Starter Story · 2026-09-09

How I Built This $160K/Month Gym App

Mauro Botanes (22), ex-fitness YouTuber, co-founded Symmetry, a gym workout tracker for the Spanish-speaking market (Spain, Mexico). One year after launch it makes ~$160K/month with ~3M downloads, grown mainly through a UGC operation (~80K videos, 500+ accounts, ~1B views) paying creators about half of revenue. Most of the episode covers his experimentation process: quarterly OKRs, funnel analytics plus user interviews, problem-first hypotheses and A/B testing (a one-screen commitment step added ~3% retention; home-screen redesigns moved nothing).

Play the episode

11 tactics

Symmetry · B2C · gym workout tracker

Post ~80K creator videos a year from 500+ accounts; track which formats win

~1B views in a year; main driver of ~3M downloads

“that is when we found UGC. We were really good at it and we just did more and better.”

Workedugc-creatorsorganic-short-video

Starter Story · 2026-09-09

Symmetry · B2C · gym workout tracker

Pay creators nearly half of revenue so they keep posting

“we give nearly half of the revenue to the creators, so we pay them a lot. This way, they're incentivized to do more content and to stay in symmetry for the long run.”

Unknowncreator-opsugc-creators

Starter Story · 2026-09-09

Symmetry · B2C · gym workout tracker

Launch to the founders' own YouTube fitness audience

Only a tiny download spike

“we had this YouTube community that we thought was going to be really good for growing the app. It wasn't.”

Failedfounder-brandcommunity

Starter Story · 2026-09-09

Symmetry · B2C · gym workout tracker

Try influencer marketing for a gym app

“We went into influencer marketing. Well, it didn't work.”

Failedinfluencer

Starter Story · 2026-09-09

Symmetry · B2C · gym workout tracker

Build a gym tracker for Spanish speakers instead of the US

Described as the fastest-growing fitness app in the Spanish market

“I built Symmetry, the fastest growing of the fitness app in the Spanish market”

Workedmarket-selectionlocalization

Starter Story · 2026-09-09

Symmetry · B2C · gym workout tracker

End onboarding with a screen where users pledge to work out

~3% better retention in an A/B test

“this experiment is just one screen at the end of the onboarding, where you commit to like workout.”

Workedonboardingretention

Starter Story · 2026-09-09

Symmetry · B2C · gym workout tracker

Test two new designs for the first screen after onboarding

Neither moved any metric

“we tested two different variants apart from the control and they moved nothing the metrics absolutely nothing and they were completely different designs”

No effectproduct-activationexperimentation

Starter Story · 2026-09-09

Symmetry · B2C · gym workout tracker

Start each test from a real user problem and A/B test for two weeks

Credited for reaching $160K/month; most tests don't move the needle

“First, we built what we wanted. Terrible idea. Second, we built what users wanted, like directly from feedback requests. Mediocre.”

Workedexperimentationfeature-development

Starter Story · 2026-09-09

Symmetry · B2C · gym workout tracker

Test the screens most users hit, like the paywall, before minor features

“if you api-test the paywall, it's going to affect a lot of users in a radical way”

Unknownexperimentationproduct-activation

Starter Story · 2026-09-09

Symmetry · B2C · gym workout tracker

Set big 90-day goals, bigger the newer the app

“For me, I use quarterly OKRs and put really ambitious OKRs.”

Unknownteam-process

Starter Story · 2026-09-09

Symmetry · B2C · gym workout tracker

Add ranks, streaks and a friends feed to workout tracking

Ranks are the most-liked feature

“the thing that people most like is here the ranks. You're seeing the ranks page where you have a rank for every muscle group and for every exercise.”

Unknownretentionproduct-virality

Starter Story · 2026-09-09

Numbers mentioned

Subject	Metric	Value	Quote
Symmetry	revenue Last 30 days, RevenueCat dashboard	USD 160K/month approximate	“You can see we're currently at around 160k monthly revenue.”
Symmetry	downloads iOS + Android; transcript says '$3 million downloads'	3M downloads approximate	“we currently have around $3 million downloads, both across iOS and Android”
Symmetry	downloads	30K downloads approximate	“We barely were at around 30K downloads.”
Symmetry	count UGC videos posted in the last year ('nearly 80,000')	80K videos/year approximate	“In the last year, we have posted nearly 80,000 videos.”
Symmetry	count UGC social accounts ('more than 500')	500 accounts approximate	“We have more than 500 accounts”
Symmetry	views Total UGC views in last year ('nearly a billion')	1,000M views/year approximate	“we have done nearly a billion views in the last year”
Symmetry	views Single viral video in the lock-screen notification format	17M viewsper video	“this video went extremely viral. You can see 17 million views.”
Symmetry	creator pay Share of company revenue paid to UGC creators	50% approximate	“we give nearly half of the revenue to the creators, so we pay them a lot”
Symmetry	retention Lift from adding a commitment screen at end of onboarding; unclear if points or relative, and which retention window	+3%	“It's increased 3% retention, adding one screen.”
Symmetry	time to milestone Launch to ~$160K/month	12 months approximate	“you got this app to $160,000 a month within one year”
benchmarkTypical monthly revenue an app reaches within its first year (host's view)	revenue	USD 30K–50K/month estimate	“usually you'll see, you know, maybe get to 30 or 50 K within a year”
benchmarkMinimum A/B test duration before analyzing	time to milestone Run experiments at least two weeks before analyzing	2 weeks	“after at least two weeks of running the experiment, you then analyze the data”