Gratitude Garden

General app idea
UI for typing your grateful thought
UI for recording your grateful thougth
Garden growth progression
Paywall to unlock garden level 15+
UI for checking your past activity
First page of onboarding
Screenshot without device borders (as required in additional info section)
App icon (as required in additional info section)

Inspiration

Toxic comparison with other people's life has become a widespread problem. Social media magnifies it by encouraging people to chase carefully curated images of other people’s lives. This can make us overlook the many blessings already present in our own lives. I built Gratitude Garden to help people shift their attention away from comparison and develop a daily gratitude habit.

What it does

Each day, users can write or record a grateful thought. Maintaining the habit builds a streak and grows a virtual garden that represents their progress. If they miss a day, the garden begins to deteriorate, creating a visual reminder to return. Users can also revisit previous entries and recordings.

How we built it

Gratitude Garden is a native iOS app built with SwiftUI, SwiftData, and RealityKit. SwiftData stores written entries and voice recordings locally, while RealityKit renders the interactive 3D garden. Although AI assisted with parts of the coding process, every one of the garden’s 28 three-dimensional growth stages was designed and assembled manually. The app also includes daily reminder notifications, analytics and crash reporting with PostHog and a paid subscription with RevenueCat which unlocks garden levels 15+,

What we learned

I learned that progress in apps does not always need to be represented by numbers alone. A visual element that evolves with the user’s progress can make it feel more noticeable and rewarding. In our app this is implemented by growing the garden in relation to the user's daily streak.

What's next for Gratitude Garden

The app still has a lot of room for improvement. I would like to expand the garden with more levels, environments, plants, seasonal changes. The long-term goal is to make Gratitude Garden a small daily space that helps people fill their life with gratitude, notice the good already present in their lives, and build a healthier perspective on life, one day at a time.