Recappel

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Why we built Recappel

We use more apps than ever. But how often do we stop and notice what they've actually helped us do?

On the other side are developers pouring time and care into great products—only to struggle to explain their value when a customer reaches the paywall or decides whether to renew. Sometimes the value is there. It just isn't visible.

We wanted to make that connection clearer. Help customers look back at what they've received and decide whether a product is worth continuing with. Help developers give their work a better chance to be understood, appreciated and supported.

The inspiration

Spotify Wrapped kept coming up in conversations with people we knew. Even with other music apps available, that yearly look back was something they loved about Spotify. It made listening feel like a personal journey, not just another subscription.

That stayed with us. Why should an experience like that be out of reach for a small team building a reading app, a learning tool or a fitness product?

The tools we explored often felt geared toward marketing campaigns, rather than telling a customer's own story. Costs also became harder to justify as audiences grew. We wanted a more accessible way for developers to create something beautiful, personal and grounded in real value.

What Recappel does

Recappel brings a visual story builder and an SDK together. Connect your app, bring in its brand and artwork, choose meaningful values, and turn them into an in-app recap.

Edit the wording, colours and layouts. Add or rearrange cards. Save a version, test it in Sandbox, and publish when you're ready. AI-assisted rewriting helps with the words, but the developer stays in control.

In Pageling, that means bringing a reader's books, highlights, genres and progress together. In another app, it could be a completely different journey. The story should feel like it belongs to that product—and to the person using it.

How we built it

We built the mobile Builder with React Native, Expo and TypeScript, backed by Supabase and PostgreSQL. The Builder and connected apps use the same SDK renderer. RevenueCat handles Recappel's developer subscriptions; integrating apps can keep their own billing provider.

The biggest challenge was making the whole flow work together: editing, saving, previewing and playing a story inside another app, while protecting customer data and keeping tests separate from live delivery.

We learned that beautiful presentation only matters if the story is trustworthy. Missing data shouldn't become an achievement, and a story shouldn't be credited with improving retention without evidence. Recappel supports measuring declared outcomes against a holdout group when enough valid data is available.

What's next

We're starting with React Native. We want to bring Recappel to Swift, Kotlin, Flutter and more, with a growing library of templates and seasonal stories.

The ambition is to become a Canva for in-app stories: a place where developers of any size can easily create something their customers look forward to seeing.

Still early. Plenty to refine. But that's the idea behind Recappel: make the value people already receive easier to see.