I built Notely, an AI transcription app for iOS, Android, and Mac, mostly on my own alongside a full time UX role. Writing the code was the straightforward bit. The real work turned out to be everywhere else.
A few things that surprised me:
Transcription quality is a moving target. Getting a model to transcribe speech is one thing. Getting it to reliably avoid hallucinating words that were never said, across different languages and accents, is a different problem entirely. I spent far more time on quality evaluation and model routing than on the actual feature building.
Naming your product is a legal minefield. I have been dealing with an intellectual property dispute over the app name, and it has taught me more about trademark law than I ever expected to know. If you are picking a name for your side project, please check registered trademarks first. It will save you a headache later.
Pricing is genuinely hard. I went through churn analysis and restructured subscription tiers more than once, trying to find something fair for users and sustainable for me. There is no formula for this, only trial and error.
Distribution and support never stop. Once the app is live, the coding work becomes a small fraction of the total effort. Reviews, support requests, App Store policy changes, all of it needs attention continuously.
If anyone here is building a side project, happy to answer questions about any of this. What has surprised you most about shipping something on your own?