I built a 100% offline app to remember people's names. 5 months later: 179 downloads and 1 paying customer.

KasamiWorks — Sat, 16 May 2026 00:40:52 +0000

"Wait... what was their name again?"

That moment of panic — that's why I built this.

I'm a solo developer with 25+ years in software.
In December 2025, I shipped my first consumer app.

This is not a success story.
But it's an honest one.

The App

NameMemory — 100% offline. No cloud. No accounts. No analytics.

Contacts apps store people. This app trains memory.

It uses Spaced Repetition to quiz you right before you'd forget someone —
the same method used in language learning, applied to the people in your life.

Originally built in Japanese. Launched with 15 languages from day one.
Because forgetting names isn't just a Japanese problem.

Built with Flutter, SQLite, local notifications, and an SM-2 spaced
repetition algorithm — with heavy AI-assisted development.

https://namememory.netlify.app/

Why I Built It

Colleagues. Clients. The parents of my kid's friends.

Every time a name wouldn't come, it felt like a small failure.

And these are exactly the names you don't want in the cloud —
customer contacts, school parents, your internal network.

That's why offline wasn't a feature. It was the point.

How It Works

Name + photo
A short note about them
Where you met

The app then quizzes you using Spaced Repetition —
surfacing each person right before you'd forget them.

Hacker News Was Brutally Right

December 2025. I posted on HN:

"Show HN: I hired AI to fix my memory,
but made it 100% Offline for privacy"

8 points. Top comment:

"I just installed and deleted the app."

That hurt. But this one hurt more — and was more useful:

"5 people free tier makes SRS useless.
Anyone who downloads this will just delete it."

Every word was correct.

What I changed:

Free tier: 5 → 20 people
Rewrote store listings in 16 languages
Resubmitted to both stores

5 Months Later

Metric	Result
Total downloads	179
Countries reached	39
Paying customers	1 ($9.99, from the US)
Daily average	~1 install/day

Top countries:
🇯🇵 49 · 🇺🇸 33 · 🇫🇷 9 · 🇩🇪 9 · 🇨🇳 5 · 🇪🇸 5

Japan is #1. I didn't expect that.

And someone in the US paid $9.99.
A stranger I'll never meet decided this was worth their money.
I don't know who they are. I never will.
But that single payment kept me going more than any download count.

What I Learned

Free tier design matters more than code quality. 5 people was useless. 20 people made the app actually usable.
Privacy is valuable — but hard to communicate. "100% offline" means different things to different people.
Localization ≠ distribution. 15 languages from day one didn't automatically bring users.
Shipping globally is emotionally brutal. You release into silence. Most days, nothing happens.
One real customer beats a thousand downloads. That $9.99 from a stranger meant more than I expected.

What's Next

Store page conversion is probably the weak link.
I'm starting by rewriting the first screenshot copy.

And I'm sharing more openly now.
This post is part of that.

Forgetting names isn't a memory problem.
It's a human relationship problem.
I'll keep improving this until it reaches the people who need it.

NameMemory

For colleagues, clients, and everyone whose name
you really should remember.
100% offline. Your data never leaves your phone.

I'm a 47yo Japanese introvert dev. I built an offline memory-aid app with AI because I kept forgetting names.

KasamiWorks — Mon, 22 Dec 2025 10:41:09 +0000

Hi Dev Community! 👋

I've been an enterprise system developer in Japan for 20 years, but I'm a total beginner when it comes to mobile apps & English.

As I got older, I started forgetting people's names, which was terrifying for an introvert like me.
So, I decided to fix this problem myself. I used Cursor (AI) to build an app called "NameMemory" in just 4 months.

📱 What I built

NameMemory: A privacy-focused app to help you remember names.
Tech Stack: Flutter + Riverpod + SQLite
Features:
- Supports 16 languages 🌍
- Works 100% offline (data stays on your device) 🔒
- Quiz mode to train your memory 🧠

It was a tough journey (struggling with Android notifications and OS differences...), but I rediscovered the joy of coding.

I'd love your feedback!

⬇️ Download Links

🍎 iOS: App Store Link
🤖 Android: Google Play Link
🌐 Official Site: NameMemory Web

DEV Community: KasamiWorks