If you have searched for what happens to your phone, your photos, or your messages when you die, you will have found two names quickly. Apple Digital Legacy. Google Inactive Account Manager. They are both real, both free, and both worth setting up. They are also, on their own, not the whole answer.
This is a plain comparison of what each one does, what they do not do, and where a service like Y.O.D.O. fits alongside them.
Apple Digital Legacy, in short
Apple Digital Legacy lets you name up to five Legacy Contacts. When you die, those contacts can request access to most of the data in your Apple Account by providing a death certificate and an access key Apple generated when you set the feature up. Once Apple verifies the request, the Legacy Contact can download photos, messages, notes, files in iCloud Drive, contacts, calendars, and similar.
It does not give them your Apple ID password. It does not unlock devices protected by an Activation Lock unless they have your device passcode. It does not include items you bought from Apple, payment information, or keychain passwords. It does not deliver anything until your Legacy Contact actively requests access, with the documents, after you have died.
Google Inactive Account Manager, in short
Google takes a different shape. You set an inactivity period, between three and eighteen months. If your account is unused for that period, Google notifies up to ten people you nominated, optionally shares selected data with them (Drive, Photos, Gmail and so on), and can delete your account if you asked it to.
It is passive by design. It only triggers after months of silence. It does not verify whether you are alive, ill, travelling, or simply on a long break. It does not carry messages you wrote for specific people, only access to data.
What both have in common
- Free, included with the platform you already use.
- Account-scoped. Apple covers Apple. Google covers Google.
- Built for data handover, not personal communication.
- No human review. No judgement call. They run on documents and timers.
What Y.O.D.O. does differently
Y.O.D.O. is not an account handover. It is a private communication support service, built in the UK, for two purposes Apple and Google were not designed to carry.
1. It checks in on you while you are alive.
You receive a Check-In on a rhythm you choose. One tap says you are OK. If you miss the Check-In beyond the buffer you set, the people you trust (your Delegates) are gently notified. Apple and Google only know you have gone silent after months. Y.O.D.O. can know within a day.
2. It carries the words, not the data.
Y.O.D.O. holds sealed text, voice, video, or file Messages written for specific people you chose. They are encrypted and sealed during your lifetime. They are released only after your passing has been formally verified by a trained reviewer, with identity checks and a 72-hour dispute window.
A message in Y.O.D.O. is not a file someone has to find in your iCloud or your Drive. It is addressed, sealed, and delivered to the named Recipient at the moment it is meant to arrive.
Side by side
| What you want to do | Apple Digital Legacy | Google Inactive Account Manager | Y.O.D.O. |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hand over your photos and files | Yes (Apple data) | Yes (Google data) | No, this is not what Y.O.D.O. does |
| Notice if you go quiet within days | No | No, months by design | Yes, on the rhythm you choose |
| Send specific messages to specific people | No | No | Yes, sealed until verified passing |
| Human review of the death report | No | No | Yes, trained reviewer plus 72-hour dispute window |
| Works across UK platforms, not just one company | No | No | Yes, UK and EEA |
Which one do you need?
Most people benefit from all three.
- Use Apple Digital Legacy so your Legacy Contact can recover your Apple photos and messages.
- Use Google Inactive Account Manager so the same thing works for your Google account, and to schedule deletion if that is what you want.
- Use Y.O.D.O. for the things neither of the above carries: an active Check-In while you are still here, and sealed, personal Messages for the people who will need to hear something from you when the moment comes.
If Y.O.D.O. sounds right alongside what you already have, start your free 14-day trial. No card required.