Simple Memo Revenue Report: Year 1 Numbers as a Solo iOS Developer

I believe in transparency. Building an iOS app as a solo developer is often romanticized on Twitter but rarely dissected with real numbers. Here's everything — the good, the bad, and the spreadsheets.

We're not a unicorn. We're a one-person niche app that solves a specific problem: sending yourself notes via email, as fast as humanly possible. Simple Memo launched as a spiritual successor to Captio, which died after 14 years. This is the financial reality of building that replacement.

I'm publishing these numbers because the indie dev community runs on shared knowledge, and I've benefited enormously from other people's transparency reports. Consider this my contribution.

The Numbers — No Sugarcoating

If those numbers look small to you, they are. This is a single-function productivity app in a niche category, not a social network or a game with viral loops. The question isn't "are these big numbers" — it's "do these numbers sustain a solo developer building something useful." Keep reading.

Download Trend (Month by Month)

Month	Downloads	Paid Conversions	MRR
Feb 2025	[XXX]	[XX]	¥[X,XXX]
Mar 2025	[XXX]	[XX]	¥[X,XXX]
Apr 2025	[XXX]	[XX]	¥[X,XXX]
May 2025	[XXX]	[XX]	¥[X,XXX]
Jun 2025	[XXX]	[XX]	¥[X,XXX]
Jul 2025	[XXX]	[XX]	¥[X,XXX]
Aug 2025	[XXX]	[XX]	¥[X,XXX]
Sep 2025	[XXX]	[XX]	¥[X,XXX]
Oct 2025	[XXX]	[XX]	¥[X,XXX]
Nov 2025	[XXX]	[XX]	¥[X,XXX]
Dec 2025	[XXX]	[XX]	¥[X,XXX]
Jan 2026	[XXX]	[XX]	¥[X,XXX]
Feb 2026	[XXX]	[XX]	¥[X,XXX]
Mar 2026	[XXX]	[XX]	¥[X,XXX]

I'll update this table monthly.

Infrastructure Costs Breakdown

One of the advantages of building a niche productivity app in 2025-2026 is that infrastructure costs are absurdly low — if you choose the right stack. Here's what we actually pay each month to keep Simple Memo running.

Service	Monthly Cost	Notes
Cloudflare Workers	¥[XXX] ($[X.XX])	[X,XXX] requests/month
Resend API	¥[XXX] ($[X.XX])	[X,XXX] emails/month
Apple Developer Program	¥[XXX] ($8.25/mo amortized)	$99/year
Domain (simplememofast.com)	¥[XXX] ($[X.XX]/mo)	Annual registration
Cloudflare Pages	¥0	Free tier
Total	¥[X,XXX] ($[XX])

The beautiful thing about Cloudflare Workers: our bill would be the same at 10x the traffic. The free tier covers 100,000 requests per day. We're nowhere near that. If we ever hit that ceiling, it means the app is doing well enough that the $5/month paid plan is trivial.

Compare this to a traditional setup with a VPS, a database, and a managed email service. You'd be looking at $50-100/month minimum for equivalent reliability. The serverless edge architecture isn't just technically elegant — it's economically essential for a solo developer who can't afford to bleed money while waiting for product-market fit.

What Worked

Timing — Captio's Shutdown

The single biggest factor in Simple Memo's early traction was timing. Captio was removed from the App Store in October 2024. Thousands of users suddenly needed a replacement. We shipped in early 2025.

• Captio removed: October 2024
• Users immediately began searching for alternatives
• "Captio alternative" became our #1 organic keyword
• The Captio Alternative comparison page became our highest-traffic landing page

Lesson: solving an urgent, specific problem beats building a general tool. Every time. We didn't invent a new category. We filled a hole that thousands of people were actively looking to fill. The demand was pre-existing — we just had to show up.

If I could give one piece of advice to indie developers: watch for products that are dying or shutting down. Their users are the most motivated audience you'll ever find. They already understand the problem, they already have the habit, they just need a new home.

Content Marketing (This Site)

• [XX] blog posts published (JA + EN combined)
• Top performing article: "Why Captio Died" — [X,XXX] pageviews
• Blog drives [XX%] of total organic traffic
• Cost: $0 (self-written with AI assistance for translation and editing)

Content marketing works especially well for niche products because you can realistically rank for long-tail keywords that big players ignore. Nobody at Apple or Google is writing a 3,000-word article about "why Captio shut down" or "best self-email apps." But the people searching for those terms are exactly our target users.

The SEO flywheel takes time. Our first three months of blog traffic were negligible. But content compounds. Every article is a permanent asset that keeps bringing in organic traffic long after publication. The cost is my time, which I'd be spending anyway since I actually enjoy writing about this stuff.

App Store Optimization

• Key ASO keywords: [LIST PLACEHOLDER]
• Screenshot optimization: showed speed comparison (0.3s launch time front and center)
• Localization: Japanese primary market, English secondary
• App Store rating: [X.X] stars ([XXX] reviews)

ASO is underrated by indie developers who spend all their energy on external marketing. The App Store is a search engine. If you're not optimizing for it, you're leaving the easiest traffic on the table.

What Didn't Work

Transparency means showing the failures too. Here's where we burned time for minimal return.

[PLACEHOLDER — Failed Strategy #1]

We tried [STRATEGY] expecting [OUTCOME]. We spent approximately [XX] hours over [X] weeks building and executing this. The result was [ACTUAL RESULT]. Specifically, the numbers looked like this: [METRICS].

The lesson: [LESSON]. In hindsight, the signals were there. [EXPLANATION OF WHAT WE SHOULD HAVE NOTICED]. If you're considering a similar approach, the key question to ask yourself is: [QUESTION].

[PLACEHOLDER — Failed Strategy #2]

We tried [STRATEGY] expecting [OUTCOME]. We spent approximately [XX] hours over [X] weeks building and executing this. The result was [ACTUAL RESULT]. Specifically, the numbers looked like this: [METRICS].

The lesson: [LESSON]. In hindsight, the signals were there. [EXPLANATION OF WHAT WE SHOULD HAVE NOTICED]. If you're considering a similar approach, the key question to ask yourself is: [QUESTION].

I'm not embarrassed by these failures. They collectively cost less than a month of a junior developer's salary, and the learning was worth more than most business books. The real mistake would have been not trying.

Profitability Analysis

Here's the part everyone actually wants to read: is this thing profitable, and is it worth the time?

Is it worth it? [PLACEHOLDER — honest reflection]

The honest answer has layers. If you evaluate this purely as a job — comparing the hourly rate to what I could earn as a senior iOS developer at a tech company — the math doesn't work yet. A senior iOS dev in Tokyo makes ¥[X,XXX]/hour. My effective rate here is lower.

But that comparison misses the point. This is an asset, not a job. The app generates revenue while I sleep. The codebase is mine. The customer relationships are mine. The brand equity is mine. A salaried position pays better per hour but builds someone else's asset.

The more honest question is: can this grow to the point where the hourly rate is competitive? I believe it can. Here's why: the infrastructure costs are nearly fixed regardless of scale. Going from [X,XXX] to [XX,XXX] users would 5-10x the revenue while barely touching the cost base. The unit economics get dramatically better at modest scale.

If I can't get there within the next 12 months, I'll have to reassess. But right now, the trajectory is pointing in the right direction, and I'm learning more than I ever did working for someone else.

What's Next

Transparency about the future is harder than transparency about the past, because plans change. But here's what I'm thinking as of March 2026.

Short-term (next 3 months): [PLACEHOLDER — describe immediate priorities, e.g., specific feature, marketing experiment, partnership]

Medium-term (next 6-12 months): [PLACEHOLDER — describe growth initiatives, e.g., new platforms, new markets, pricing experiments]

Long-term (1-2 years): [PLACEHOLDER — describe vision, e.g., sustainability target, potential adjacent products, community building]

The north star hasn't changed: one screen, instant capture, your inbox. Everything else is a growth vector, not a product pivot. I'd rather be the best single-function app in the world than a mediocre multi-feature one.

If you're building something similar — a niche indie app, a solo SaaS, anything where you're one person against the market — I'd love to compare notes. Seriously. Reach out via the contact page or find me on X/Twitter. The indie dev community is strongest when we share what actually happens, not just what looks good on a landing page.

Download Simple Memo on the App Store — free to start, with a 7-day unlimited trial.