How to find app ideas that people actually pay for

If you’ve ever tried to “come up with an app idea,” you know how that usually goes. You stare at a blank page, write down five vague things, convince yourself someone’s probably already built them, and give up.

Here’s the thing: that’s not how good app ideas get found. The best ones aren’t invented. They’re discovered. They’re already out there, in Reddit threads, X posts, and Threads complaints, waiting for someone to notice them.

This post walks you through a repeatable system for how to find app ideas that are grounded in real demand. No guessing. No brainstorming in circles. Just a process you can run any time you want a new direction.

The process

Here’s the process from start to finish:

Pick a niche with AI
Build a list of search queries your frustrated user would actually type
Search Reddit, X, and Threads using SocialCrawl
Save the results and ook for the patterns — that’s where your app idea lives

The core logic is simple. People don’t go online and post “I wish there was an app for this.” They say things like “I’ve been trying to do X for weeks and nothing works” or “does anyone know a tool that does Y?” That’s pain. And pain is where app ideas come from.

How to find app ideas that people actually pay for

Step 1: Pick a niche with AI

“App ideas” is too broad to search for. You need a specific space to dig into, so your research comes back with something you can actually use.

If you already have a niche in mind, we’re going to dig deeper to find some micro-niches. I’m going to use ‘pet care’ as my example here.

Make sure to have /brainstorming skill installed 👉 https://www.skills.sh/obra/superpowers/brainstorming

If you’re starting from scratch, open Claude Code or Codex and run this prompt:

I'm looking to build a small app or SaaS product.
I want to find a niche that:
- Has a real pain point people complain about online
- Is specific enough that I can search for it on social media
- Could be solved with a simple app (not a big platform)

Give me 10 niche suggestions, and for each one, give me:
1. The niche name
2. One sentence on the pain point
3. One example search query someone frustrated in this niche might post on Reddit

use /brainstorming skill

Pick one that resonates. Something you understand a bit, or something you’re genuinely curious about. For the rest of this walkthrough, I’ll use “multi-pet medication tracker” as the example niche.

Step 2: Build your search query list

This is the step most people skip, which is why their research comes back with nothing useful.

The key is to think like your frustrated user. Someone dealing with late invoices doesn’t search for “invoicing app.” They type something like “how do I stop clients ghosting on payments” or “anyone else losing money on late invoices?”

Go back to your AI tool and run this:

For the niche: [your chosen niche]

Give me a list of 10–15 search queries that someone frustrated
with this problem might post on:
- Reddit (question style, rant style)
- X / Twitter (short, sharp, emotional)
- Threads (conversational)

Format as a simple bullet list.

Copy the output into a doc. This is your search brief. Aim for 10 to 15 queries, enough variety to catch the different ways people describe the same problem.

Step 3: Search Reddit, X, and Threads with SocialCrawl

This is where it comes together. And it’s the part that saves you hours.

Instead of opening Reddit in one tab, X in another, and Threads in a third, you’re going to do it all in one prompt using SocialCrawl. It’s an API that can search 27 social platforms at once, directly from your terminal.

Take the query list you built in Step 2 and run this:

You have access to the SocialCrawl skill.

I'm researching app ideas in this niche: [your niche]

Here are my search queries:
[paste your list]

Please:
1. Use SocialCrawl to search Reddit, X, and Threads for each query
2. Only include posts from the last 30 days
3. Summarise your findings in this format:

---
# App Idea Research — [Niche]
Date: [today's date]

## Keyword: [query]
### Interesting finds:
- [post summary + platform + link if available]

## Patterns I'm Noticing:
- [recurring pain point]
- [feature gap that keeps coming up]

## Potential App Idea:
[1-sentence description of the opportunity]
---

Run all queries and give me the full summary in one response.

Step 4: Save your research and spot the patterns

The AI already formatted everything for you, so this step is just saving it.

Copy the full output and paste it into a Markdown file. Notion, Obsidian, a plain .md file, whatever you have open. You’ll end up with a document full of real quotes, real frustrations, and real evidence from the past 30 days.

That last section, “Patterns I’m Noticing,” is where your app idea actually lives. You’re not guessing. You’re reading.

Step 3 example output – summary of app ideas

What to do with your idea next

Once you’ve spotted a recurring pattern, you have something real to work with: a specific problem, a specific type of person, and evidence they’re actively looking for a solution.

From here you can go deeper. Find 5 to 10 posts that represent the pattern and read the comments. Look at what people say they’ve already tried. That tells you what’s missing from current solutions, which is often more useful than the original pain point itself.

The whole point of this process is that you’re not building something you hope people want. You’re building something people are already asking for.

That’s a much better place to start.