Shai is a native iOS app of original sleep stories in history, nature, and travel, built for people whose minds won’t switch off at bedtime. It began with a simple question: how might a new ritual be so honestly made and effortlessly habitual? I designed and built it as a solo founder, with my wife and editor Megan shaping the prose, and I used AI tools extensively and openly throughout.

The project spans product strategy, UX and visual design, a native Swift build, and a repeatable production system for writing, narrating, and illustrating each story. Shai is now in alpha on TestFlight with a waitlist open, and this case study walks through the problem, the solution, my role, and what I learned.