Manu

I like eating out and traveling 🙂 So I'm building an app that helps me actually do it. Posting the whole build, bugs included.

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

New version available on the App Store finally🙃

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

Making the chat less of a chat.

Left is where I'm going, right is what it looks like today. The idea is that apart from the improvement of UX/UI, planning is actually the central piece of the chat, and you have a lot of different modes of doing it.

Thought?

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

@b4dgerr hahaha that's insane

i don't even know how you consume all that, I struggle to use my 200 Claude and 100 Codex

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

@michal_liszcz @imeronn Hope six is your lucky number like it was mine hahaha

let me know when you get an update

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

@kidtsang Thanks man🙂, I’ll work on the community, I had never thought about it.

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

Week 58 building XPLORE:

✅ Launched Lists and the new Messages screen. Planning is now at the core of the app.

❌ Still no in-app reservations. We need more traction before third-party providers approve us.

📊 99 MAU (monthly active users). Almost double what we had two weeks ago 🙂.

💡 Realized it’s better to spend more time marketing the app than building more features.

🔜 This week: rebuilding the AI travel system and launching Premium.

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

@adilkhan8th Madrid, and the reason is boring: you can leave the house at 11pm on a Tuesday and something is open hahaha (also the sun and the language play a big part)

Worth testing that in any city you are considering. Not the museums, the Tuesday nights.

which one are you picking?

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

@theralkia Madrid (my city) never shows up on these lists and I think it's because people do it in two days on a layover.

worth giving a city one full weekday instead of a weekend, it's a completely different place when nobody is on holiday.

what made London a never again for you?

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

@GHRadio_Mavrick Congrats man, the presenting part is the bit nobody warns you about hahaha

took me 14 months to ship mine and showing it was still worse than building it. The fear does not scale down with the size of the thing.

how did the team take it?

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

@flornkm rebuilt our messaging from scratch last week and half that work was just removing spinners

worth adding that the worst loading state is the one where other people are waiting on you to finish, not you waiting on the app hahahah

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

what are you using for analytics in a small app?

I've started vibe coding my own dashboard because most tools I tried stop at screen views and taps. I care more about what happens after: do people save the plan, share it, invite friends?

is there something better out there I'm missing, or is building your own a bad idea? curious what you're all on.

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

@pcshipp Congrats 🙂

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

what are you using for push notifications?

my app is about making plans with friends, so a normal push just gets lost in the pile. Trying live activities right now, because they seem to be very eye-catching.

anyone shipped those?

[Kevin Xu @kevinxu]

so much is happening in AI rn you basically have to be unemployed to keep up

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

I rebuilt our whole messaging system from scratch last week because I hated it. 14 months in and i'm still deleting things I was proud of hahahah
does this stop at some point?

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

I do this in reverse. I live in Madrid and the restaurants with the best terrace in the centre are the ones no local eats at.
My rule when I travel is to ask someone who works in the city, not someone who is paid to host me. Waiters,
baristas, the guy in the bike shop. And I ask where they eat on a Tuesday, not where they take visitors. Different answer every time.

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

@floguo I spent 14 months on one app and almost none of the hard part was code. The hard
part was deciding what not to build. Anyone can copy a feature in a weekend.
Nobody can copy why you picked that feature over the other nine. That reason is
the whole product.

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

@TTrimoreau Travel planning app

[Manu @xplorewithmanu]

@JustinasRoland0 Most of the times even if you are verified 😂