal, then the days tick upward. Milestones sit on the line at 7, 30 and 90 days of the term, and at 180 and 365 days of the gambling free run, which a new term does not reset, lit in sun colours. At the end of the term the line forks three ways: renew for another term, extend the one you are in, or the ongoing line, which has no end. A TERM, START TO END Pledge you sign it Seal day 1 begins 7 30 90 180 365 7, 30, 90 on the term; 180, 365 on your run Term end Renewanother term Extendthis one, further Ongoingno end date Nothing switches off at the end.
A term runs from the pledge and the seal through the term's milestones at 7, 30 and 90 days to its end, with 180 and 365 counted on your gambling free run, which a new term does not reset,, where it forks: renew, extend, or the ongoing line with no end date. Nothing switches off by itself.

What you see, and the two ways forward

  1. Home says the term is served

    The safe's word becomes TERM COMPLETE and the readout turns around: it stops counting toward a date and reads the time you held, capped at the length of the term itself. The card under it states both halves of the situation, that your term is served and that blocking holds until you end it, with Start a new term as its one button.

    Home reading TERM COMPLETE over a time held readout, with a card saying the term is served and blocking holds until you end it, above a Start a new term button.

    The term complete face

  2. Or add time before you get there

    Extend moves a fixed end date later, at no charge. The calendar opens on the day after your current end date and there is nothing earlier to select, so the screen can only ever lengthen a term. The old end date is replaced by the server, which accepts only a later one, and everything else about your commitment carries on untouched.

    The Extend screen: a headline reading Add more time, a calendar with only dates after the current end selectable, and a Move my end date button.

    Extending before the end

Starting a new term

Start a new term opens a full screen choice with two forks. The first is a new commitment: ongoing by default, or a fixed end date at least a month out, exactly the same two shapes you chose from at the beginning. It is not tied to the term you just finished and it is not tied to your billing plan either. The apps you sealed and the people in your circle carry over, so there is nothing to set up again, and the app deletion lock is offered again rather than assumed, with the plain note that a window open on the old term ended with it.

The old term's shields stay applied until the new commitment is confirmed by the server, so there is no gap between the two.

Stopping

Stopping is the second fork, and it is deliberately the quiet one: smallest, last, and behind a confirmation. It does not clear anything on the phone. It asks the server, and the shields hold until the grant comes back. That grant is the moment your keyholder's card changes for the last time, which is why they are told twice around a term ending: once when it completed, once when you took the key back.

Ending your account is a different act again, and it opens here: while a term is enforceable it stands in the way of deletion, and a completed term is what clears that.

What this does not do

The end of a term unlocks nothing on its own, and no timer on your phone is involved in any part of this. It does not renew your subscription and it is not renewed by one. Extending can only move an end date later, never earlier, and it is not a way to change an ongoing commitment into a dated one. And if an exit request was open when the term ended, it is closed rather than completed: the wait it was counting does not carry over into anything.

Still stuck? Email support@foldem.app and we answer within two working days.