Built an AI wingman for dating apps here's what I learned from 0 to first paying users

I built CupidAI after watching a friend spend 20 minutes staring at a Hinge prompt, paralyzed. He knew what he wanted to say. He just couldn't start.

The app is simple: screenshot any dating app conversation or profile, and get personalized openers, replies, and strategy from AI in seconds. No generic pickup lines it reads the actual context.

What surprised me building this:

• OCR on dating app screenshots is way harder than it looks. Every app has different UI, fonts, and layouts. Spent weeks just on reliable text extraction.

• The first version generated cringe. The real work was prompt engineering that produces confident, specific, human-sounding responses — not "Hey, your smile is beautiful 😍"

• Free web tools (Hinge Opener Generator, Rizz Generator, etc.) drive way more organic traffic than I expected. SEO from tool pages > blog posts for this niche.

Currently: free tier + freemium subscription on iOS. Still early but growing.

Happy to answer questions about the tech stack, App Store distribution, or the prompt engineering behind it.