Founder Playbook · Sub Club by RevenueCat
9 tactics from David Barnard
How To Make a Living as a Solo App Developer in 2022
Watch the full episode“The subscription model has opened up the opportunity for smaller niche apps to make enough money to make a living off of.”
Subscriptions Opened the Door for Solo Indie Apps to Make a Real Living
Before subscriptions, indie app economics were brutal — one-time purchases meant constant churn of new buyers just to stay flat. The recurring subscription model changed the math entirely: even a small niche app with a few thousand paying subscribers generates steady, compound revenue. This is the structural shift that made solo app development a viable career in the 2020s, not just a side project.
“If your goal is to be the next headspace you're building a different product you need to start with some level of funding because yes competing and growing is going to be brutally hard.”
Don't Try to Be the Next Headspace — You Need Funding for That Game
Trying to compete head-on with category-defining apps like Headspace, Calm, or Duolingo as a solo developer is a losing bet. Those products require massive marketing spend, brand-building, and content investment that only VC funding can fuel. The indie path requires a different strategy entirely — one where you do not need to win a category, just serve a specific audience well enough that they pay.
“If you're a developer and you want to make a go at being an indie developer and making a good living on the app store instead go the opposite direction go really really niche but in a niche that people are willing to spend money and that people find valuable.”
Go Really Really Niche — Find an Audience That Happily Pays
The indie app winning strategy is extreme niche focus — not a narrow niche, but a niche where spending is already normalized. Hobbyists, professionals, and enthusiasts who spend thousands on their interest in the physical world will pay $10-50/year for a great app in their domain. The goal is to find where people already spend freely, then build the obvious app for that community.
“Fishing hobby people spend thousands tens of thousands of dollars on boats and trips and other stuff so if you're a solo developer looking to make a living right now go find a niche one where people are gonna find it valuable enough to spend money.”
Hobby Niches Where People Already Spend Thousands Are Gold for Indie App Revenue
The fishing analogy is instructive: people who spend $30K on a boat will not blink at a $50/year app subscription. The same applies to golf, hunting, woodworking, homebrewing, sailing, and dozens of other hobbies with dedicated spending. Evaluating a niche means looking not just at user count but at existing offline spend — a community that spends big offline will spend proportionally on a great digital tool.
“You need some level of built-in marketing you have to know how your app is going to get attention before you go build it.”
Know How Your App Will Get Attention Before You Build It
The 'build it and they will come' assumption kills indie apps. Before writing code, the question every solo developer should answer is: how will people discover this? The answer should be specific — an existing subreddit, a Facebook group, an annual conference, a YouTube channel, or an SEO angle. If there is no clear answer, that is a signal to keep searching for a better niche, not to build anyway.
“Don't go build an app and have this if-I-build-it-they-will-come kind of mentality — you need some level of built-in marketing.”
Distribution Built Into the Niche Beats Marketing Bolted On After Launch
Distribution is not a marketing problem to solve post-launch — it is an architectural decision made before building. The best solo app developers pick niches with inherent distribution: hobby communities that share app discoveries, professional networks with word-of-mouth, or content channels already producing the keywords users search. Niche selection and distribution planning are the same decision made simultaneously.
“In some ways it's easier in 2022 to make a living off of indie apps than it ever has been.”
Easier Than Ever to Make a Living on the App Store — If You Pick the Right Niche
Despite the crowded app store narrative, the structural conditions for indie app success have actually improved: subscriptions create steady income, developer tools are better, distribution channels like TikTok and Reddit reach niche communities cheaply, and platforms like RevenueCat removed infrastructure burden. The problem is not the market — it is picking the wrong niche or the wrong distribution angle.
“Go find a niche one where people are gonna find it valuable enough to spend money and then two where there is some form where you understand how you're going to get attention for it.”
Two Filters for a Viable Solo App Niche: Pays Money + Has Built-In Attention
The two-filter test for evaluating an indie app niche: first, do people in this community already pay for things they value? Second, is there an existing channel or community through which you can reach them without paid advertising? Both filters must pass. A passionate community that does not pay is a content project. A paying audience with no accessible channel is a distribution puzzle you may never solve.
“Apps are dead etc which of course is not true — it seems difficult to make a living off it with such a crowded app market.”
The App Store Is Not Dead — The Mass-Market Commodity App Is Dead
The 'apps are dead' narrative confuses the mass-market commodity problem with the indie niche opportunity. Generic productivity apps, generic social apps, generic fitness apps — those are brutally competitive. But a fishing log app, a woodworking calculator, a beekeeping tracker, or a surf forecast subscription? Those niches are not crowded and the competitive dynamics are completely different. The crowded market argument does not apply when you go narrow enough.