Yelp
Yelp Terms of Service and Privacy Policy
Yelp is an online platform where users can search for local businesses, read and write reviews, book reservations, and access advertising and business management tools.
Analyzed May 21, 2026
Key findings
Summary
Yelp's terms grant the company an extremely broad, irrevocable, perpetual license to use user content for any purpose including AI training and third-party "Other Media," combined with broad account termination rights without notice, extensive data collection (including precise location and cross-device profiling) used for advertising, and mandatory individual arbitration with class-action and jury waivers. These provisions collectively represent materially higher risk to users than standard industry terms.
Category Breakdown
Yelp collects extensive data including precise geolocation, contacts, device identifiers, cross-device profiling, and sensitive personal information used for advertising and personalization.
From: PRIVACY POLICYYou may choose to allow Yelp to collect and store certain sensitive personal information about you (e.g., precise geolocation)... we may use that information to provide our Services, personalize your experience, make more relevant recommendations, and for advertising or ad attributionView source document
Yelp shares data with third parties for advertising, ad attribution, and personalized ads based on tracked activity, with cookies used by third-party providers across platforms.
From: PRIVACY POLICYYelp, and its third-party service providers, may use cookies, web beacons, tags, scripts, SDKs, and other tracking technologies... in connection with your access to and use of the Service and third-party platforms or sitesView source document
Yelp takes an irrevocable, perpetual, worldwide, assignable, sublicensable license to use user content for any purpose including AI training and commercialization, and grants this same access to other Users and third-party 'Other Media.'
From: TERMS OF SERVICEyou hereby irrevocably grant us world-wide, perpetual, non-exclusive, royalty-free, assignable, sublicensable, transferable rights to use Your Content for any purposeView source document
Yelp may close accounts, suspend access, or ban users for any or no reason, without notice or liability, and users lose access to their content.
From: TERMS OF SERVICEwe may close your Account, suspend your ability to use certain portions of the Service, terminate any license or permission granted to you hereunder, and/or ban you altogether from the Service for any or no reason, and without notice or liability of any kindView source document
Mandatory binding individual arbitration via NAM with an explicit class-action waiver and jury trial waiver; a small claims carveout exists but a formal opt-out mechanism is not described, and mass filings are subject to restrictive batch procedures.
From: TERMS OF SERVICEYOU AND YELP EXPRESSLY WAIVE THE RIGHT TO TRIAL BY A JURY... ANY ARBITRATION MUST BE RESOLVED ON AN INDIVIDUAL BASIS IN OUR RESPECTIVE INDIVIDUAL CAPACITIES, AND NOT AS A CLASS OR COLLECTIVE ACTIONView source document
Booking and transaction features may involve cancellation or no-show fees per the transacting business's policy, with Yelp facilitating payments on behalf of businesses.
From: TERMS OF SERVICEYou may be required to provide your credit card information to confirm a booking, and will be charged any applicable fees, including cancellation or no-show fees in accordance with the transacting business's cancellation policy provided at the time of bookingView source document