The Leaderboard
Our ultra-fast Daily: Three takes on new products. Yesterday’s top ten launches. That’s it.
Notion gets new superpowers
You know you've made it when makers and startups build on top of your business.
We saw it in the early days of Product Hunt before we even offered an API. Twitter, Reddit, and Snap are just a few others that attracted a lot of developers unofficially tinkering on top of their platform early on.
Today we're seeing a rise in apps built to make Notion better.
Notion, the all-in-one workspace, has endeared itself to the tech community since 2016. In 2018 when they launched Notion 2.0, they hit #1 product of the month on PH, and by September 2019 they had over a million users. This April, Notion raised another $50 million at a $2 billion valuation. Quite the impressive two-year feat when you consider that when they launched Notion 2.0 on PH in 2018 they had less than 10 people on the team.
Here are a few of the companies building on top of Notion:
Super turns your Notion docs into a website. You can customize Notion docs with Google fonts, inject JS snippets for analytics or live chat, and customize social meta tags and images using Super.
Fruition makes Notion pages much prettier with custom domains. It’s a lot like a starter version of Super, and it’s open-source and free to use.
Notion Charts helps you create interactive charts that are tailored for Notion’s embed blocks. Although the reports aren’t totally “live” you can create live-ish dashboards and charts via a connection to Google Sheets.
Reports for Notion creates embeddable charts and tables from CSV Files, JSON links, GitHub, Trello, and Google Sheets.
This might just be the start of a new wave of Notion tools. 🌊
We saw it in the early days of Product Hunt before we even offered an API. Twitter, Reddit, and Snap are just a few others that attracted a lot of developers unofficially tinkering on top of their platform early on.
Today we're seeing a rise in apps built to make Notion better.
Notion, the all-in-one workspace, has endeared itself to the tech community since 2016. In 2018 when they launched Notion 2.0, they hit #1 product of the month on PH, and by September 2019 they had over a million users. This April, Notion raised another $50 million at a $2 billion valuation. Quite the impressive two-year feat when you consider that when they launched Notion 2.0 on PH in 2018 they had less than 10 people on the team.
Here are a few of the companies building on top of Notion:
Super turns your Notion docs into a website. You can customize Notion docs with Google fonts, inject JS snippets for analytics or live chat, and customize social meta tags and images using Super.
Fruition makes Notion pages much prettier with custom domains. It’s a lot like a starter version of Super, and it’s open-source and free to use.
Notion Charts helps you create interactive charts that are tailored for Notion’s embed blocks. Although the reports aren’t totally “live” you can create live-ish dashboards and charts via a connection to Google Sheets.
Reports for Notion creates embeddable charts and tables from CSV Files, JSON links, GitHub, Trello, and Google Sheets.
This might just be the start of a new wave of Notion tools. 🌊
NEW from Microsoft (basic but cool)
Turns out, being basic is so in right now. With this new range by Microsoft, it’s whats inside that counts.
With the new Surface Book 3 announced yesterday, the focus for Microsoft was increasing performance by 50% to appeal to gamers and designers. The Nvidia Quadro RTX 3000 is the source of that power, and the idea is to get render time down. Reducing charging time was a factor too, so the previous 102W charger on the 15-inch model was upgraded to a 127W for this launch.
The Surface Go 2 is the second iteration of their tiny tablet. The $399 base model has a Intel Pentium 4425Y with 4 GB of RAM and a focus on keeping the price point low. If you want to use the tablet more like a laptop, a higher-end version with an Intel 8th Gen Core M3 and 8 GB of RAM was released too.
The other big Microsoft launch yesterday was the Surface Headphones 2. In the same vein, the focus was on bettering the basics, so the battery life has been extended from 15 hours to 20 hours. Noise cancellation saw some upgrades too, now it’s tuned active noise cancellation for the human voice. If you’re working from home with family right now, this might carry some extra appeal.
Now let’s talk about Apple, they’ve been busy lately launching a new 13" MacBook Pro and a iPhone SE 2nd Gen. The MacBook Pro is touting double the storage and a magic keyboard, while the new iPhone is priced at a wallet-friendly $399 for what looks to be a pretty capable device.
We’re keeping an eye out for the rumoured AirPods 3, so watch the PH homepage for more apple launches coming soon. 👀
With the new Surface Book 3 announced yesterday, the focus for Microsoft was increasing performance by 50% to appeal to gamers and designers. The Nvidia Quadro RTX 3000 is the source of that power, and the idea is to get render time down. Reducing charging time was a factor too, so the previous 102W charger on the 15-inch model was upgraded to a 127W for this launch.
The Surface Go 2 is the second iteration of their tiny tablet. The $399 base model has a Intel Pentium 4425Y with 4 GB of RAM and a focus on keeping the price point low. If you want to use the tablet more like a laptop, a higher-end version with an Intel 8th Gen Core M3 and 8 GB of RAM was released too.
The other big Microsoft launch yesterday was the Surface Headphones 2. In the same vein, the focus was on bettering the basics, so the battery life has been extended from 15 hours to 20 hours. Noise cancellation saw some upgrades too, now it’s tuned active noise cancellation for the human voice. If you’re working from home with family right now, this might carry some extra appeal.
Now let’s talk about Apple, they’ve been busy lately launching a new 13" MacBook Pro and a iPhone SE 2nd Gen. The MacBook Pro is touting double the storage and a magic keyboard, while the new iPhone is priced at a wallet-friendly $399 for what looks to be a pretty capable device.
We’re keeping an eye out for the rumoured AirPods 3, so watch the PH homepage for more apple launches coming soon. 👀
The most underrated skill in startups
The one thing that has the potential to dramatically increase the value of your brand, the impact of your marketing, and the conversion of your products is simple: better copywriting.
If you spend your time anywhere in the early stages of launching a company, honing your writing and your pitch can be a big help with acquiring customers long term.
If you already have copy to work with, a good way to find out if it’s working for you is to test it with your audience, and that’s what Copytesting is doing. Although much of what you can do in startups is inherently measurable, it’s really tricky to get data around your copy.
Another copywriting product that caught our eye this week was Gramara. If english is your second language, this will be particularly useful, it was built to help english-learners specifically. Gramara uses natural language processing and AI to increase the fluency and clarity of your writing. It will catch not only errors but will intuitively draw conclusions on what you meant to say to suggest the right corrections.
The maker, Jack Qiao, was inspired by his ESL family who was having trouble with the mainstream grammar apps like Grammarly “They assume that your writing is mostly correct, and don't perform sentence-wide changes that are sometimes necessary. They don't parse your text for semantics, and most of the time they simply can't detect that anything is wrong at all,” says Jack.
If your english is already pretty good, you can use Gramara to generate paraphrases in alternative writing styles. See what works for your audience, and you’ll be golden. ✍️
If you spend your time anywhere in the early stages of launching a company, honing your writing and your pitch can be a big help with acquiring customers long term.
If you already have copy to work with, a good way to find out if it’s working for you is to test it with your audience, and that’s what Copytesting is doing. Although much of what you can do in startups is inherently measurable, it’s really tricky to get data around your copy.
Another copywriting product that caught our eye this week was Gramara. If english is your second language, this will be particularly useful, it was built to help english-learners specifically. Gramara uses natural language processing and AI to increase the fluency and clarity of your writing. It will catch not only errors but will intuitively draw conclusions on what you meant to say to suggest the right corrections.
The maker, Jack Qiao, was inspired by his ESL family who was having trouble with the mainstream grammar apps like Grammarly “They assume that your writing is mostly correct, and don't perform sentence-wide changes that are sometimes necessary. They don't parse your text for semantics, and most of the time they simply can't detect that anything is wrong at all,” says Jack.
If your english is already pretty good, you can use Gramara to generate paraphrases in alternative writing styles. See what works for your audience, and you’ll be golden. ✍️
How to sing like Bieber
You don’t have to be born a star to become a musical icon. You just need the right tech in your dressing room.👨🎤
If you’re new to it, learning music is a bit like learning a new language. You can fast-track the tricky parts, like figuring out how to read musical notes using ChordIQ, which claimed #1 product of the week last week.
It gamifies the learning experience by having you guess-the-note, key signatures, and chords using memory-friendly patterns.
“Went from guessing 1 note a round to 4 notes a round, progress!” - Evgeniya
The other neat thing about ChordIQ is it’s scope. You can use it to become a better singer and get feedback on your range, or perfect your instrument skills with guitar, piano and saxophone training.
Since quarantine is an ideal time to level-up your music skills, here’s a couple more finds from the community to get you jamming again:
You can use Piano Companion like a search engine. It’s a chord and scale dictionary, where you can contribute your own scales to the community. It shows chord and scale notes on the grand staff, degrees, relative scales, intervals, and fingering for both hands in major and minor scales.
If you don’t know what any of that means quite yet, go back to step 1 and check out ChordIQ.
Next up, compose music using only your voice. Just sing a melody and Symphonia will detect it and turn it into an instrumental.
Lastly, it’s time to embarrass yourself in the name of fun. Sing a song for your friends and have them try and guess the track you’re laying down with Warbly.
If you’re new to it, learning music is a bit like learning a new language. You can fast-track the tricky parts, like figuring out how to read musical notes using ChordIQ, which claimed #1 product of the week last week.
It gamifies the learning experience by having you guess-the-note, key signatures, and chords using memory-friendly patterns.
“Went from guessing 1 note a round to 4 notes a round, progress!” - Evgeniya
The other neat thing about ChordIQ is it’s scope. You can use it to become a better singer and get feedback on your range, or perfect your instrument skills with guitar, piano and saxophone training.
Since quarantine is an ideal time to level-up your music skills, here’s a couple more finds from the community to get you jamming again:
You can use Piano Companion like a search engine. It’s a chord and scale dictionary, where you can contribute your own scales to the community. It shows chord and scale notes on the grand staff, degrees, relative scales, intervals, and fingering for both hands in major and minor scales.
If you don’t know what any of that means quite yet, go back to step 1 and check out ChordIQ.
Next up, compose music using only your voice. Just sing a melody and Symphonia will detect it and turn it into an instrumental.
Lastly, it’s time to embarrass yourself in the name of fun. Sing a song for your friends and have them try and guess the track you’re laying down with Warbly.
Trending right now: 👩🍳
It turns out, kitchen nightmares can be averted with just a pinch of technology, and of course, a splash of Sriracha. 👌
If staying at home has you cooking up a storm, you might be logging some fails by now. In the wise words of Julia Child, “No matter what happens in the kitchen, never apologize.” Lucky for you, the PH community is your perfect sous-chef.
First things first, if you’re fresh out of ideas on what to make, let Cook Magic be your friend. Launched last week, you can text the ingredients you have on hand and get a reply in seconds with tasty meal recommendations and recipes.
If you’re on the bread-baking bandwagon, you can get a fitness tracker for your sourdough starter. Monitor the height, temperature and humidity of your starter with Sourd.io.
Your oven can be smart, too. June created a computer-based oven to take the guesswork out of cooking times and temperature control.
And an oldie but a goodie, the New York Times has a free cooking app with over 17,000 chef-tested recipes.
Bon App-étit 👨🍳📱
If staying at home has you cooking up a storm, you might be logging some fails by now. In the wise words of Julia Child, “No matter what happens in the kitchen, never apologize.” Lucky for you, the PH community is your perfect sous-chef.
First things first, if you’re fresh out of ideas on what to make, let Cook Magic be your friend. Launched last week, you can text the ingredients you have on hand and get a reply in seconds with tasty meal recommendations and recipes.
If you’re on the bread-baking bandwagon, you can get a fitness tracker for your sourdough starter. Monitor the height, temperature and humidity of your starter with Sourd.io.
Your oven can be smart, too. June created a computer-based oven to take the guesswork out of cooking times and temperature control.
And an oldie but a goodie, the New York Times has a free cooking app with over 17,000 chef-tested recipes.
Bon App-étit 👨🍳📱
Like rotten tomatoes inside Netflix 🍅
Bliss = becoming a better binge-watcher without needing to leave the Netflix app.
Voteflix recently launched to (finally!) bring ratings and reviews to Netflix. Now you can share your own review of Tiger King from the comfort of your browser. Think of all the time you’ll save researching what to watch next on IMDb and Rotten Tomatoes.
We’ve seen some pretty unique Netflix companions launched by makers:
Netflix Party is having a second life because of the pandemic with over 10 million users registered. You can sync up your Netflix playback with your friends remotely to watch shows or movies together.
Mate Translate helps you learn a new language while binging your favorite shows, with translation for over 103 languages. You can click on phrases or words in subtitles, get them translated and export them to CSV files to import into another app like Reji.
Netflix categories codes help you find hidden categories using their secret codes.
Soon on Netflix let’s you track your favorite shows so you know when a new season is set to come out.
And last but not least, we’re putting this one in the save this for later category. Netflix Hangouts was created to help you watch Netflix at work while faking a conference call. This is particularly useful once you're back in the office. 😉
Happy streaming. 🍿
Voteflix recently launched to (finally!) bring ratings and reviews to Netflix. Now you can share your own review of Tiger King from the comfort of your browser. Think of all the time you’ll save researching what to watch next on IMDb and Rotten Tomatoes.
We’ve seen some pretty unique Netflix companions launched by makers:
Netflix Party is having a second life because of the pandemic with over 10 million users registered. You can sync up your Netflix playback with your friends remotely to watch shows or movies together.
Mate Translate helps you learn a new language while binging your favorite shows, with translation for over 103 languages. You can click on phrases or words in subtitles, get them translated and export them to CSV files to import into another app like Reji.
Netflix categories codes help you find hidden categories using their secret codes.
Soon on Netflix let’s you track your favorite shows so you know when a new season is set to come out.
And last but not least, we’re putting this one in the save this for later category. Netflix Hangouts was created to help you watch Netflix at work while faking a conference call. This is particularly useful once you're back in the office. 😉
Happy streaming. 🍿
Create a no-code clone
Imitation is flattery, and now you can clone the UI of popular websites like Facebook, Netflix and Slack without writing a single line of code.
Bubble just launched step-by-step tutorials for how to recreate the internet’s biggest hits using their point-and-click visual web editor.
“While no-code is now more popular than ever, people are still often skeptical that no-code tools can rival the power and depth of custom programming. This series by Bubble will prove them dead wrong,” says the maker Emmanuel.
If you’re interested in UI and UX, it’s an opportunity to look under the hood to see how these popular sites were built piece by piece. Although you likely won’t want to build a carbon copy, you can easily adopt some frameworks that fit your product vision.
The PH community is excited about what this could mean for the future of no-code:
“Bubble has genuinely opened up my world and given me opportunities I never though possible. I went from being a non-technical ideas person to having multiple SaaS products built by me from the ground up.” - Kieran
“This set of tutorials is addressing a single biggest issue with Bubble - people's healthy skepticism towards the "realness" of this framework. This will help more people to see the true beauty and power or Bubble, building amazing things from scratch, and using awesome templates to get a head start." - Vlad
“Our entire business is built on Bubble and it allowed us to scale from 0 to 30+ employees in just 4 years without any investment whatsoever.” - Levon
Build your own app or site without code using a few of these handy tools:
• Community for no-code
• Web apps
• Mobile apps
• Simple landing pages
Bubble just launched step-by-step tutorials for how to recreate the internet’s biggest hits using their point-and-click visual web editor.
“While no-code is now more popular than ever, people are still often skeptical that no-code tools can rival the power and depth of custom programming. This series by Bubble will prove them dead wrong,” says the maker Emmanuel.
If you’re interested in UI and UX, it’s an opportunity to look under the hood to see how these popular sites were built piece by piece. Although you likely won’t want to build a carbon copy, you can easily adopt some frameworks that fit your product vision.
The PH community is excited about what this could mean for the future of no-code:
“Bubble has genuinely opened up my world and given me opportunities I never though possible. I went from being a non-technical ideas person to having multiple SaaS products built by me from the ground up.” - Kieran
“This set of tutorials is addressing a single biggest issue with Bubble - people's healthy skepticism towards the "realness" of this framework. This will help more people to see the true beauty and power or Bubble, building amazing things from scratch, and using awesome templates to get a head start." - Vlad
“Our entire business is built on Bubble and it allowed us to scale from 0 to 30+ employees in just 4 years without any investment whatsoever.” - Levon
Build your own app or site without code using a few of these handy tools:
• Community for no-code
• Web apps
• Mobile apps
• Simple landing pages
Is this the next Patreon?
Last week Cent launched a Patreon competitor to support not only creators but also early backers.
Today creators have so many ways to make money on the internet, but it's still very hard. Artists have been shapeshifting to adjust to new platforms and scale up their audiences to monetize their content.
With Cent, the creator and their work is at the forefront. The system is designed to provide income for both the creator and the fan through two mechanisms:
1. ‘Seed a Creator’ and get rewarded
2. ‘Spot’ a post, and show you like it.
By backing creators early on, fans can also “earn” in their eventual upside. That incentivizes fans to become evangelists, meaning everyone wins in the production of new creative work.
The PH community certainly seems intrigued:
“This is the most interesting thing on Product Hunt today, imo" - Ryan
“I've seeded five creators and got seeded by five users, so far so good.” - Samuel
“Cent has one of the coolest concepts I've come across recently. It's like Patreon on-the-go where you can support your favorite creators.” - Hady
It’s early days for Cent, and we’ll be watching to see how their beta is received, but it’s a promising step towards funding the arts in a sustainable way.
“Many creators not only share their final work, but document the steps that went into creating it. Fans seem to really connect with creators more as they learn more about their process, and it's also the perfect way for aspiring creators to learn. I think this is missing on other platforms,” Pavan, the maker said.
Last week Cent launched a Patreon competitor to support not only creators but also early backers.
Today creators have so many ways to make money on the internet, but it's still very hard. Artists have been shapeshifting to adjust to new platforms and scale up their audiences to monetize their content.
With Cent, the creator and their work is at the forefront. The system is designed to provide income for both the creator and the fan through two mechanisms:
1. ‘Seed a Creator’ and get rewarded
2. ‘Spot’ a post, and show you like it.
By backing creators early on, fans can also “earn” in their eventual upside. That incentivizes fans to become evangelists, meaning everyone wins in the production of new creative work.
The PH community certainly seems intrigued:
“This is the most interesting thing on Product Hunt today, imo" - Ryan
“I've seeded five creators and got seeded by five users, so far so good.” - Samuel
“Cent has one of the coolest concepts I've come across recently. It's like Patreon on-the-go where you can support your favorite creators.” - Hady
It’s early days for Cent, and we’ll be watching to see how their beta is received, but it’s a promising step towards funding the arts in a sustainable way.
“Many creators not only share their final work, but document the steps that went into creating it. Fans seem to really connect with creators more as they learn more about their process, and it's also the perfect way for aspiring creators to learn. I think this is missing on other platforms,” Pavan, the maker said.
And the winner is... 🥁
It’s time to announce the winner of Maker Fest WFH edition and the recipient of a highly coveted Silver Kitty trophy. 😻🏆
The theme for this festival was products that focus on relief efforts (in any form) for the COVID-19 pandemic. Let’s break down the numbers, first:
• Over 500 makers participated, submitting more than 90 products
• More than 1700 upvotes helped determine the winner
After an impressive response to the challenge, we’re happy to announce the winner is Charlie Holtz of Goodnight Zoom! 😴
Goodnight Zoom enables remote story time with an isolated senior. To connect as many people as possible, it was launched as a free product and was inspired by the creators own experience during quarantine.
"While we've all been isolated, my grandparents have started to read stories to my younger cousins via video chat, which has been a great way for my grandparents to feel connected and loved," says the maker Charlie Holtz. “Many of our seniors are especially isolated right now, so I thought it would be nice to connect them to kids all across the US for a remote storytime.”
Here’s what PH had to say about it:
“Wholesome product of the day!” - Arin
“This is the most heartwarming idea I have ever seen! I This is such a uniting platform - in current times more that ever.” - Anastasia
Let’s celebrate the runners up of Makers Fest too 👏
• Salut, created by Matthew DiPietro, let’s you find free virtual fitness classes and trainers, and you can donate to the trainer directly in the app
• DIY Face Shield, created by Fajar Siddiq, helps you make your own PPE out of a laptop cover
• Yuzoo.me, created by Csongor Bókay and Jeremiah Smith let’s you start Zoom meetings on the fly from any tab, browser of app for free
Congrats to all the makers who spent time and energy developing products for a noble cause. 🏆
The theme for this festival was products that focus on relief efforts (in any form) for the COVID-19 pandemic. Let’s break down the numbers, first:
• Over 500 makers participated, submitting more than 90 products
• More than 1700 upvotes helped determine the winner
After an impressive response to the challenge, we’re happy to announce the winner is Charlie Holtz of Goodnight Zoom! 😴
Goodnight Zoom enables remote story time with an isolated senior. To connect as many people as possible, it was launched as a free product and was inspired by the creators own experience during quarantine.
"While we've all been isolated, my grandparents have started to read stories to my younger cousins via video chat, which has been a great way for my grandparents to feel connected and loved," says the maker Charlie Holtz. “Many of our seniors are especially isolated right now, so I thought it would be nice to connect them to kids all across the US for a remote storytime.”
Here’s what PH had to say about it:
“Wholesome product of the day!” - Arin
“This is the most heartwarming idea I have ever seen! I This is such a uniting platform - in current times more that ever.” - Anastasia
Let’s celebrate the runners up of Makers Fest too 👏
• Salut, created by Matthew DiPietro, let’s you find free virtual fitness classes and trainers, and you can donate to the trainer directly in the app
• DIY Face Shield, created by Fajar Siddiq, helps you make your own PPE out of a laptop cover
• Yuzoo.me, created by Csongor Bókay and Jeremiah Smith let’s you start Zoom meetings on the fly from any tab, browser of app for free
Congrats to all the makers who spent time and energy developing products for a noble cause. 🏆
Facebook is taking on Zoom and Houseparty
It’s no secret that Houseparty and Zoom have seen unprecedented growth because of the pandemic, and Facebook has been taking notes.
On a livestream announcement this past Friday, Facebook announced that Messenger Rooms, a new drop-in video chat room for up to 50 people, will be launching globally and rolling out over the next few weeks.
Taking aim at Zoom, they will be introducing Messenger Rooms with no time limit and a low barrier to entry to join. Anyone with a Facebook account can create and share a room, and those joining the chat don’t need a Facebook account to access it. Facebook also has plans to bring rooms to Instagram Direct, WhatsApp and Portal.
With Messenger Rooms, you can choose if you want to make the room open or keep it locked and share out links to invite people to join in directly, or post the link to groups or event pages.
The interface looks a bit like Houseparty, where you pop in and out of rooms that your friends are in a bit less formally than a Zoom call. If you have the Messenger app, you’ll also be able to use all the AR effects, plus some new AI-powered features like mood lighting and dynamic 360 degree backgrounds.
This isn’t Facebook’s first attempt at cloning Houseparty, they launched Bonfire in September 2017 and later shut it down in May 2019.
If you’re looking for a casual way to hang out with friends or coworkers while working from home, Chatparty launched recently with a different spin, casual video chats with no audio.
On a livestream announcement this past Friday, Facebook announced that Messenger Rooms, a new drop-in video chat room for up to 50 people, will be launching globally and rolling out over the next few weeks.
Taking aim at Zoom, they will be introducing Messenger Rooms with no time limit and a low barrier to entry to join. Anyone with a Facebook account can create and share a room, and those joining the chat don’t need a Facebook account to access it. Facebook also has plans to bring rooms to Instagram Direct, WhatsApp and Portal.
With Messenger Rooms, you can choose if you want to make the room open or keep it locked and share out links to invite people to join in directly, or post the link to groups or event pages.
The interface looks a bit like Houseparty, where you pop in and out of rooms that your friends are in a bit less formally than a Zoom call. If you have the Messenger app, you’ll also be able to use all the AR effects, plus some new AI-powered features like mood lighting and dynamic 360 degree backgrounds.
This isn’t Facebook’s first attempt at cloning Houseparty, they launched Bonfire in September 2017 and later shut it down in May 2019.
If you’re looking for a casual way to hang out with friends or coworkers while working from home, Chatparty launched recently with a different spin, casual video chats with no audio.