The best time to create an app was ten years ago. The second-best time is now.

I still can remember that day when a friend shared something he read in the news that morning. A 10 years old boy created an app and sold it to Yahoo for Millions of dollars.

I was amazed. Is that even possible, was my first reaction. Can you really create something from the comfort of your home and sell that for millions of dollars?

A bit embarrassing, but that was the first time I even came to learn that applications were made out of code.

So I went home and the next thing I did was play video games. Yep, that’s it. I totally forgot about that boy. And no, this isn’t the kind of story where I tell you that I totally immersed myself in programming. I wish I had, but I didn’t.

Why am I telling you all this?

So why am I even telling you this story, you might be asking. Well, that’s because of this article I stumbled upon. It states that nearly 1,000 App store developers earned their first 1,000,000 dollars in 2021.

This means that 10 years after I heard about that boy who created that app and sold it for millions of dollars to Yahoo, there are still people making a decent living from iOS development.

And the most astonishing part is that this number even doubled in the past five years. Meaning that if you’re an indie software developer who is thinking about giving up because you haven’t seen any result in the past years, you definitely should stick to it.

But there is something you should keep in mind

This sounds like great news, and it absolutely is. If you’re a software developer who loves creating stuff then I should highly recommend you dive into creating an app that solves some kind of problem.

But there are some things you should keep in mind.

The first one is that you will not be the only one doing this. With the rise of websites like Codecademy and FreeCodeCamp the amount of developers is increasing every single day. You and thousands of others are competing against each other to secure that App Store monetization spot.

So after all, you should give up and forget about making a living from iOS (or any kind of) development. Right?

The answer is NO

Let me ask you a question. How many athletes are out there trying to become number one in their field? The answer is thousands, if not millions. Some people train day and night, put blood Sweat, and tears in their endeavor to win that gold medal and end up not winning a thing.

Does that stop them from doing the things they love most? Not a single moment. They train, entertain and fail, they train, entertain and fail, they train, entertain and fail. And keep doing this for years.

Adopt a similar mindset

I know how hard and frustrating it can be. And you might have way more on your plate than just writing code. Some people need to provide for their families, raise kids, work a 9 to 5, and find those midnight hours to write code.

But you need to adopt a similar mindset to those athletes who keep trying no matter how many times fail.

One more thing

Before you go, I have one thing that might interest you. I write a lot on the internet, but when it comes to those golden nuggets, I like to share them with my friends first. So make sure to join the club by subscribing here to my email list!