Indie Devs Ship Fast Then Stall Before Anyone Sees It

“https://apps.apple.com/ch/app/boxingbuddy/id6818497655?l=en-GB https://lle00n.github.io/my-portfolio/project/0 I've worked as a software developer for some time. Now i've decided to release my first application. Its just a basic IntervalTimer that you can use to workout. I've started to work on it when AI/Vibecoding wasn't really a thing. Now i've finished it with AI. I'm looking forward for some testers & feedback.:) Updates are coming soon! submitted by”

“One thing I've noticed is that building the product is often easier than getting people to actually use it. It's tempting to keep adding features, but sometimes the simpler version is all users really need. Getting feedback from a few real users early on can save a lot of time. I'd focus on solving one specific problem really well before expanding. A small group of happy paying customers is a good start. Then you can build from there based on what people actually ask for. [re: From t”

“yeah, and the ones asking for an email before you've seen a single screen are the worst of it. [re: I got fed up with calorie apps that show you 5 popups before you can log breakfast, so I built my own]”

“If you could, please share what made you quit or come back and try again. Thank you! [re: I turned a lighthouse-defense idea into an Android release — looking for feedback on the first few minutes]”

“Of course, every app is unique, and everyone has their own goals. But I believe an app shouldn’t try to "stick" a user to it; rather, it should be useful precisely when needed. After all, "stickiness" itself is often far from ethical - and apps focused on wellness and health should be ethical by default. That’s why, in my own app, I’ve deliberately avoided any mechanics designed to keep users tethered to the application. [re: What makes you stick with a wellness app?]”

“appreciate the advice. i'm not a professional designer or developer, and this was our first time building something like this. theres definitely a LOT that can be done here visually which will certainly happen over time but i'm happy to hear some of the features here resonate with you [re: My wife and I got sick of ad-filled recipe sites, so we built a recipe app with no ads and no tracking. Would love your feedback]”

“Im wondering if you can share your workflow for building this app and the cost? I’m also trying to create a social app but a little stuck with where to start. If you have time I would love to chat! [re: I built and launched a social app — now I'm trying to get the first real users]”

Don’t work so hard and focus on your marriage:) [re: I built an app to save my marriage. The marriage didn't make it, the app did]

“good call, the generic motivational ones always feel like placeholder copy that never got replaced [re: free tool to make store screenshots + google play feature graphic, would love ASO feedback]”

“I'm the dev of Slean , a photo cleaner for iphone (and now android). I started building it in 2024 and shipped it in january 2025. I published the android version this year. a lot has changed since the first version. vibe-coded cleaner apps have flooded the market since then. I've leveraged AI a lot myself too, even the app store video attached here was made entirely with Claude, but I never changed the fundamentals or the simple, native-feeling design of Slean. these are the things I ke”

“that fake traction thing is so real, feels good for a day then you realize none of it actually counts [re: Built an iOS app, got 22 downloads in 2 weeks (mostly friends/family) — how did you get past that?]”

“Took me two years to get quality right and then consistency fell apart immediately after. It’s like whack a mole. The machine running without you is a massive unlock though, that’s the part I’m most curious about with what you’re building [re: In early distribution, most founders choose either consistency or quality. Doing both is hard.]”

“This is a pretty relatable problem lol. Building the app is often the fun part, then deployment turns into a checklist of 20 annoying little things. The one-time pricing also makes sense for this kind of tool. [re: I turned my habit of never launching my apps into a product]”

imo the bigger challenge isnt the breaking-down part, its getting people to come back day after day. retention for productivity apps is brutal. how are you thinking about that? [re: I made…

notes app graveyard is so real. do you think the browsing angle alone would actually be enough to get you to open it regularly though? [re: I built a free app to…

“Like in my title, this is my first time making anything. I'd love feedback on the game and themeing! submitted by /u/Euphoric_Void1 [link] [comments]”

“I don't see any value add here, there's free apps with feature parity and paid ones with extreme feature supremacy. I didn't hear any real roadmap except that it's "rich with features" and that social features are coming. My honest opinion is that it's going nowhere, and I'd totally bet on it too. That doesn't make me a dick, entrepreneurs need to be used to hearing things like "no" and "that's all?" [re: A basketball app that tracks”

“Yes man it took 3 month approx to finish this 😂 [re: I built a planner for myself. The hardest part had almost nothing to do with planning]”

“Here is a general principle of mine : 1. if your app’s function can be done by any LLM AI’s app , don’t build it; 2. If there is a similar app on the market already, don’t build it [re: Got fired, built a product for a year, and nobody uses it. Tell me why.]”

The app is still an MVP (in rudimental form). In some next version I would add a smart notification that will remind you of your sitting ideas and what to do next…

“Thanks for the award! Down-vote me all you want, app devs who abandon their product cause fuckloads of headaches over the years. [re: Hulk Product Options gone?]”

“I’m a solo dev working on Central , an end-to-end encrypted messenger with personal safety features. A messenger is a hard sell: nobody switches apps because yours has a nicer lock icon. So I tried something different and built Central City , a small isometric town that lives inside the app. What it is Every user has a house in a shared vector-art city. You walk around with a joystick, and your friends’ houses are on the same streets. You can visit them, decorate your own place, and bump into ot”

“Thank you but like, the model support is still under active dev as I understand. So I was just asking if the current progress is enough to have a usable text only model, cause well, this boi a chonker to download and run. [re: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 [GGUF + Abliterated]]”

“Me too op! [re: I turned my habit of never launching my apps into a product]”

“For a while I had a pile of apps I built with Claude that worked fine on my laptop and never went anywhere. Every time I went to launch one it was the same boring list: Hosting, a domain, CI/CD, testing environments, payments and paywalls, user analytics, crash reports, TestFlight, keeping keys out of the repo, and a hundred little things you only remember once users find them. So I made launchpad, a Claude Code plugin that does that whole list. You run one command in your project, it figures ou”

“It's subjective, and a bit hard to answer as I never used it properly, but I think: - Focus on library, not on social aspects - More modern UX. To me manyfold feels outdated in UI/UX experience, but it's a matter of preference I guess. - Dedication to create an ease of importing and syncing with Major providers [re: Thingport is officially v1.0.0]”

“not gonna lie this looks way more put together than i expected from a solo project. the hour-by-hour view with planned vs actual time is exactly the kind of thing i always wish other tools had but they never quite get right sync being the nightmare part checks out though, every dev i know who's tried building something offline-first ends up with the same war story. what did you use for the sync layer or did you roll your own [re: I built a planner for myself. The hardest part had almost noth”

“Hi y’all, I’m a designer and traveler who believes good design can change things, even if only a little. That still feels worth spending my effort on. I was honestly fed up with needing an account just to use a small app. So I started making apps I would genuinely use myself: stored on our phones, working offline, with no account needed. Sometimes we do not need another system or app trying to fix us. We just need a quiet place to hold something, clear our brain RAM, or keep everyday things in o”

“feels like a manually coded lovable app [re: Got fired, built a product for a year, and nobody uses it. Tell me why.]”

“Do you vibe coding it? [re: 188K Reddit views, $192 in app revenue, and the biggest lesson I've learned building my first iOS app]”

“I'm worried that simply knowing how to build web applications won't be enough It never was. People in general just never understood how easy it actually was to build things. Once you get over an initial stage of understanding and knowing where to find what sources you always could have built almost whatever service that you wanted. No matter if a website, web app, or app. What matters in building commercial applications and startups is systems architecture and long-term planning. It'”

“Thanks for your comment! Appreciate it! [re: I’ve been making minimal, private apps for everyday human needs (not another productivity apps lol)]”

“Hi y’all, I’m a designer and traveler who believes good design can change things, even if only a little. That still feels worth spending my effort on. I was honestly fed up with needing an account just to use a small app. So I started making apps I would genuinely use myself: stored on our phones, working offline, with no account needed. Sometimes we do not need another system or app trying to fix us. We just need a quiet place to hold something, clear our brain RAM, or keep everyday things in o”

“I'm 20, building my first iOS app, and I've spent more time figuring out how to get people to use it than actually building it lately lol. It's called Overdrive. Basically, it turns real-world driving into a map exploration game, kind of like Forza Horizon IRL. Every road you drive gets colored in on your map, and you slowly unlock your city just by exploring. Here's where things got interesting. I tried posting about the app in developer communities. Almost nothing happened. 0 u”

“I used to believe this to, but I disagree now. My argument is this assumes people know what they want and how it should work, and I have yet to see that play out nicely. Also, larger, more complex apps like photoshop, while they can be duplicated (and were recently!) doesn't mean that if i need to edit some photos I should just build photoshop. Lots of nuances here, but in general I believe software is more alive than ever, just more democratized. More slop will exist, SaaS will probably slo”

“Great timing to shift focus outward. Most people just keep adding features until the thing collapses under its own weight. [re: My local directory finally has users. Now I’m trying not to ruin it by building too much.]”

“for the last 3 and a half months i've been "developing" this operating system for fun i created it because i've always liked trying out operating systems, and i always liked the idea of having my own, but of course, i barely know anything about programming, and even less about making something as complex as a complete os on my own, so using only codex (and patches with chatgpt when i ran out of usage) i managed to create my own os! it has smp, ring 3, paging, its own 32 bit ker”

“I like the home screen and the concept. However I'm not really sure if anyone would pay for this. Learning random things without a goal: I doubt many people want to do that. Instead why don't you focus on things like NEET? [re: Priced my learning product at $14.99/mo with exactly 1 paying user. Roast the pricing]”

“Hey r/SaaS , I see a lot of posts here about launching brand-new micro-SaaS ideas every week. Today, I wanted to share a completely different perspective: what it’s like to completely rewrite and re-architect an independent app that I have been maintaining for over 10 years . My app is called ClipBox , an iOS, iPad, and Mac clipboard manager. As you all know, the clipboard manager market for the Apple ecosystem is incredibly crowded. There are dozens of tools out there. For a long time, I asked”

“I'm a solo developer and this is my side project: Countdown Widget: Any Event, for iPhone and iPad. Most countdown apps I looked at charge for the widget, which is the part people actually see every day. So in mine the widgets are free — every size, Home Screen and Lock Screen — and you can keep as many countdowns as you like. Pro is just looks and extras. What surprised me was how much work dates are. Christmas is easy. Thanksgiving is the fourth Thursday of November, Mother's Day moves”

“The problem that you not getting is that all these apps use to be unique. Not anymore. They’re all identical to each other. Only thing different is their logo. Might as well put them all in 1 app and watch which ever one u want like a streaming app.. before 2030 they all will do the same thing [re: Thoughts? Youtube has added GIFs to comments.]”

“So I got about 8 mins to write this before I gotta go to a church get together. Since my last post I explained that I was stuck on the logo, and wasn't sure about the branding. Well after a few days of messing around with it, I finally came across a visual identity that I like. It's quite simple, and most importantly it is cohesive with the niche my app is for AND it also makes sense. The elements aren't random, they are placed with intention. Fast forward after that, with the logo t”

“Hey everyone, I am building and publishing my own ios apps since this year and now I also want to create things on web. Mainly because shipping is easier and there is no 30% cut like in apple. I have a web internal tool which I use for marketing my apps I thought maybe I can make it public. But I am not sure about it so I am searching what can I build. I have couple questions and I thought I can ask here to get some advice from people who already has SaaS web app and made money from it. First of”

“so I've been building this on evenings for a few months. it's called DetoxScreen, it blocks apps and sites on iPhone through Apple's Screen Time API. you can block always, on a schedule, after a daily limit, after X opens a day, or by place (no insta at the office basically) free, no account, nothing leaves the phone stuff I got wrong: - asked for the Screen Time permission cold at the end of onboarding and 40% said no. gave it its own screen with one line of why and most of that wen”

“Shipped a journaling app in March. Single-digit installs, zero revenue, and I'd quietly decided nobody wanted it. Moved it off Replit in August to fix it up, and found out what was really going on: The production build's backend address was literally a placeholder. AI features failed silently and showed fallback text, so it *looked* fine. The subscription key came from that same backend, so nobody could buy anything. If someone had paid anyway, the code checked for an entitlement called”

submitted by /u/Key_Particular5271 [link] [comments]

“I have taken inspiration from the apps like notion and clickup and what my model does is a BYOS and BYOA that is bring your own storage and bring your own ai along side everything in clickup and notion. The major issue is will you be down to use it if given. I have also planned on to bring features like migrate your workspace but thats on later stage but in the beginning will it be of any use. Any idea is welcomed .. submitted by /u/dramrxt [link] [comments]”

“You're an engineer aren't you? Can't you review your existing app and figure out how it works and go from there? [re: Am I bad at communication or my CTO is being cheap/frugal here?]”

“I keep thinking about how people often dismiss certain app ideas as too boring, too simple, or too saturated Camera apps, to-do list apps, fitness apps, etc. There are already thousands of them. But at the same time, new products in these categories still manage to get users and grow. It makes me wonder, does the idea itself really matter that much, or is success more about how you execute it, position it, and get people to care about it? Can a seemingly bad idea become a great product if you ap”

“I think the last one you mentioned is what I am missing thanks [re: I thought making my app 100% free would bring in users]”

“I believe that’s psychological. [re: I thought making my app 100% free would bring in users]”

“Hi y’all, I’m a designer and traveler who believes good design can change things, even if only a little. That still feels worth spending my effort on. I was honestly fed up with needing an account just to use a small app. So I started making apps I would genuinely use myself: stored on our phones, working offline, with no account needed. Sometimes we do not need another system or app trying to fix us. We just need a quiet place to hold something, clear our brain RAM, or keep everyday things in o”

“It's been 3 months and 100+ users around the world. I know there is a market and I am just trying to capture every space possible and making Android, iOS and Web app possible where one subscription can be used on all on workspaces and handle their team as well. Trying to talk to few small size companies to use and give me feedback and improve the app in return I give them premium for free. Trying everything possible. Check out my app - https://www.taskspend.com [re: 6 months in, $0 revenue.”

“We're a tiny development studio in Australia. A couple of months ago we shipped Reset, a fasting timer, as a $3.49 paid app with no ads, no subscription and no internet permission. Last month Play Console showed 13.3K impressions, 89 store visits and 1 purchase. So people were seeing it. They just weren't tapping, and almost nobody who tapped bought it. Looking back it's pretty obvious why: - paid apps show a price instead of stars in search results, and we had zero ratings - our fir”

“Heyy, I’m working on making a few small apps and I wanna know how people would like it, and if people would even use it. Some background: I started making these back in 2019 when I was still in high school. My aunt started a company back then and I saw how much software costs. I also saw that she had a legit budget laptop (Intel Celeron), and just running Outlook and Canva was enough to make it lag. When I started uni I also didn’t have the best tech and struggled to use most heavy-duty software”

“I partly agree: about a week ago, I (eventually!) shipped a small mobile app on my own (on a zero budget), and within the first week, it got a few dozen installs across both stores. I checked store search today, and it ranks first for a few rare, specific searches, but sits around 25-30 for the obvious broad term. It seems like store rankings mostly follow installs, so a new app doesn’t get discovered there by itself, and you have to bring the first people in from outside. Building is cheap and”

Ten months ago I built my first iOS app with almost no coding background. A photo cleaner where you swipe left to delete, right to keep. Built most of it with AI,…

“In February, I started a small experiment called Health Mirror. I'm a product manager by background, not a software engineer. The idea was a mobile app inspired by traditional Chinese medicine's practice of observing tongue patterns to gain deeper insights into the body's state of balance. A disclaimer: it's not a diagnostic tool. ;) About a week into the experiment, I had something working end-to-end on my phone through Expo Go. It used my phone's camera, processed images th”