Building our first iPhone app: what the work involves

Begin with the everyday task

An invoice is one part of a larger workflow. A customer asks about work, an estimate is prepared, details change, the work is documented, and eventually a bill is sent.

Building around that sequence helps connect the information instead of treating every document as a separate task. For a first app, a specific workflow gives feature decisions a useful anchor.

The stack is only part of the project

The WP Labs: Invoice project uses Expo and React Native for the app, Supabase for backend services, and RevenueCat for subscriptions. Choosing tools still leaves many product decisions: what a new user sees, what a free plan includes, and how errors are explained.

Technical setup matters, but so does the person trying to send an invoice between jobs. Clear labels and predictable actions make a difference.

Pay attention to the first few minutes

Signup, policy acceptance, and choosing a plan form one connected experience. Test them from a fresh account rather than relying on a developer account that already has saved settings.

The same principle applies to an empty customer list or a first invoice. A new user needs enough guidance to take the next step without being asked to learn the entire app at once.

Shipping begins another phase of work

WP Labs: Invoice is available on the App Store. A released app still needs support, verification of updates, and attention to the real workflows people use.

For anyone starting an app, keep a list of issues and the steps that reproduce them. Test the core customer tasks after each change. Small, understandable improvements are easier to assess than changing everything at once.

Explore the app or read our App Store submission overview for the next part of the journey.