Is it legal to export reviews?
The honest answer: it depends far less on the export and far more on what you do with it. Here is how to think about it.
This page is general information, not legal advice. Rules differ by country and by platform, and they change. If a specific use matters to your business, check the platform’s current terms and speak to a qualified lawyer.
The short answer
When you export reviews with ExportReviews, you are saving a local copy of information that is already public and already visible to you on a page you opened. For personal research, competitive analysis, or internal reporting, that is generally a reasonable use of public data, not fundamentally different from reading the reviews and copying them into a notebook by hand. What raises or lowers the risk is not the act of exporting, it is what you do next.
Public reviews are not the same as private data
ExportReviews only reads what is already rendered on the page in your own browser session. It does not sign in on your behalf, defeat any access control, or reach content you could not see yourself. It does not touch a platform’s private APIs or internal data. If you can read a review on the page, the tool can put it in a spreadsheet; if you cannot, neither can it. That boundary, only ever the public, visible page, is a deliberate part of the design.
Respect each platform’s terms of service
Every review platform has its own terms of service, and they are not identical. Some restrict automated collection or bulk reuse of their content. ExportReviews does not, and cannot, change what a platform allows: it gives you a faster way to organise what is already in front of you, and it is your responsibility to use it within the terms of the site you are on. If you plan to export at scale or build something on top of the data, read the relevant platform’s current terms first.
GDPR and personal data in reviews
A review that names or otherwise identifies a person is personal data under the GDPR and similar laws. That does not make exporting it forbidden, but it does mean the usual principles apply once you store or process it: have a legitimate reason, keep only what you need, do not hold it longer than necessary, and keep it secure. Using an export purely for your own internal analysis is usually the lowest-risk case. Building a public database of named reviewers is the highest. When in doubt, drop or anonymise the reviewer-name column and work from the ratings and text.
Do not republish other people’s reviews as your own
Reviews are written by real people and are often protected as their authors’ words. Exporting them for analysis is one thing; republishing them verbatim, presenting them as reviews of a different product, or passing them off as your own content is another, and can breach copyright or platform rules. Treat an export as research material, not as a content library to repost.
A short checklist for responsible use
- Export only reviews that are genuinely public and visible to you on the page.
- Use the data for analysis and decisions, not for republishing or reselling.
- Respect the terms of service of the platform you are exporting from.
- If you keep reviewer names, treat them as personal data: minimise, secure, and delete when done.
- Get proper legal advice before any large-scale or public use.
What ExportReviews does by design
The product is built to keep you on the safe side of these lines. Extraction runs locally in your browser and the export file is generated on your device, so the reviews you pull never reach our servers. We hold your account and your export credits, never review content.
Legality, answered.
Is it legal to export reviews to a spreadsheet?
Exporting reviews that are already public and visible to you, for your own research or analysis, is generally treated the same as reading and copying them by hand, just faster. The picture changes with how you use the data: republishing reviewers’ words as your own content, or breaching a platform’s terms of service, are separate questions. This is general information, not legal advice.
Does the GDPR apply to exported reviews?
It can. A review that names or identifies a person is personal data, so if you store or process exported reviews with reviewer names, GDPR principles (a lawful basis, minimisation, keeping it only as long as needed) apply. Using an export for your own internal analysis is usually the lowest-risk case.
Can I republish the reviews I export?
Treat that as a different decision from exporting. Reviews are written by real people and often carry the platform’s own terms, so republishing them verbatim, or passing them off as your own, can breach copyright or platform rules. Use exports for analysis, and get proper advice before publishing someone else’s reviews.
Does ExportReviews bypass logins or access private data?
No. It only reads what is already rendered on the page you have open, in your own session. It does not log in for you, defeat access controls, or call private APIs. If you cannot see a review yourself, the extension cannot export it.