Freedom kills focus. iPromise is a new deep work protocol built on the principle of Body Doubling, the idea that having a "witness" boosts accountability. // Your AI Buddy lives elegantly in your Mac notch. It understands your active window’s context. When you drift into distractions, it gently nudges you back. // Make a promise. Your buddy helps you keep it.
Hi I’m Todd, some of you might know me or my team from Cubox, our tool for managing digital knowledge and reading.
Over the years of building efficiency tools, I ran into a deeply personal problem that no reading or note-taking app could fix: The ultimate freedom of working on a Mac was secretly destroying my focus.
Without a boss or an office setting, the temptation to "just check one notification" was constant. Willpower alone was a losing battle. I noticed that I always focused best in bustling coffee shops or libraries, anywhere with a "presence." That led me to dive into the psychological concept of Body Doubling — the proven idea that having a "witness" to your work drastically reduces procrastination.
I built iPromise to digitize that exact energy and bring it straight to your Mac screen.
Why iPromise is different:
The "Witness" Protocol: You commit to one single, hard task. Your AI Focus Buddy, living elegantly in your Mac notch, becomes your companion and keeps you accountable.
Context-Aware, Not an Intrusive Monitor: It doesn't just run a timer. It understands the context of your active window and knows if you're actually building or getting lost in a thread.
Privacy-First: Like with Cubox, I care deeply about data privacy. Your screen data never sends to us.
iPromise is currently completely free. I haven't even figured out a pricing model yet because my main goal right now is to perfect the core experience and build it alongside this community.
I’d love to hear your thoughts, feedback, or any feature requests. What’s the biggest distraction you fight on your Mac every day?
Let's stop working alone, and start making promises.
Stay focused!
Body doubling is underrated for solo devs working alone means no ambient accountability. Curious how the AI version compares to actual co-working sessions. Does it react to what you're doing or mostly just stay present?
The notch as a surface for ambient companions is a genuinely good call — it's one of the few places on the Mac where a glanceable element doesn't feel like it's stealing real estate. Quick question: is the "buddy" reacting to anything (active window, time in app), or is it purely a timer/animation? I'm trying to figure out whether this works for me as a vibes nudge vs. an actual focus signal.
as a fellow mac indie — curious how you handle the notch UI on non-notch macs (external display, MBA M1)? does it gracefully fall back to menubar, or hide entirely?
I love all the animal avatars! The design is super neat. Is it possible to adjust the "tone" of your buddy? For example, I personally would find it more intriguing if it was very blunt and sassy to me when I get distracted, rather than giving a polite, long paragraph...
Hey Todd! As great as this is - it poses a serious privacy/security threat. E.g. I read "Your screen data never sends to us", but how do you independently ensure this to users?
lovely, cant wait to give this a go. how are you handing the screen context, is it local? the better question would be if it's a one time payment or a subscription?
hey todd! this is right up my street :) body-doubling shrunk to the notch, smart! the hard part is presence without surveillance. does it sit there as an awareness signal, or does it actively nudge when focus drops? and how do you draw the line. congrats on your launch, and good luck with it!
Congrats on the launch! Personally, my biggest distraction is basically a "quick check" loophole. I'd open a new tab to look up one piece of documentation and end up in a completely different rabbit hole. Quick question about the ambient sound: Will we be able to import or bring our own custom soundtracks or background audio loops or do you have/are you planning an integration with external players like Spotify or Apple Music?
The trust killer for this kind of tool is the first false positive I guess? Buddy nudges me while I'm actually deep on something that just looks like drift (HN thread that's real research, Twitter that's competitor recon). How does the current heuristic handle 'looks like distraction, is the work'? By all means, good launch great work!
Great idea! as someone with ADHD I've been trying to build myself an interstitial journal, the body doubling via the notch is a great idea. Downloaded and excited to try this :)
Congrats on launching! As someone who's sat in virtual study rooms this is intriguing, also an awesome name :) I guess one thing I got from people-populated study rooms was the feeling of reciprocity (the other people there also doing their own work) rather than surveillance. Curious what it will feel like to not have that, will take this for a spin.
distraction usually starts as a tiny “just one notification” moment and then quietly breaks the whole flow.
I like the body-doubling/witness angle because it feels more human than another blocker.how iPromise knows when to intervene versus stay quiet. Does it learn each user’s work patterns over time, or does the user define what “focused” means for each promise?
looks like a promising app! makes a lot of sense and for someone like myself who uses body doubling services often, i’m keen to give this a go!
seems strange thought that the latest supported openai model is 5.2, given how much of an improvement overall 5.5 is. any plans to update the models available?
About iPromise on Product Hunt
“Bring "Body Doubling" to your Mac notch”
iPromise launched on Product Hunt on May 22nd, 2026 and earned 189 upvotes and 26 comments, placing #5 on the daily leaderboard. Freedom kills focus. iPromise is a new deep work protocol built on the principle of Body Doubling, the idea that having a "witness" boosts accountability. // Your AI Buddy lives elegantly in your Mac notch. It understands your active window’s context. When you drift into distractions, it gently nudges you back. // Make a promise. Your buddy helps you keep it.
iPromise was featured in Mac (103.5k followers) and Productivity (652.2k followers) on Product Hunt. Together, these topics include over 142.5k products, making this a competitive space to launch in.
Who hunted iPromise?
iPromise was hunted by Todd Jiang. A “hunter” on Product Hunt is the community member who submits a product to the platform — uploading the images, the link, and tagging the makers behind it. Hunters typically write the first comment explaining why a product is worth attention, and their followers are notified the moment they post. Around 79% of featured launches on Product Hunt are self-hunted by their makers, but a well-known hunter still acts as a signal of quality to the rest of the community. See the full all-time top hunters leaderboard to discover who is shaping the Product Hunt ecosystem.
Want to see how iPromise stacked up against nearby launches in real time? Check out the live launch dashboard for upvote speed charts, proximity comparisons, and more analytics.
Todd Jiang