After WWDC26, Reselecting What an Indie Should Build Right Now
Now that on-device AI is free for small developers, the premises of app planning have quietly shifted. Here are five questions to choose what to build with Rork at the concept stage.
Routing inference on-device first and escaping to the cloud only when it's worth it, in a Rork app
Build a tiered, fallback-based inference router in a Rork (Expo) app: cache to on-device to Private Cloud Compute to a remote API (Claude/Gemini). Working TypeScript covering budgets, timeouts, caching, and image routing.
Designing Empty States Properly in Your Rork App — First Run, After Deletion, and Network Errors in One Component
When you build an app from a prompt in Rork, only the data-filled screens tend to look polished. Here is how to build the first-run, post-deletion, and network-error empty states into one reusable component, with retry logic, screen-reader support, and effectiveness measurement.
You Only Get to Ask Once — Implementing a Notification Soft-Ask in Your Rork App to Lift Opt-In
On iOS, once a user denies the notification prompt you can never show it again. In a Rork (Expo) app, instead of firing the system prompt on launch, we add our own soft-ask screen and only request permission once the value has landed. Built with expo-notifications, covering Android 13 POST_NOTIFICATIONS, a recovery path after denial, and opt-in measurement.
Design the Exit Before You Commit to a No-Code Mobile Platform
When you build an app business on a no-code tool, the first thing to plan is not the features but whether you can ever leave. Here is how to weigh lock-in risk for Rork and Rork Max from a portability standpoint.
Raising Your Subscription Price: How to Handle Existing Subscribers on the App Store and Google Play
Raise your subscription price without losing existing subscribers: break-even churn math, store consent flows, PRICE_INCREASE and EXPIRED handling, and cohort tracking.
Keeping a Rork-Built Expo App Ready for Kotlin Migration — Design Notes After Android Studio's Migration Agent Announcement
Android Studio's new agent can migrate React Native apps to native Kotlin. Here is how I restructured a Rork-built Expo app to stay migration-ready: a native dependency audit script, a portable core layer pattern, and a readiness checklist.
When and How to Remove Features Nobody Uses — Auditing and Safely Retiring Functionality in Rork-Built Apps
Unused features quietly make an app harder to maintain. A field-tested playbook from running six wallpaper apps in parallel — how to measure feature usage, decide what to retire, and remove functionality in three safe stages with Remote Config.
When Hiragana Doesn't Match Katakana — Japanese-Aware In-App Search for Rork Apps
A hiragana query silently missing katakana titles is a UX failure users never report. How I fixed Japanese search in my wallpaper app with NFKC normalization, kana folding, and precomputed search keys.
A Three-Layer AI Cost Design for Rork Apps After Apple Opened Foundation Models to Small Developers
Apple now offers Foundation Models on Private Cloud Compute at no charge for developers under two million first downloads. Here is a three-layer cost architecture for Rork apps, with a simulation script and working bridge code.
Keeping Manual Fixes Alive Across Rork Regenerations — Boundary Design for AI-Owned Code
A tiny copy-change request quietly reverted my week-old ATT fix. Here is the boundary architecture I use now: a guarded directory, one-line adapters, patch assets, and scoped prompts — with measured blast-radius numbers.
Android 17 Will Ignore Your Portrait Lock — Getting Rork-Built Expo Apps Ready for Large Screens Ahead of Time
Android 17 stops honoring orientation locks and resizability restrictions on large-screen devices. Here is how I assessed the impact on my Rork-built Expo apps, reworked the layouts, and verified everything with nothing but an emulator.