--- title: How I build side projects | daily.dev description: This post provides an end-to-end approach for building side projects, including requirements, sketching, designing, building, testing, and documenting. It also... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/how-i-build-side-projects-niuexwtou twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: How I build side projects | daily.dev og:description: This post provides an end-to-end approach for building side projects, including requirements, sketching, designing, building, testing, and documenting. It also... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/how-i-build-side-projects-niuexwtou og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/NiUeXWTou.png og:image:alt: How I build side projects og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # How I build side projects **[Saiyan Growth Letter](https://daily.dev/sources/saiyangrowthletter)** · 4 min read · 630 upvotes · 25 comments ## Summary This post provides an end-to-end approach for building side projects, including requirements, sketching, designing, building, testing, and documenting. It also answers frequently asked questions about what to build, finding time to work on side projects, and finishing projects on time. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Community discussion Top comments from developers on daily.dev. **@legendaryemoji** · 14 upvotes > If you are building a side project for money, you should avoid working on it for a long time. Instead of making the final product, just make a simple product at first and see if people like it. If people don't, it won't succeed even if it is the final product as well. **@kiselitza** · 10 upvotes > I came for Trunks, left with some questions. > > Full-on appreciation for the hustle, seems like you are taking way too much time on the technicalities. > > If the side project is something you're passionate about and don't care if anyone else will ever use or like it - fine. > > But if you want to monetize it and for it to be successful in a wider community, you must cut down your 0-Launch drastically. > > Just build the core of the core, the simplest top-down flow/feature, and run a bunch of tests (you can utilize reddit for initial feedback, people are more than happy to give an opinion. Then you... **@denicodes** · 8 upvotes > ayyy brother good post, perfect timing as im making a vid on how beginners devs should tackle projects for getting a job **@ryandotfurrer** · 7 upvotes > Great recommendations! I'm trying to get into the habit of designing then building but damn do I often just want to get to coding. Not because I dislike designing, but seeing things come to life in front of me is intoxicating. **@ghost** · 2 upvotes > Abandon substack. ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [Don’t just attend KubeCon \+ CloudNativeCon, Merge Forward your experience\!](https://daily.dev/posts/don-t-just-attend-kubecon-cloudnativecon-merge-forward-your-experience--l0rpp73x8) · CNCF · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [Announcing H2 2026 KCDs](https://daily.dev/posts/announcing-h2-2026-kcds-m96goajm1) · CNCF · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [Two months of Open Community Groups](https://daily.dev/posts/two-months-of-open-community-groups-asf52zhbs) · CNCF · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [CNCF Unveils Schedule for KubeCon \+ CloudNativeCon Europe 2026](https://daily.dev/posts/cncf-unveils-schedule-for-kubecon-cloudnativecon-europe-2026-ikhcoa5cb) · CNCF · 2 upvotes · 0 comments - [CNCF Debuts KubeCon \+ CloudNativeCon Japan 2026 Schedule](https://daily.dev/posts/cncf-debuts-kubecon-cloudnativecon-japan-2026-schedule-xp5pyudub) · CNCF · 1 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#productivity](https://daily.dev/tags/productivity), [#project-management](https://daily.dev/tags/project-management) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/how-i-build-side-projects-niuexwtou) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"How I build side projects","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/how-i-build-side-projects-niuexwtou","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/how-i-build-side-projects-niuexwtou"},"datePublished":"2024-03-23T10:17:40.583Z","dateModified":"2024-05-09T08:39:06.345Z","description":"This post provides an end-to-end approach for building side projects, including requirements, sketching, designing, building, testing, and documenting. 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Instead of making the final product, just make a simple product at first and see if people like it. If people don’t, it won’t succeed even if it is the final product as well.","datePublished":"2024-03-24T17:09:33.726Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/NiUeXWTou#c-LkbHh9G0S","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Legendary Emoji","url":"https://daily.dev/legendaryemoji","image":"https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/60050010?v=4"},"interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":14}},{"@type":"Comment","text":"I came for Trunks, left with some questions.\nFull-on appreciation for the hustle, seems like you are taking way too much time on the technicalities.\nIf the side project is something you’re passionate about and don’t care if anyone else will ever use or like it - fine.\nBut if you want to monetize it and for it to be successful in a wider community, you must cut down your 0-Launch drastically.\nJust build the core of the core, the simplest top-down flow/feature, and run a bunch of tests (you can utilize reddit for initial feedback, people are more than happy to give an opinion. Then you figure out if there is any value and either pivot or build on top of it.\nDon’t take too much time or pride in making it perfect, perfect might not be what the folks need. Cheers. :)","datePublished":"2024-03-26T12:34:42.221Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/NiUeXWTou#c-PB0hhcJD2","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Aldin Kiselica","url":"https://daily.dev/kiselitza","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/s--7MmdUNnH--/f_auto/v1711021771/avatars/avatar_wmyiR105exUAMUi0AIxh6"},"interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":10}},{"@type":"Comment","text":"ayyy brother good post, perfect timing as im making a vid on how beginners devs should tackle projects for getting a job","datePublished":"2024-03-23T23:18:13.982Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/NiUeXWTou#c-gz5rGYgjp","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Deni","url":"https://daily.dev/denicodes","image":"https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/60447880?v=4"},"interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":8}},{"@type":"Comment","text":"Great recommendations! I’m trying to get into the habit of designing then building but damn do I often just want to get to coding. Not because I dislike designing, but seeing things come to life in front of me is intoxicating.","datePublished":"2024-03-24T16:02:10.773Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/NiUeXWTou#c-vvIErECWZ","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Ryan Furrer","url":"https://daily.dev/ryandotfurrer","image":"https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/a/ACg8ocLmpReb0_NfyE3MrWNxyXEQ2PUyOo6LQP7bWa0XBb0up6g=s96-c"},"interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":7}},{"@type":"Comment","text":"Abandon substack.","datePublished":"2024-03-23T18:41:43.516Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/NiUeXWTou#c-zWsFtMNkM","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Deleted user","url":"https://daily.dev/ghost","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/s--hNIUzLiO--/f_auto/v1705327420/public/ghost_vlftth"},"interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":2}}]} ```