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Indie · Image compression

Karui

A pay-once app that shrinks images by up to 90%. Price is a one-time $29. I wrote the PNG and PDF compression myself in Rust, not leaning on an off-the-shelf library — and it comes out ahead of the commercial tools. Not a throwaway novelty app; a quietly well-built piece of indie software.

Indie $29, pay once Written in Rust Sold in 5 countries
Karui
Makes images and PDFs lighter while keeping the way they look.
90% off
How far it can compress an image
$29once
Not a subscription
5countries
Where it sold
$0ad spend
Reached them with none
What

What it is

An app that makes images and PDFs lighter while keeping their look as intact as it can. Pictures for a blog post, a PDF to send. I built it to get that quiet, recurring chore done with a single drag. The compression itself — PNG and PDF both — I wrote myself, in Rust. More work than just calling a ready-made library, but it lets it come out lighter than the commercial tools. Owning the internals is exactly where that pays off.

Story

It crossed borders with no ads

I haven't run any advertising. And yet, before I knew it, people in five countries had bought it. Zero marketing budget. No headline feature. Just: it genuinely makes things lighter, and the price is easy to understand. Something built quietly on quality crossing borders without a single ad was, honestly, a good feeling. Building small, self-contained things like this between the heavy medical products is also how I reset.

Related

Related

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