pluris FAQ
Answers to the questions we get most. For anything else, the support page is a real inbox.
Getting set up
Why doesn’t call blocking work straight away?
iOS requires you to switch pluris on yourself — apps aren’t allowed to do it for you. Go to Settings → Apps → Phone → Call Blocking & Identification and turn pluris on. The Set Up checklist in the Shield tab takes you straight there and confirms automatically once it’s active.
And SMS filtering?
Same idea: go to Settings → Apps → Messages → Unknown & Spam → Message Filtering and select pluris. One difference — iOS gives apps no way to check this switch, so the checklist asks you to confirm it yourself.
Where do filtered messages go?
To the Junk folder inside the Messages app, routed there by iOS itself. Nothing is deleted, so a message caught by mistake is never lost — and you can whitelist a sender or keyword in pluris so it doesn’t happen again.
Passwords
Where is the password vault?
At the top of the Shield tab, under Passwords. If your iPhone has Face ID, Touch ID or a passcode set up, the vault asks for it before it shows anything, and locks again when pluris goes to the background. It holds logins, passkeys, API keys, bank cards, identity documents, recovery phrases and Wi‑Fi or device details.
How do I turn on AutoFill?
Go to Settings → General → AutoFill & Passwords and turn on pluris. From then on pluris offers your logins wherever iOS shows AutoFill suggestions, and signs you in with passkeys wherever a site offers them. A login is suggested on the site whose web address it holds; one saved without an address can still be filled by opening pluris from the AutoFill list and choosing it.
How do I bring my passwords over from Apple Passwords?
On iOS 26, open the Passwords app, choose Export Data to Another App, pick pluris and confirm. The credentials are handed over app to app by iOS (Credential Exchange), so no file is written on the way. pluris then lists every item with its secret masked and anything Already in vault marked, and nothing is saved until you choose Import Selected. Other password managers that support Credential Exchange hand over the same way. A free transfer brings in up to 10 items; Pro brings in all of them.
Can I move my passwords out of pluris?
Yes, and it is free. In the vault, open More → Import & Export → Export. On iOS 26, Transfer hands the items you choose straight to another password manager, with no file at all. Logins CSV writes your logins in the columns Apple Passwords reads, and JSON writes every item; neither file is encrypted, so pluris asks you to confirm that first, and it tells you before writing which items a format cannot carry.
How do I back up the vault?
Open More → Import & Export → Export and choose Encrypted archive. You set a passphrase of at least 8 characters, and the file carries every item in every category, passkeys included — it is safe to keep in a cloud folder, because without the passphrase it cannot be opened, by you or by us. iCloud Keychain keeps your devices in step, but sync copies a deletion as faithfully as anything else; the archive is the copy that does not. To restore it, choose Import, then Pluris Backup: items already in the vault are matched rather than duplicated, and restoring your own backup is never capped.
What does Review Vault check?
More → Review Vault… lists reused secrets, items overdue for rotation, items untouched for a long time and items with nothing to identify them by. Reuse is found without decrypting anything: pluris compares keyed fingerprints, not values. Check Strength is a separate button because it reads every value, so it takes noticeably longer than the rest of the report.
Contacts
How does duplicate detection work?
pluris groups contacts that share a phone number (compared in normalised international form, so “+55 11 9…” and “011 9…” match), share an email address, or have identical or nearly identical names. Every group shows why it matched, and you can compare the members before touching anything.
It flagged two people who aren’t duplicates
Fuzzy name matching occasionally over-reaches — dismiss the group and pluris remembers your decision across scans. The group only resurfaces if a future scan adds a new contact to it, which is worth a fresh look anyway.
What exactly happens when I merge?
The most recently updated contact becomes the base; phone numbers, emails and tags are combined without duplicates, missing fields are filled in from the others, and notes are joined together. The original contacts go to pluris’ own trash — nothing is hard-deleted, and you can restore them at any time.
How long does the trash keep contacts?
Forever, by default — auto-empty is off. If you prefer, switch it on in Contacts settings and choose 1, 7, 15 or 30 days of retention. Emptying the trash yourself is free; pluris asks first, because it is the one contact action that cannot be undone.
What can phone number repair fix?
The usual accumulated mess: doubled “+” signs, “00” international prefixes, numbers missing a country code (inferred from your home country, the patterns in your own contacts and your region), numbers missing an area code, and Brazilian mobiles missing their ninth digit. Each suggestion shows its reasoning, and you approve changes — individually, or in bulk with Pro.
Which account do my contacts live in?
pluris works directly on Apple Contacts, so whatever accounts you use today — iCloud, Gmail, on-device — keep working and syncing exactly as before. If your contacts are scattered across accounts, the Consolidate tool moves them all into one, with an undo.
Can I export my contacts?
Yes, with Pro — vCard (.vcf), CSV, or a full backup you can import again later. Importing is open to everyone, up to 10 contacts at a time on the free tier.
Photos & videos
What’s the difference between “exact” and “similar” duplicates?
pluris fingerprints every photo and video on your device and scores how alike each pair is. Pairs above the similarity threshold count as exact duplicates; pairs below it are “similar” — burst shots, near-retakes. The threshold is yours to tune (50–100%, default 95%), so if you see too many or too few matches, adjust the slider in Photos settings.
Where do deleted photos go?
To Photos → Recently Deleted, where iOS keeps them for 30 days. pluris always deletes through the system, so iOS shows its own confirmation and nothing vanishes silently.
How does compression work?
Large photos are re-encoded to HEIC and videos to HEVC — modern formats that look the same at a fraction of the size. The compressed copy is saved as a new item in your library and the original is left in place, so nothing is lost without your say-so; delete the originals once you’re happy to actually reclaim the space.
Calls
How many calls has pluris blocked for me?
Unknowable — for any app. iOS handles the blocking itself and never reports back, so the number pluris shows is the size of your block list, not a count of calls stopped. Any app claiming otherwise is guessing.
How does prefix blocking work?
A prefix rule blocks every number that starts with the digits you give — each rule covers the prefix plus four trailing digits (10,000 numbers). It’s the right tool when spam comes from a range rather than a single number.
What does the Brazil 0303 switch do?
Anatel reserves the 0303 prefix for active telemarketing in Brazil. The switch (a Pro regional rule) blocks the entire range in both its national and international forms — around twenty million numbers. Because registering that many entries takes iOS a moment on every change, it’s opt-in.
Where does the spam list come from?
A public, community-maintained blocklist of known spam numbers, checked over HTTPS at most once a day when you open the app, and downloaded again only when it has changed. The request carries nothing about you. With Pro, Call Shield blocks the numbers on it, and under Spam List Sources you can add lists of your own by pasting an https address. Your own block list is yours either way.
How do I use Meeting Mode?
Meeting Mode is an iOS Focus filter, so it rides along with any Focus you already use. In Settings → Focus, pick or create a Focus, then under Focus Filters add the pluris filter and set Call Shield on. From then on, Call Shield switches on and off automatically as that Focus starts and ends.
I toggled the Shield from a widget and nothing changed
Only the app itself can rebuild the iOS call directory. Changes made from a widget, Control Center, the Action Button or Siri are queued and applied the next time you open pluris.
Messages
What are the filter modes?
Smart Heuristic (the default) scores each message from unknown senders on junk keywords, links and email addresses, and files it as Junk when the score is high enough. Strict Quarantine sends anything with a link or an email address straight to Junk. Or switch filtering off entirely. Messages can also be sorted into Promotional and Transactional, and your Allow list always wins.
Do the keyword lists follow my language?
Yes — the starter keywords are localised for every language pluris ships in, and if you change the app’s language the defaults switch too, while your own custom keywords stay put.
The filtered-messages counter seems low
That counter is approximate by design — iOS heavily restricts what a message-filter extension can report back, and on recent iOS versions the count may lag or stay at zero. The filtering itself still works; the proof is in the Messages Junk folder.
Widgets, Shortcuts & Focus
What widgets does pluris have?
Shield Status for the Home and Lock Screen shows your protection level and list sizes at a glance. Pluris Call Shield is a toggle for Call Shield you can put in Control Center, on the Lock Screen or on the Action Button. There’s also a small Battery widget showing charge and charging state. Siri Shortcuts cover toggling the Shield, cleaning duplicates and identifying a number.
Free vs Pro
What’s free?
All the scanning and browsing, and every action taken one at a time: find all duplicates and errors, restore contacts from the trash or empty it, and review and delete duplicate photos individually. Call Shield and SMS Shield are free within starter limits — 5 blocked numbers, 5 caller labels, 3 prefix rules and 12 keywords per category (the Allow list is unlimited). The password vault is free too: AutoFill, passkeys, encrypted backups, exports and the vault review, with transfers from another app of up to 10 items.
What does Pro add?
The bulk and the community: unlimited block lists, labels, rules and keywords; community spam lists, lists of your own, and regional rules like Brazil 0303; merging duplicate contacts; bulk photo clean-up; photo and video compression; bulk number repair; contact export and unlimited import; spam reporting from the Messages report sheet; and password transfers of any size. Pro is a monthly or yearly subscription with a 14-day free trial, or a one-time lifetime purchase — prices are shown in the app in your local currency, and all plans are family-shareable.
What happens if my subscription lapses?
Nothing is deleted. Your full lists stay on your device — the free-tier limits simply apply again (the first 5 blocked numbers, first 12 keywords, and so on), and Call Shield stops using the community spam lists. Your password vault carries on exactly as before. Re-subscribe and everything picks up where it left off.
How do I restore a purchase?
Open Settings → pluris Pro in the app and choose Restore Purchases. Purchases are tied to your Apple Account, so they carry across your devices.
Data & privacy
What leaves my iPhone?
Nothing about you is sent by pluris. There is no account system, no server of ours and no analytics. Contacts, photos and messages are processed on the device. Your vault is kept in the iOS keychain and, if iCloud Keychain is on, syncs between your own devices through Apple. The requests the app makes are downloads of public spam lists — the community list, and any list you add with Pro — with nothing of yours attached.
Which permissions does pluris need?
Contacts for the contacts tools, Photos for the photo tools — limited access works too — and Face ID to unlock the password vault. The call and SMS shields need no permissions at all, only the two iOS Settings switches, and AutoFill is one more switch. If you decline a permission, the rest of the app keeps working.
Requirements & languages
What does pluris require?
An iPhone running iOS 18.6 or later. Moving passwords app to app with Credential Exchange uses iOS 26; the vault, AutoFill, passkeys and encrypted backups all work from iOS 18.6.
Which languages does pluris speak?
22 languages, from Danish to Simplified Chinese, with separate regional variants for English, Portuguese and French. The app follows your device language; to use a different one, go to Settings → Apps → pluris → Language.