I chose to build in public as a solo developer because doing the work quietly was not getting it in front of anyone, and a finished app nobody knows about is just a private project. The decision was practical, not idealistic. I do not particularly enjoy posting online. I do it because building alone in silence is a reliable way to ship things that never get found, and I would rather solve that problem early than keep wondering why nothing happens on launch day.
This is an honest account of why I build in public under softDev23, what I actually get out of it, and where the usual advice oversells it. I am not going to tell you it transformed everything, because it did not. But it changed enough things in useful ways that I keep doing it, even though it is not my natural instinct.
→RelatedWhat I Learned Launching My First iOS App as a Solo DeveloperBuilding in silence does not solve the discovery problem
The core reason I build in public is that building something good does not make people find it. This is the lesson that surprised me most as a solo developer. I had a quiet assumption that quality would carry the work, that a useful app would somehow surface on its own. It does not. The App Store is full of good apps nobody has heard of.
Discovery is a separate problem from quality, and it does not solve itself. You can build the best small app in your niche and have it sit at zero because no one knows it exists. The work of being found is its own work, and it does not start at launch. It starts long before, by giving people a reason to know who you are and what you are making.
Building in public is the cheapest way I have found to work on that discovery problem continuously instead of cramming it into a launch week that nobody is watching. Every post about what I am building is a small, ongoing investment in not being invisible later.
The alternative I had been running was the silent version: build the thing, ship it, and hope. That plan has a single point of failure, which is launch day. If nobody is paying attention on that one day, the work just sits there. Spreading the effort out over weeks of small posts removes that single point of failure. It is the difference between betting everything on one moment and building a little momentum the whole way through.
It creates accountability without a boss
Building in public gives me accountability that I do not otherwise have as a solo developer. When you work alone, there is no team waiting on you, no manager checking in, and no external pressure to finish anything. That freedom is nice until it becomes the reason projects quietly stall for months.
Saying out loud what I am working on creates a small, useful pressure to actually do it. It is not dramatic. Nobody is going to be upset if I miss something. But having said it, it changes the internal math just enough to keep me moving. A goal that exists only in my head is easy to renegotiate. A goal I mentioned publicly is slightly harder to quietly abandon.
I want to be clear, this is mild accountability, not magic. Posting that you will do something does not make you do it. But for me, it tips the balance on the days I might otherwise drift, and over months, those days add up.
Feedback comes earlier and cheaper
Building in public means I hear what people think before an app is finished, instead of after. This is the practical benefit that is easy to underrate. When you build quietly and launch, all your feedback arrives at once, at the end, when changing things is most expensive. When you build in public, small pieces of feedback arrive along the way, when changes are still cheap.
Someone pointing out a confusing idea, a feature that does not make sense, or a problem I had not considered is worth far more before I have built around it. It is much easier to change direction at the idea stage than after I have written and tested a feature nobody wanted. Showing the work in progress turns feedback from a post-launch verdict into an ongoing input.
The catch is that you have to actually show real work and ask real questions, not just broadcast updates. Feedback comes when you give people something specific to react to. Vague progress posts get vague responses. Concrete questions get useful ones.
It builds a small audience over time, slowly
Building in public slowly builds a group of people who know what I am doing, and that group is the closest thing a solo developer has to a launch advantage. I want to be honest about the word slowly here, because the build-in public advice online tends to skip it. There is no fast version of this for most people. It is a slow accumulation of people who have seen the work and have some reason to care.
But slow is not the same as pointless. The difference between launching to people who already know you and launching to no one is enormous, and you only get the first version by putting in the time before you need it. Every app I ship from now on launches to slightly more people than the last one, because building in public means I am not starting from zero each time.
This is the long game, and it only works if you keep showing up. A burst of posting followed by silence builds nothing. Consistency over a long time builds the audience. That is unglamorous, and it is also the actual mechanism.
Why I build in public even though I dislike posting
I build in public despite not enjoying social media because the alternative is worse for the business. I do not post because I love it. I post because being invisible is a bigger problem than being slightly uncomfortable, and as a solo developer, I cannot afford to ignore the part of the job that gets the work seen.
The way I make it sustainable is by treating it as part of the work rather than as a separate hobby I have to feel inspired for. I do not wait to feel like posting. I have a rhythm, I keep it light, and I try not to let it expand into something that eats the time I should be spending building. The goal is consistency I can maintain, not a volume that burns me out and then stops entirely.
This matters because the most common way build in public fails is not bad posts. It is quitting. People start strong, treat it as a performance, exhaust themselves, and disappear. A quieter pace I can keep for years beats an intense pace I abandon in a month. Boring and sustained wins.
Where the build-in-public advice oversells it
Building in public is useful, but a lot of the advice around it promises outcomes it cannot deliver. It will not make a mediocre app succeed. It will not create an audience overnight. It will not replace the actual work of building something people want. If the underlying product is not useful, posting about it just means more people watch it not work.
It is also not the same as marketing on its own. Showing your process is one part of getting found, but it does not remove the need to think about who the app is for, why they would use it, and how they would ever come across it. Building in public is a habit that supports those things. It is not a substitute for them.
So I would temper expectations. If you go in expecting a slow, compounding way to stop being invisible and to get earlier feedback, you will probably be satisfied. If you go in expecting it to launch you, you will probably be disappointed and quit, which is the one outcome that guarantees it does not work.
What it actually comes down to
The honest reason I build in public as a solo developer is that it is the most sustainable way I have found to solve problems I cannot ignore: being discovered, staying accountable, and getting feedback early. None of those problems solves itself, and building quietly leaves all three unsolved. Posting about the work consistently and without overthinking it chips away at all three at once.
It is not my favorite part of the job, and I am not going to pretend it is. But it is a part of the job, the same way the App Store listing and the testing and the boring setup are parts of the job. The apps are the work I enjoy. Building in public is the work that gives the apps a chance to be found. I do it because both have to happen, and only one of them happens on its own.
If you are a solo developer sitting on work nobody knows about, that is the case for it. Not inspiration, just arithmetic. Quiet good work plus no audience equals no result. Building in public is how I am trying to change one side of that equation, slowly, one post at a time.
