Malikbaby: a shared feed tracker we built for ourselves

Malikbaby is a free shared feed tracker for parents and caregivers. It started because the app my wife and I used became a $10-per-month subscription, and we only needed one thing from it: a quick way to track Malik's feeds together.

# A free app went paid

We had been using Nara Baby and I genuinely liked it. It was simple, useful, and free. I even told my wife: “This app is actually quite good, and it’s free!”

I probably jinxed it.

A month later, it became a paid app. Around $10 per month.

I understand that apps cost money to make and maintain. But for us, paying every month just to track feeds felt like a bit much. We only used one part of the app anyway.

So on a Saturday, I started building a tiny alternative for ourselves.

# One weekend, a few prompts

The first goal was deliberately small: a web app where my wife and I could add feeds and see the latest one.

No sleep tracking. No charts. No big feature list. Just the thing we actually needed.

I used Codex and Claude Code, hit a few usage limits along the way, and kept prompting my way through the rough parts. By the end of the weekend, Malikbaby existed as a working web app. We could log feeds, see the shared activity, and use it from our phones.

In the past, an idea like this would have stayed an idea. I would have needed to find a developer, explain the concept, make a budget, and decide whether it was worth the effort. For a small family tool, the answer would probably have been no.

Now I can build a first version myself, use it in real life, and improve it while we go.

# Building the thing we wished existed

The subscription was the reason I started, but the ability to change the details is what made it fun.

I liked Nara Baby, but one thing kept bothering me: the button to add a feed sits at the top of the screen. When you are holding a baby, reaching for the top of a phone is not the nicest interaction.

Six years of working in accessibility taught me one very practical thing: put the actions people use most where they can comfortably reach them. So in Malikbaby, the main actions sit closer to the bottom of the screen.

It is a tiny decision. But those tiny decisions are exactly why making your own tool is so satisfying. You do not have to accept the parts that annoy you. You can change them.

# Free to use on any device

What started as a simple tool for us has grown into a proper web app that other parents and caregivers can use too. Malikbaby is fully working and free to use on any device with a browser.

Malikbaby lets a household keep one shared feed log. You can add bottle feeds, breastfeeding sessions, pumping entries, and diaper changes, then see updates from another device without passing a phone around.

I may add optional paid features later, perhaps deeper insights or an AI chat feature, but the core feed tracking should stay useful on its own.

If you are a parent or parent-to-be looking for a simple way to track feeds, give it a try at malikbaby.com.

The native iPhone app is also in the works as I write this.