To be honest from the start, I was inspired to write this essay by something very small. It wasn't something I felt compelled to tell everyone about. Rather, the opposite—it's a story about something I couldn't say, didn't say, yet has stayed with me ever since.
If you've ever created and released an app as an individual, you might understand a little. The silence right after release. Those first few weeks when the download count doesn't budge from single digits. That feeling of asking yourself every morning when you open your phone: "Is anyone actually using this?" I spent a long time in that period too.
Today, I want to tell you about something that happened during that time. About the day I found my app's icon on a friend's phone.
I released the app at the end of a certain spring. After spending about half a year building it bit by bit, I finally submitted it to the store, it passed review, and I pressed the release button thinking "this is it."
For the first few days, I downloaded it myself multiple times to check that it worked, so the numbers moved a little. But then they stopped. Not zero, but close to zero—that state continued. Every time I opened the store dashboard, the graph was nearly a flat line, and the more I stared at it, the more I'd think "I wish I hadn't looked," repeating this cycle over and over.
Why I Didn't Promote It
To be honest, I hesitated about promoting it. I didn't have the courage to write "I made this" on social media. The thought of what if there was zero response terrified me. I didn't have few followers, but imagining that silence when I said "please try it" and nobody responded—my fingers would freeze.
Recommending it directly to friends felt awkward too. I knew that "How did you like it?" followed by "Um, I didn't really understand how to use it" would be the hardest to hear. More than the fear of having my creation rejected, I was afraid of being pitied. So in the end, I said nothing to anyone and just watched the numbers.
A few months after release, the download count was slowly increasing. I hadn't run ads or gone viral. Yet the numbers were moving, ever so gradually.
Of course, I don't know who each of these people are. Strangers with names and faces I'll never know. But they actually opened the app, felt something, and kept it on their phones—thinking that made my chest feel warm in a way I can't quite describe.
I Got Used to the Numbers, But Never Felt It Was Real
Strangely, even as the numbers grew, I never felt like it was "reaching" anyone. Downloads are just numbers, and I couldn't quite grasp the sense that there were living people on the other side of them. Even if hundreds of people used it, as long as it was just "a hundred," the reality felt distant. When reviews came in, I felt a bit of traction, but those were just words on a screen—not quite the same as feeling something warm and alive.
It happened one weekend morning when I was meeting a friend at a nearby café.
I had forgotten my phone, so I asked my friend, "Can I borrow yours to check the map?" The moment they unlocked the home screen for me, my hand stopped.
My app's icon was there.
I Couldn't Say Anything
I was too shocked to speak. Or more precisely, I decided before speaking that "I shouldn't say anything."
If I had said "Hey, I made this," my friend would definitely feel awkward. They might force out a response like "What? I use it all the time!" There's no way to know if those words are sincere. And honestly, I didn't want to know.
I checked the map, said "thanks," and handed the phone back. My friend had no idea. Only I knew. And that felt just right. We drank coffee and talked about nothing in particular, and the morning passed. Inside my chest, I carried something small.
Walking home from the café, the realization came slowly.
My friend had installed my app without anyone recommending it. And it was on their home screen. The home screen is a place you see every day. The fact that they hadn't deleted it meant they were still using it. I don't know how often, but at least it hadn't been uninstalled. It was still there, existing.
I hadn't promoted it. I hadn't recommended it. Yet it had reached them.
That fact felt far more real than any number reaching the hundreds—it taught me that "what I made exists."
I Should Also Talk About My Failures
To be honest here, the things I started making before this app barely took shape. I started three projects and completed only one. I stopped the other two halfway through because I thought "nobody's going to use this."
The reason I stopped wasn't because I lost motivation or hit a technical wall—it was because "I stopped feeling like it would reach anyone." As I was building, the imaginary user in my head became blurry, and once I started thinking "does this even matter?" my hands just wouldn't move anymore.
I think I was able to finish this app because I decided on a small threshold at the beginning: "once I get to this point, I'll release it." Not waiting until it's perfect, but releasing it once it works. That decision alone carried me to the end.
After I handed back my friend's phone, for a while after that, the way I approached making things shifted a little.
Before, I was driven by "I want more downloads" and "I want more ratings." But since that morning, I've been thinking about something a step before that. Existing quietly on someone's home screen. Not being deleted. It doesn't need to be opened every day—being remembered occasionally is enough. That's the feeling I have now.
It's not resignation. If anything, it's the opposite—my resolution became clearer. Instead of aiming for "going viral," I started aiming for "lasting."
On Continuing to Move Forward in Small Ways
After that, I've been adding small improvements to the app bit by bit. Not big feature additions, just fine-tuning usability. Every time I make a change, I think "if that friend used this, would it be a little more comfortable?" I think the same thing about other people whose names and faces I don't know.
Rather than dropping a big update all at once, I quietly keep updating with small improvements. That rhythm works for me now. I don't know right away if it's reaching anyone. But if I keep going, maybe there will be another moment when I realize it someday. I can believe that now.
Finally, to you reading this essay.
If right now the numbers aren't moving, you don't know if it's reaching anyone, and you're wondering if it makes sense to keep creating—your creation might quietly exist on someone's phone somewhere.
It might be used in the gaps of someone's daily life without you ever being told. A friend of a friend might have installed it for some reason and thought "well, it's not bad" and left it there. It might be solving someone's small problem in a way you never imagined.
What I felt that morning when I saw my app on my friend's phone is hard to put into words, but if I had to say it, it was less "I'm glad I made this" and more "I'm glad I didn't give up." I'm glad I finished it, I'm glad I released it, I'm glad I kept going even when I felt like quitting—that kind of quiet relief.
If you don't stop creating, the possibility of reaching someone never becomes zero. That much is certain. Somewhere, I believe in the day your creation appears on someone's home screen.
Lily (@bokuwalily) — Individual developer. Creating iOS apps and web services in tandem with AI.
