The easiest way to find your next app idea!
One of the biggest mistakes indie developers make is thinking they need a completely original app idea. In reality, many successful apps are built by taking a proven concept and adapting it to a different audience or problem.
A great example is Quittr, a quit-porn app that reportedly generates around $250,000 per month. Instead of trying to invent something entirely new, someone took the same core concep and applied it to a different niche.
The result? STOPPR, a women's quit sugar app that now generates around $12,000 per month.
The idea wasn't revolutionary. The execution was.
This strategy works because you're building on something the market has already validated. If one niche responds well to a specific app format, there's a good chance a related niche will too. Instead of gambling on whether users want your idea, you're adapting a model that has already proven demand.
Some examples include:
A quit-porn app → a quit-smoking app
A quit-porn app → a quit-vaping app
A quit-porn app → a quit sugar addiction app
Of course, simply cloning an app isn't always enough. The original app often has a first-mover advantage, making it difficult to outperform them in the same market. That's why the better strategy is to either target an underserved niche or significantly improve the product with better design, features, onboarding or user experience.
The takeaway is simple: you don't always need a brand-new idea. Sometimes the smartest move is to find something that already works, understand why users love it, and adapt it for a new niche that hasn't been explored yet.
I made a list of apps with their estimated MRR and a breakdown of their marketing strategies. You might find your next winning app idea here: Clone The App
This hits hard. I've been obsessing over "originality" for months while building my first app — an offline AI assistant with persistent memory. Kept thinking "but ChatGPT already exists, why would anyone care?"Reading this made me realize: I'm not competing with ChatGPT. I'm solving a different problem for a different person. The one who doesn't want their journal entries training someone else's model. The one who needs the AI to remember what they said last Tuesday.Same core tech, completely different niche. Still wrapping my head around this, but thanks for the perspective.
That's a smart way to find out validated app ideas.
exactly!
I was looking for an app idea but I think I found one. Thanks for the resource.
you are welcome!
Excellent idea and resource - I will use it! Thank you. I have had no shortage ideas lately. My bigger problem is not creating the solution, but marketing it and placing it where it can find traction - just not a strong suit yet.
yeah distribution is always the hardest part.
love the concept.
Thanks
Great
I'm curious, can you reveal where you got the app revenue data from?
Really helpful to read this. As a non-technical founder I keep going back and forth on how much to build vs validate first — how did you decide?
Thank you for sharing, which benefits more people
One thing I've noticed is that successful "clones" rarely win because they copied features. They win because they found a different audience, a better onboarding flow, or a more compelling positioning. The product changes less than the story around it.
This is such a smart approach,
Too many founders waste months (or years) trying to invent something completely new when there are already proven concepts with paying users. Adapting a validated idea with better UX, niche focus, or marketing is way lower risk and faster to test.
The Quittr → STOPPR example is perfect. Same core idea, different niche, real money.
Thanks for building Clone The App — this is going to save a lot of people from idea paralysis. Definitely checking it out.
Thanks for your kind words.
This is very useful
I am glad that you found it useful!
Great thinking dude
Thanks dude.
I got to admin this is a really wonderful informative post keep it up !!!
Thanks parvez.
I built Henson Group in a category that already had hundreds of established Microsoft resellers, zero original ideas involved, and it still became one of the largest globally because we out-executed on service and niche focus. Proven demand plus better execution beats novel thinking in almost every market I've operated in or invested in. One caution from the investing side: the clone plays that win usually pick a niche the incumbent structurally can't serve, not just one they haven't gotten to yet.
That's really valuable information. Thanks for sharing.
nice
Thanks you.
I didn't even know these apps existed. I like this approach of applying them to other niches.
Yeah it's the fastest way to test an app idea.
Thanks, this really made me to rethink my entire process
I am glad that you found it valuable.
Love this approach — adapting proven models to new niches is a smart way to get started.
I personally believe the most valuable ideas come from first principles: what are real users complaining about? What are they searching for but can't find a good solution? When you start from real pain points and unmet demand, the idea almost builds itself.
That's why I built RightIdea — you type an idea and it pulls real App Store reviews, Reddit discussions, and search volume data to show you where the real frustration and demand are. Validation based on real data, not guesswork.
Great post, saved it!
Sounds great
Nice idea
Thanks buddy!
The quit-sugar example is a clean illustration of the idea because the demand was already proven, the audience was already paying, and the only question was whether the niche was underserved enough to be worth entering. That's a much lower-risk starting point than hoping a completely new problem exists.
The pushback about distribution and retention taking over once a niche gets crowded is the part worth sitting with. The cloning playbook gets you past idea risk but it doesn't get you past execution risk, and that one doesn't get easier just because someone else validated the concept first.
true. even the best idea can fail because of poor execution. so execution is more important than the idea itself.
Exactly. The idea gets you to the starting line. Execution is the actual race.
Clone the app concept is really effective to find out an idea really fast. I will try it out.
you should try it out.
Thanks for sharing the process. It's a new way to find out an idea.
Yeah.
Fair, but every posted playbook has a half-life. Once everyone's cloning into fresh niches, the niche stops being the edge and it comes down to distribution and retention. The clone wars reward operators, not idea-finders.
Exactly this approach is why I built ZerfAI.
Instead of guessing, it scans real user complaints from Reddit, Hacker News & GitHub Issues, then uses 2 AI agents to suggest Micro SaaS ideas that are already validated by the market — perfect for adapting proven concepts to new niches like in your example.
What niches are you currently exploring?
Ok