TLDR: How We Feel, a free mental wellness app, needed to accelerate their Android development while maintaining iOS momentum. Ravn stepped in as their development partner, taking ownership of the Android development and later QA processes. The partnership resulted in successful cross-platform development and established efficient, scalable processes for How We Feel's continued growth.

Checkout the How We Feel app here!

Greetings!

Yes, that is me holding a genuine Apple Design Award! Ever since I started building iOS apps in 2010, these awards have been the holy grail of app design recognition. Receiving one means Apple – arguably the world's greatest design innovator – thinks your work is exceptional.

Plot twist: This isn't actually my award (I know, I know... clickbait guilty as charged! 🙈). But getting to hold one was still a pretty special moment for a young iOS developer.

First person to tell me who this Apple Design Award belongs to gets dinner on me! 🍽️

Flash forward to today and one of our amazing clients was a 2024 finalist for this prestigious award. How We Feel is a mobile application thoughtfully developed by a team of scientists, designers, engineers, and therapists.

In collaboration with Yale University's Center for Emotional Intelligence and based on Dr. Marc Brackett's research, the app guides users in identifying and articulating their feelings. It also seamlessly tracks sleep, exercise, and health trends through HealthKit, helping users uncover meaningful patterns over time.

The How We Feel product team is led by Ben Silbermann, co-founder of Pinterest. The team includes current and former Pinterest employees who are passionate about creating a more emotionally healthy world.

The app offers essential tools to enhance relationships, manage stress and anxiety, and improve emotional regulation. Users can share their feelings in real time with trusted friends and access step-by-step video strategies that include cognitive techniques, movement exercises, mindfulness practices, and social skills, all designed to help them navigate their emotions more effectively.

01 The Challenge

How We Feel had an ambitious vision: to build a strong presence across both iOS and Android platforms, maximizing their app’s reach and impact. While iOS development was advancing, accelerating the Android version became a priority to ensure a consistent experience across both platforms.

02 The Solution

To achieve this expanded development capacity, How We Feel partnered with Ravn, combining both teams' expertise to accelerate their app's evolution and market presence.

The Ravn team stepped in as a true development partner, providing both the technical expertise and additional capacity How We Feel needed. Operating autonomously, our engineers took full ownership of development tasks, allowing How We Feel's team to focus on their broader strategic initiatives. 

As trust in the partnership grew, How We Feel expanded Ravn's role to include quality assurance. We implemented automated testing solutions that enhanced both the efficiency and reliability of the QA process, further strengthening the app's development pipeline.

03 The Outcome

Through our partnership, we established a streamlined process that seamlessly flows from design to development to QA. Our team's commitment to quality and adaptability, coupled with close collaboration with How We Feel's leadership, accelerated development across both iOS and Android platforms. This systematic approach not only delivered exceptional user experiences but also created a sustainable foundation for How We Feel's continued growth and success.

As 2024 comes to a close we want to express our gratitude for all the talented and creative technologists working hard to improve the world around them. We wish you all a happy holiday season and a prosperous 2025. If you would like to know more about How We Feel, Ravn or just want to connect and talk tech don’t hesitate to reach out!