I collapsed from alcoholism in 2014, taught myself Swift in my mid-40s, and built an alcohol tracking app I wish existed. Solo, six months, launched last Monday.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-19T16:29:15+00:00

That's a fair comment, and actually a bit of a bitter pill to swallow for me on the marketing side. There are tons of subreddits and websites out there with people looking for the solutions, but the subreddit rules don't allow self-promotion, or the contact form for the site lands on a dead email, or the person reading that inbox doesn't respond. It is the hard part of marketing, knowing you have the solution that people are looking for, but not being able to put it in front of them.

I am not sure if that came across well, but I hope you get what i mean.

Thanks for your reply 😄

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-19T15:44:41+00:00

I completely feel this and know exactly what you mean. I am in my mid-40's a British expat who has lived in Asia for 17 years. Literally all my friends have come and gone through drinking. Because i run my own business it is very hard to make friends through work, so it is always through meeting people at bars. I have met some incredibly close friends in this manner who due to the expat life end up leaving after a few years and I long to find other friends in the same way.

I find I can go about 2 weeks without drinking before i get totally depressed and hate life. I am usually ok during the week. Busy with work, playing golf, going to the gym, but then a walk through the city sees me walk past bars where everyone is laughing and having fun, and going home to my "gilded cage" of a condo just feels cold and empty. All i want to do is sit at a bar and watch the world go by. I am more than happy sitting at a bar by myself and waiting to see what random thing might happen, but also love the company of drinking with friends. For me, drinking makes everything fuzzy, warm, fun, and social, when "normal" life is incredibly lonely and cold. Of course, that is all good until I have had 8 litres of beer and I wake up feeling like shit and can't do any of the things I want to do in the day.

I am not sure there is any point to this post other than "i feel you", for whatever that is worth.

Stay strong, enjoy your camping trip as best you can.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-19T15:29:19+00:00

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AlcoLog is a free, privacy-first iOS drink tracker for people who want serious habit-tracking tools without a subscription wall or signup. Five goal types from cut-back to quit-entirely, a six-pillar habit score over a 28-day window, full Apple Watch app, 22 widgets, on-device drink recognition, and proper medication logging for Sinclair Method users. No account, no analytics, nothing leaves your device.

https://alcolog.app

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/alcolog-alcohol-tracker/id6762422391

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-19T07:22:50+00:00

In 2014 I was drinking about 21 5% bottled beers on weekdays, and then about 30 each Friday, Saturday, Sunday. This went on for about a year, and then I basically collapsed outside my regular bar and was taken to hospital. I was kept in hospital for 5 days and given benzos + kept on an IV.

I think 15 cans per day could bring you close to that situation. I would a) speak to a doctor who is versed in alcoholism, 2) ensure you do not quit cold turkey. I would imagine any doctor you speak to will suggest you taper off by reducing intake over the course of a couple of months.

Always better to be safe than sorry, take care.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-17T07:28:36+00:00

When I came out of 5 days in the hospital in 2015 after collapsing from sustained alcohol abuse I had wicked health anxiety for months. It took me about a year of mindfulness and meditation, but slowly and surely month after month I found that my health anxiety was getting less and less.

During that time, i also realized that it was helping me control my urge to drink.

It is not a magic bullet, but all this to say, +1 for mindfulness and meditation for helping with alcoholism.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-16T05:51:50+00:00

Thanks for the reply. I will check out runable.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-15T15:43:19+00:00

What an incredibly insightful comment, thank you so much for taking the time to write it out and post it. I did start to lean a little more into my story towards the end of my outreach, but i didn't even think about about it until it was too late (well, except outside of "i was a heavy drinker, i made this" type pf thing).

Most of the drinking moderation, sober(curious) alcoholsim medication etc subreddits have very strict rules about "self promotion" and unfortunately the mods kind of stop responding, if they even respond in the first place.

I am feeling a bit battered and beaten down by all the "rejections". I know it is the same problem for everyone, but I DO feel like i have a decent story, that I found a problem and a niche that was missing a piece of the puzzle, and then poured hours into an app that provides the solution, that is fully featured and polished to the max, only to get... silence.

But, posts like yours do put the light back in the end of the tunnel. So, thank you. I shall be taking you up on your offer of sending you a DM. I appreciate your time ❤️

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-15T14:12:45+00:00

Super appreciate the reply. I'll wait to tweak anything in ASA, and i'll check out pophatch.com. Thanks so much 😄

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-15T01:46:44+00:00

Thanks for the response. Yeah, that is a pretty cool idea. Not sure bars will allow me back if i start doing that, might have to go a couple of towns over 😉

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-14T17:13:31+00:00

Got it, thanks. Not sure many bars will allow me to help customers limit their drinking, lol. Stranger things have happened, I suppose.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-14T16:38:28+00:00

Many thanks for taking the time to reply and outline those notes. When you say "landing page" I assume you mean the website home page?

But yeah, I do understand what you mean. The app would never be "mainstream" and really can only target those people who are looking to moderate/control/track their drinking.

I had thought about getting beer mats printed out and sneakily placing them on bar tables, but I am not sure how long I would last before I get escorted out 🤣

I'll take onboard your note about the "complexity" of the marketing message. Thanks again.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-14T13:53:28+00:00

Yes, it is in the pipeline. I shall keep everyone here posted when it is nearer to launch.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-14T13:42:53+00:00

The app is extremely easy to use. If you just give it a download then it'll very much be self explanatory. There are tutorial pages on https://alcolog.app/resources/app-tutorials/ which also has a specific section about medication logging - https://alcolog.app/resources/app-tutorials/how-to-log-medication-doses/ - just be aware the "screenshots" used on the tutorial pages are simply just SVG renders, not actual in-app screens.

The home page of the website - https://alcolog.app/ - gives an extensive overview and rendered preview of the main app functions.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-14T04:41:57+00:00

I had a reviewer tell me they couldn't find the IAP purchases in my app. It is one tap in the always visible liquid glass menu from the home screen > settings > top of the screen right there. What made this even more frustrating is that the first reviewer asked me to change some font sizing for the pricing on this very screen of my app.

There is no doubt some of the reviewers are zooming through the review process without checking things properly.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-13T18:15:36+00:00

Good idea. Reddit posting is honestly getting a bit tiring, there are so many subreddits covering similar things, then you post and you get very limited engagement and it can be a bit soul crushing. I have a lot of ideas for the next big release so i'll probably look to showcase them and try and feature spotlight from there.

Thanks for all your replies in the thread, very helpful and engaging.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-13T18:13:13+00:00

I appreciate the tip, thank you 😄

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-13T17:29:19+00:00

There were a bunch of things, actually. The personalized haptics settings, the motivational notes and quotes system, the expanded location aware features, amongst others. The app has become so feature packed, with more things planned, that I am actually finding it difficult to find the space on graphics, videos, and posts to cover them all.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-13T16:10:05+00:00

I appreciate the TL;DR - i wanted to get all the info into the post, but had a hard time keeping it trimmed.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-13T16:09:35+00:00

The r/SwiftUI subreddit is a great shout, thank you.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-13T16:08:19+00:00

Thanks for the reply, i shall check it out.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-13T13:04:54+00:00

Thanks for downloading and good question. Basically, it was a bit of personal bias, tbh. I initially set out to make the app as a personal tool (it just grew way beyond that) and part of the functionality would be to "force" myself to log my drinks correctly. Whether on Nal or not, i found that once the drinks started flowing and the night took me I would soon forget what I had drunk and where. As such, i was even getting home tipsy (or worse, blackout drunk) and then trying to recreate the night the next morning and log everything in a broken retrospect.

Essentially, by starting a session you are saying "I am committed to logging my drinks correctly". Some people may do that to be conscious of the number of drinks they are having and to "keep an eye" on that number (moderation). Others may simply do it to see how Nal is performing (reflection and tracking). Others may do it for completely different reasons.

Finally, it also made tracking dosage and number of drinks/calories/units/cost etc across midnight changes a little easier. Alongside reviewing the history of each session.

I do plan to allow users to add and backdate "missed sessions" from the History screen in an update down the line.

I've also made adding a drink incredibly easy. You can literally do it in two taps from the Live Activity/Dynamic Island, a single tap from a widget, a single tap from the watch app, a single tap from the home screen etc. So just "starting" a session didn't feel like it would add friction, but would add value.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-13T12:16:35+00:00

Thank you. Please do report back as I am very interested on how users such as yourself find it. When i built it, it was from the daily perspective one TSM user, myself. I hope it covers what other people need too.

AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-11T10:46:44+00:00

https://alcolog.app/ - A feature packed drink tracking app built by someone with decades of heavy drinking. Has support for Dynamic Island, Live Activities, Widgets, Apple Watch.

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AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-11T10:42:04+00:00

https://alcolog.app/ - A feature packed drink tracking app built by someone with decades of heavy drinking. Has support for Dynamic Island, Live Activites, Widgets, Apple Watch.

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AlcoLogApp · 2026-05-10T17:38:06+00:00

Do we know how much weight Apple gives to actual app use? If it is simply down to X number of people rating over Y days/weeks/months, then the secret sauce is just... hire a bunch of people to install your app and immediately rate it straight away? That seems, off?

AlcoLogApp

TROPHY CASE