Kitty Nip

The Problem

Kitty Nip already had an audience as a location-based cat social / dating-style app — but needed an engineer to own the full stack and keep it stable as the product grew past early stage.

What I Built

I took over full product ownership: React Native client plus Firebase (Auth, Firestore, Storage, Functions, Messaging, Analytics, Crashlytics).

• Geo discovery and swipe matching with location/discovery settings.
• Cat and human profiles; photo galleries (premium unlocks richer media).
• Private chat with photos/videos after match; push for matches and messages.
• Premium via IAP; Google Mobile Ads; report flows; Google/Apple sign-in.

Live on Play Store and App Store.

Major Features

• Swipe + location discovery — match with nearby cat people / profiles.
• Profiles & media — cat-forward identity with gallery and premium photo rules.
• Private chat — post-match messaging with media and push.
• Monetization — IAP premium and ads without a separate backend rewrite.
• Ownership — client + Firebase backend ops under one engineer.

Key Challenges

Taking over a live codebase meant stabilizing Firebase data and auth flows before feature work — real users were already depending on chat and matching. Location queries and media-heavy chat needed careful indexing and storage habits as the base grew.

Results

Kitty Nip stayed live on iOS and Android under my ownership, past 10,000+ Play Store downloads, with backend responsibility included in that scope.

Stack Decisions

The existing React Native + Firebase stack was retained rather than rewritten — a live social app doesn’t justify rewrite risk. Redux Toolkit and native IAP/ads plugins stayed aligned with what the stores and users already expected.