If I were drinking coffee at the time, this line would have made me spit it out in a fit of unbelievable laughter:
"- In our opinion, no coffee tool really captures the flavor, emotion, and aesthetic of great coffee—from a design perspective."
What does it mean to capture emotion in a coffee tool from a design perspective? You can't make this stuff up! Actually, I guess you can.
But anyway, I'm sure this comment section will be full of exclamation points (!) about how exciting this is and good luck and can't wait and this is amazing and wow thank you's and so on. Carry on.
rokeyzhang 3 hours ago [-]
Haha, fair enough! Totally see how that line might come across as a bit too “crafted.”
What we meant is: many tools are great on data, but few feel fun, delightful, or reflect how expressive coffee culture really is.
But yep, emotions are tricky to “design for”—we’re trying anyway
leetrout 54 minutes ago [-]
Em dashes in responses with tone like this are a hallmark of AI generated content these days.
number6 26 minutes ago [-]
Not Op, but I liked the em dash; I read an article here some years ago on when to use which and it is quite accessible on the phone; even made a Linux shortcut for it. I hope the semicolon won't be flagged as well ;)
ladidahh 2 hours ago [-]
I think the "My Tasted Notes" section captures it, that is a really nice looking screen
rokeyzhang 26 minutes ago [-]
Thanks for point this, we highlighted lots of features from individual perspective. Because coffee is very personal
desigooner 2 hours ago [-]
Just curios - Outside of "AI", what's the benefit of using your app over Beanconqueror (https://beanconqueror.com/), which is open source, has a lot of functionality built out already across multiple years and supports integrations with scales, refractometers, etc?
rokeyzhang 30 minutes ago [-]
Full respect to Beanconqueror! It’s an amazing tool for advanced coffee folks: open source, extremely customizable and supporting Bluetooth gear like scales and refractometers. We admire what they’ve built.
We’re trying things from a different angle:
We’re building for entry to mid-level coffee lovers—people who want to enjoy better coffee, stay organized, and reflect on their brews.
Most tracking apps start with forms.We start with senses, we thinking a lot what coffee looks like in our mind.
What makes BeanBook different:
- Snap-first design: No typing required.
- YouTube/photo to recipe
- Sensory-first interface
- Zero-config start
We want to build a Coffee app as a memory, not just numbers
We think there’s room for both kinds of tools:
Beanconqueror is like a cockpit for pros.
BeanBook is more like a beautifully illustrated notebook that fills itself in as you brew.
ladidahh 2 hours ago [-]
Not a coffee person, but the design of the app under "Coffee notes reimagined" looks great. However, I think your splash video isn't doing it justice, between the overlayed text and the glare from it being shot outside, I didn't get a sense of how great the UI is till that section down the page.
Best of luck!
rokeyzhang 1 hours ago [-]
Thanks so much for the honest feedback!
That’s super helpful—we hadn’t considered how the glare and text overlap could affect first impressions. We’ll rethink the first screen
whoamii 5 hours ago [-]
Why only accept Google/Apple accounts? Why even require an account? :(
rokeyzhang 4 hours ago [-]
Google/Apple sign-in is a simple and secure way to reduce spam and support account-based features down the road. And having a sustainable model helps us maintain the team and keep improving the product.
fennecbutt 4 hours ago [-]
Userbase for acquisition. We're on a site paid for by ycombinator remember.
rokeyzhang 4 hours ago [-]
Well explained, thank you!
3 hours ago [-]
mastazi 3 hours ago [-]
As a coffee aficionado I always wanted this, especially after one of my wine loving friends showed me the Vivino app. I've always wondered why we don't have a similar thing for coffee. Well done!
rokeyzhang 3 hours ago [-]
Thank you for the support! And yes—great point bringing up Vivino. It really sets a strong example of where we could go with BeanBook. Lots to learn from that model!
jeemusu 7 hours ago [-]
Looks great, hopefully you have plans to bring it to Android. I've been tracking every shot I pull in a coffee journal for the last 2-3 years. While I love writing it all down, it would be quite nice to have all the stats related to habits, trends, spending, etc. I think the biggest frustration I have with home espresso is when I pick up a bag of new beans that I've never tried before, or have no point of reference for, and end up wasting coffee getting it dialed in. It would be great if there was a way to see other peoples brew notes, especially people using similar coffee hardware.
rokeyzhang 6 hours ago [-]
Thanks—that’s great input, and really appreciate you sharing your experience! We’re definitely working toward that direction: tool-first, then building more ways for people to connect and share notes—especially around specific gear or beans.
And yes, Android is on our radar too!
rorylaitila 9 hours ago [-]
Congrats on the launch and good luck!
Back when I was home roasting as a hobby, I built a database to track my roast times and tasting notes. I thought it would be interesting to build a database of roast recipes and green bean sourcing, because that was the hardest to remember what I liked best.
As for purchased roasts, I just find a brand I like I stick to it. So not much for me to track.
rokeyzhang 9 hours ago [-]
Thanks for your feedback!
I’m home roasting too—using an entry-level FreshRoast SR800, which has been a ton of fun to learn on. I still buy from great roasters as well, since it’s a great way to rhetorically access to different processing methods and regions.
We also thought about home roasting. A few folks have mentioned wanting to log green bean origins, roast curves, and profiles—there’s a lot of potential there.
Right now, we’re focusing on making the bean & recipe tracking seamless for brewed coffee, we found good amount of people buying from roasters all around the world like us.
Appreciate you sharing your experience—it’s super helpful!
wmrio 7 hours ago [-]
Congrats on the launch! I have been making a similar app.
Happy for you for the launch, mad at my self for not finishing my side projects!
Cheers
Def will download and check it out. Thanks for sharing.
rokeyzhang 6 hours ago [-]
Thanks so much! Totally feel you on the side project struggle—it took us a while to get this one across the finish line too. Would love to hear more about what you were working on if you ever revisit it!
ChrisMarshallNY 2 hours ago [-]
Good luck!
For myself, I have done the whole shebang, Jamaican Blue Mountain, Tanzanian Peaberry, Mocha Yemen Mattari, Kona, etc.
Never did Catshit Coffee or Jura coffee machines, but I’ve invested in a lot.
But the last ten years or so, I have been buying 4 bags at a time (once a week), of Dunkin’ whole bean, and I’ve been using standard Braun Melitta-style coffeemakers.
I know, I know. I’m doomed to Coffee Hell for my blasphemy, but it really is the best coffee I’ve had. Home-roasted is better, but too high-maintenance for me.
wjgilmore 5 hours ago [-]
Amazing. Just downloaded! Excited to give it a spin!
wjgilmore 5 hours ago [-]
Just FYI the text in each screen of the onboarding flow is cut off on my iPhone 14. For example screen 3/3 says "How far have your beans".
rokeyzhang 4 hours ago [-]
Thanks for reporting this! We found on similar issue on SE screen, sorry for the buggy start will definitely fix in next update
rokeyzhang 4 hours ago [-]
Thank you! Glad you like it! Looking forward for your feedback!
radicaldreamer 6 hours ago [-]
Haven't tried it myself yet, but this looks really good!
rokeyzhang 6 hours ago [-]
Thanks for your interested, looking forward for your feedback!
spiralcoaster 3 hours ago [-]
Are you guys shouting at each other from across a crowded room?! I hope everything is OK!
Overwhelmingly excited to hear back from both of you!
easygenes 7 hours ago [-]
Nice app! Quick note of first thing I noticed: Would be nice to have a more detailed option for roast. In my case I have a DiFluid Omni and use it for roast analysis, so would like to be able to enter the data from it.
rokeyzhang 6 hours ago [-]
Thanks for the feedback!
Using a DiFluid Omni—you’re definitely a hardcore coffee enthusiast
We do have a notes feature attached to each bean, so you can always save that kind of data there for now. At the moment, we’re focused on building a solid foundation for entry- to mid-level coffee lovers, but deeper roast profiling and advanced tools like Omni integration are definitely on our radar.
4 hours ago [-]
garysahota93 6 hours ago [-]
I've been wanting to build this forever now... I LOVE IT!
Would love to connect & share more ideas that I don't have time to build myself + feedback
rokeyzhang 6 hours ago [-]
Thank you for your kind words! That means a lot
We’d absolutely love to connect! rokeyzhang@beanbook.app
dummyvariable 7 hours ago [-]
Do you have an Android version coming?
rokeyzhang 6 hours ago [-]
We just two person team, currently we trying to stabilize on iOS developing, then we’ll definitely looking for Android version, lots of people asked for this too!
amelius 5 hours ago [-]
A trivial idea that might help you: nowadays, you can easily build entire Android and iOS apps by using ChatGPT, even if you have no experience in either platform (though you will need some general programming experience to catch and work around occasional problems). Karpathy mentioned something similar in his recent talk.
rokeyzhang 5 hours ago [-]
Hah, thanks for the idea!
Over the past year of developing, we’ve been constantly surprised by what AI can do—and how much it’s accelerated our workflow. Hiring an AI Android dev is definitely a direction we’ll look into more seriously :D
Rendered at 04:11:30 GMT+0000 (UTC) with Wasmer Edge.
"- In our opinion, no coffee tool really captures the flavor, emotion, and aesthetic of great coffee—from a design perspective."
What does it mean to capture emotion in a coffee tool from a design perspective? You can't make this stuff up! Actually, I guess you can.
But anyway, I'm sure this comment section will be full of exclamation points (!) about how exciting this is and good luck and can't wait and this is amazing and wow thank you's and so on. Carry on.
But yep, emotions are tricky to “design for”—we’re trying anyway
We’re trying things from a different angle:
We’re building for entry to mid-level coffee lovers—people who want to enjoy better coffee, stay organized, and reflect on their brews.
Most tracking apps start with forms.We start with senses, we thinking a lot what coffee looks like in our mind.
What makes BeanBook different:
- Snap-first design: No typing required.
- YouTube/photo to recipe
- Sensory-first interface
- Zero-config start
We want to build a Coffee app as a memory, not just numbers
We think there’s room for both kinds of tools: Beanconqueror is like a cockpit for pros. BeanBook is more like a beautifully illustrated notebook that fills itself in as you brew.
Best of luck!
That’s super helpful—we hadn’t considered how the glare and text overlap could affect first impressions. We’ll rethink the first screen
And yes, Android is on our radar too!
Back when I was home roasting as a hobby, I built a database to track my roast times and tasting notes. I thought it would be interesting to build a database of roast recipes and green bean sourcing, because that was the hardest to remember what I liked best.
As for purchased roasts, I just find a brand I like I stick to it. So not much for me to track.
I’m home roasting too—using an entry-level FreshRoast SR800, which has been a ton of fun to learn on. I still buy from great roasters as well, since it’s a great way to rhetorically access to different processing methods and regions.
We also thought about home roasting. A few folks have mentioned wanting to log green bean origins, roast curves, and profiles—there’s a lot of potential there.
Right now, we’re focusing on making the bean & recipe tracking seamless for brewed coffee, we found good amount of people buying from roasters all around the world like us.
Appreciate you sharing your experience—it’s super helpful!
Happy for you for the launch, mad at my self for not finishing my side projects!
Cheers
Def will download and check it out. Thanks for sharing.
For myself, I have done the whole shebang, Jamaican Blue Mountain, Tanzanian Peaberry, Mocha Yemen Mattari, Kona, etc.
Never did Catshit Coffee or Jura coffee machines, but I’ve invested in a lot.
But the last ten years or so, I have been buying 4 bags at a time (once a week), of Dunkin’ whole bean, and I’ve been using standard Braun Melitta-style coffeemakers.
I know, I know. I’m doomed to Coffee Hell for my blasphemy, but it really is the best coffee I’ve had. Home-roasted is better, but too high-maintenance for me.
Overwhelmingly excited to hear back from both of you!
We do have a notes feature attached to each bean, so you can always save that kind of data there for now. At the moment, we’re focused on building a solid foundation for entry- to mid-level coffee lovers, but deeper roast profiling and advanced tools like Omni integration are definitely on our radar.
Would love to connect & share more ideas that I don't have time to build myself + feedback