How I Built It: $400K/Month iOS App
Yoni Smolyar, a former corporate software engineer, explains how his gamified screen time app Brainrot grew from about $10K to $400K a month, and the steps he would take building apps in 2026.
The gist
-
Smolyar built 100,000 to 150,000 Instagram followers before launch, teased a waitlist, and says the app made about $10,000 on day one.
-
He recommends constant small experiments, like reordering onboarding slides, noting nine out of 10 won't matter but one can change your trajectory.
-
For a first app, he advises a simple utility solving one core problem you have yourself, avoiding crowded spaces and trend chasing.
-
Smolyar urges getting a co-founder and says founders should find the changes worth 20% to 100% and delegate the small stuff.
"Step three, I recommend understand exactly what your users are doing in your app. Analytics should be sampled and sent to some kind of analytics provider like Mixpanel or PostHog, and you should let Claude or Codex have at it and really understand what your users are doing."
▶ Play at 7:28"You should let Claude or Codex have at it and really understand what your users are doing... We use Claude Code and Codex for various coding and internal business stuff."
▶ Play at 7:3897 creators recommend it, including Riley Brown, Claire Vo, and Dan Shipper.
See all on the Codex pageWhat they recommend · 2 picks
"Step three, I recommend understand exactly what your users are doing in your app. Analytics should be sampled and sent to some kind of analytics provider like Mixpanel or PostHo..."
"You should let Claude or Codex have at it and really understand what your users are doing... We use Claude Code and Codex for various coding and internal business stuff."
Made by someone on this episode
Also mentioned
Ads in this episode
120+ Businesses You Can Start With Less Than $500. They're paid, so we keep them out of the picks above.
See what Starter recommends without being paid →Related episodes
Episodes covering similar topics
More from Starter Story