Week 1 of building my side project in public. 200 users, 2000 games, one big lesson.
A bit of context: I'm a customer success manager by day. Daily IQ is a side project I'd wanted to build for months.
The problem I had: I'd wake up, reach for my phone, and lose 30-45 minutes to Instagram before my brain was even fully online. By the time I got to real work, the sharpest version of me was already gone.
So I built Daily IQ. 3 brain games per day. Logic, memory, perception. Takes 5 minutes. Tracks your IQ score over time. The pitch is simple: do this before Instagram, see if your day shifts.
I soft-launched a week ago to family and friends. Some real numbers from week 1:
- 200+ people played
- 2,000+ games in the first 24 hours
- Average 7 games per user on launch day
The thing I didn't expect: by day 3, the top feedback wasn't "add more games" or "make it harder." It was "I want to see what my friends got."
A bunch of people also said "you should make this a real app." I almost did. Then I realized they didn't want a native app, they wanted a reason to come back. So I shipped friend leaderboards instead. Took 2 days.
Now you can invite friends with a 6-character code, see their daily IQ on a shared leaderboard, and compete on today's score.
Stack: Next.js 16, Tailwind, Postgres on Vercel, Resend for emails. PWA so it works on any device. Built largely with Claude Code.
The thing I'm still figuring out:
- Most people who try it once don't share it
- The people who share it bring 2-3 friends each
- The gap between those two groups is basically the whole game
If anyone wants to try: dailyiq.app
I'd love any feedback on:
- The first 30 seconds: is it obvious what to do?
- Hard mode: too hard, too easy, just right?
- Anything that made you bounce
Thanks for reading.