Top 20 Most Profitable One-Person Businesses

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Building a one-person digital business that generates serious revenue used to sound like a pipe dream, but the data tells a completely different story.

We tracked down 20 verified solo founders who publicly disclosed their revenue numbers, and the range is wild (from $10K to over $1M per month). These aren't vague estimates or wishful thinking, they're documented figures with actual sources.

What's particularly interesting is that 90% of these founders built their businesses with zero paid advertising, and most had multiple failures before their breakthrough (which is exactly why we create our market clarity reports, to help you skip the guesswork and build with actual data).

Top 20 One-Person Businesses Ranked by Monthly Revenue

• 1. BuiltWith ($1,166,667/month)

  BuiltWith is a website technology profiler that tells you exactly what tech stack any website uses, from payment processors to analytics tools. Gary Brewer, an Australian software engineer, runs this entire operation solo (he handles all development, customer service, and operations himself, occasionally outsourcing very specific tasks like Salesforce integration). The $1,166,667 monthly revenue comes from $14M ARR that he's maintained consistently since 2020, serving customers like Google, Meta, and Amazon with 85-90% profit margins. His growth strategy hinged on a strategic partnership with AboutUs.com that created massive backlinks and a 10X traffic increase, plus 50%+ of traffic from SEO (primarily branded searches) with zero traditional marketing spend.

  Sources: Starter Story, Colin Keeley, Medium
• 2. Justin Welsh ($533,333/month)

  Justin Welsh runs a digital education business teaching solopreneurs how to build one-person internet businesses, and he's the living proof it works. The former startup executive who managed teams of 50+ and helped raise $300M+ in VC quit after severe burnout in 2019 and built this solo operation to $6.4M in 2024, crossing $10M lifetime revenue in October 2024. His $533,333 monthly revenue (calculated from $6.4M annual) comes from three flagship courses, a newsletter with 200K+ subscribers generating sponsorships, and an affiliate program pulling in $600K+ annually, all with 86-92% profit margins and just a part-time VA. The growth playbook is relentless consistency: 600+ posts yearly on LinkedIn, 500+ consecutive days on Twitter, building 520K LinkedIn and 450K Twitter followers with $0 in paid ads, plus his Creator MBA launch brought in $1.6M in just 6 days in January 2024.

  Sources: Justin Welsh, Growth in Reverse, The Tilt
• 3. Wave AI ($450,000/month)

  Wave AI is an iOS/Android app that transcribes and summarizes recorded audio, phone calls, and meetings using AI, built entirely by Josh Mohrer, the former GM of Uber New York. Here's the wild part: Josh was a first-time coder who used ChatGPT to write 99% of the code, built the first concept in one day, and scaled to $5.4M ARR within the first year. The $450,000 monthly revenue comes from 22,000 paid subscribers who found the app through strong App Store optimization and organic growth, with subscriber volume doubling monthly at peak. His strategy was pure speed and AI leverage: he used ChatGPT to break down complex code into smaller segments, launched on iOS first then Android, and leveraged his Uber experience for product-market understanding without needing traditional coding skills.

  Sources: Starter Story, Adapty, This Week in Startups
• 4. HeadshotPro ($300,000/month)

  HeadshotPro generates AI-powered professional headshots from casual photos, eliminating expensive photo shoots entirely. Danny Postma, a Dutch entrepreneur who taught himself coding at age 25 in Bali (2019-2020) and previously sold an AI copywriting tool for 7 figures after just 8 months, built this as a true solo operation (though by 2023-2024 he hired his girlfriend for 2-3 hours/day and was seeking an ML engineer). The $300,000 monthly revenue at its mid-2023 peak came from viral growth on Twitter, programmatic SEO with 200+ city/location pages ranking for "professional headshots" keywords, and building on his existing audience from a previous viral product (ProfilePicture.AI). His growth strategy centered on moving fast, solving a clear pain point (expensive professional photography), and leveraging his 101K+ Twitter followers for instant distribution, ultimately serving 196,987+ customers and generating 17.9M+ AI headshots.

  Sources: Starter Story, Indie Hackers, The Bootstrapped Founder
• 5. DesignJoy ($258,333/month)

  DesignJoy offers unlimited design work through flat monthly subscriptions ($4,995 Standard, $7,995 Pro), and Brett Williams handles every single design request himself. Brett, who spent years in design agencies before starting DesignJoy in 2017, explicitly states "DesignJoy does not employ other designers, or outsource work to any other entity," managing 30-40 recurring clients solo with a 48-hour average delivery time using just Trello for queue management. The $258,333 monthly revenue (calculated from $3.1M in 2024, though some sources cite $145K/month as of June 2024) comes from premium pricing with a waitlist creating scarcity, maintaining 90%+ profit margins with only $84/month in operating costs. His growth strategy focused on building community on Indie Hackers (targeting indie makers), growing 40,000+ Twitter followers by sharing his journey, and creating a "design as subscription" model that was unique enough to generate word-of-mouth, notably hovering around $5K/month for nearly 3 years before taking off.

  Sources: Starter Story, GetLatka, IndieBites
• 6. FormulaBot ($220,000/month)

  FormulaBot converts text instructions into Excel formulas using AI, and it was built entirely with no-code tools by David Bressler, a marketing analytics professional (not a coder) during his 6-week paternity leave in July 2022. David, from Orlando with 10+ years in data analytics and a full-time job since 2011, learned Bubble (no-code platform) from YouTube tutorials and explicitly states he operates solo, using freelance contractors only for specific tasks. The $220,000 monthly revenue at its February 2024 peak comes from 750,000+ users and 5,000+ paying subscribers, with viral Reddit posts (r/Excel and r/InternetIsBeautiful) bringing 100,000 visitors overnight and making $30,000 in the first 3 months. His growth strategy centered on organic SEO (350K monthly visitors), a premium domain purchase, hiring a full-time influencer for Instagram (20K followers), and a 30% affiliate program with 12-month commissions, all while rejecting offers from Microsoft, Sequoia Capital, and Y Combinator.

  Sources: NoCode MBA, Picklerooms, Starter Story
• 7. Nomad List ($176,000+/month)

  Nomad List ranks 1,500+ cities worldwide for digital nomads by cost of living, internet speed, weather, and safety, built by Pieter Levels (@levelsio), the Dutch developer famous for his "zero employees" philosophy. Pieter, who taught himself to code by lurking on Hacker News since 2010, has lived in 40+ countries and never worked for anyone else, running a portfolio of products including RemoteOK (remote job board, $35K-$80K/month), PhotoAI ($65K-$70K/month), and InteriorAI ($38K/month). The $176,000+ combined monthly revenue (Nomad List alone hit $441,667/month calculated from $5.3M in 2024) comes from 625,000+ monthly visits, 29,000+ paying members, and maintaining roughly 90%+ profit margins. His growth started with an MVP validation as a crowdsourced Google spreadsheet that went viral on Twitter, a Product Hunt #1 launch (becoming the #15 highest-voted product of all time), features in Time and NY Times without any PR effort, massive SEO through backlinks, and building in public with all revenue openly shared on Twitter (422K+ followers) while spending $0 on marketing.

  Sources: GetLatka, Starter Story, Levels.io, Open Startup
• 8. Testimonial.to + PDF.ai ($127,000/month)

  Testimonial.to makes collecting and displaying video testimonials easy, while PDF.ai lets users chat with PDF documents using AI, both built by Damon Chen, a former Senior Software Engineer at Cisco for 8 years in Silicon Valley. Damon, who took 6 months unpaid leave during COVID (2020) with his wife and 1-year-old child, built 4 failed projects before Testimonial succeeded and explicitly operated solo until $400K ARR when he hired his first employee for marketing. The $127,000 combined monthly revenue (Testimonial.to at $66,667/month from $800K ARR, PDF.ai at $60,000/month in 2024) comes from smart domain investments (bought testimonial.io for $35K, generated $80K lifetime revenue; bought pdf.ai domain for $10K) and a 30% affiliate program driving 10-15% of revenue. His growth centered on launching on Product Hunt (sold 30 lifetime deals at $199 = $6K in first 2 weeks), building in public on Indie Hackers, social media presence catching attention of influencers like Andrew Gazdecki, and for PDF.ai specifically, hiring an influencer for Instagram (20K followers) and posting on Reddit for viral growth.

  Sources: Creator Economy, Starter Story, Indie Hackers
• 9. SiteGPT + Feather ($100,000+/month)

  SiteGPT is an AI chatbot platform that trains on website content for customer support, while Feather turns Notion pages into published blogs, both built by Bhanu Teja Pachipulusu, a 24-year-old solo founder from India. Bhanu, a graduate of Indian Institute of Technology (IIT, same as Google CEO Sundar Pichai) and former startup software engineer, built everything himself and all sources confirm he's an indie/solo operator who started these as side projects before going full-time. The $100,000+ combined monthly revenue (February 2024 Twitter disclosure showed $95K SiteGPT + $7.7K Feather, with earlier reports of $15K MRR 6 months after SiteGPT launch) comes from scratching his own itch (built chatbot for Feather support, turned it into product) and launching both on Product Hunt: SiteGPT got Product of the Day with 900 upvotes (March 2023), Feather got Product of the Day with 1,200 upvotes (January 2024). His growth strategy focused on building in public on Twitter (10K+ followers at launch), simple tweet launches generating 15K website visits Day 1, transparent revenue sharing on social media, educational video content marketing ($4K-5K monthly spend), and enterprise sales focus, ultimately selling SiteGPT in a micro-acquisition for reportedly $250K.

  Sources: Twitter, Starter Story, Super Frameworks

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• 10. ShipFast ($83,212/month)

  ShipFast is a NextJS boilerplate helping developers ship startups quickly (code template with payments, auth, and components), built by Marc Lou (Marc Louvion), a 32-year-old French developer who explicitly states "zero employees" and manages 20+ products solo. Marc, who worked as a waiter in Paris, had a failed startup in Seoul in 2017, moved to Bali, learned to code, and discovered the build-in-public community on Twitter (inspired by Pieter Levels and Danny Postma), was named Product Hunt Maker of the Year 2024. The $83,212 monthly revenue in March 2024 (breakdown: ShipFast $75,100/month, PoopUp $2,900/month, ZenVoice $1,300/month, IndiePage $1,200/month, LaunchViral $1,100/month, other sources ~$2,600/month) comes from building 27+ products over 3 years with rapid iteration, with ShipFast alone making $40K in its first month (September 1, 2023) and hitting $300K total revenue by February 2024 (5 months after launch). His growth strategy centered on building in public on Twitter/X (95,000 followers), a newsletter with 20,000+ readers, first-mover advantage (first comprehensive NextJS boilerplate), Product Hunt launch ($6K in first 48 hours), shipping products in days not weeks, emotional marketing focused on outcomes (freedom, money, status), and maintaining 92% profit margins with 329,427 website visitors and 1,851 customers.

  Sources: Starter Story, Marc Lou Newsletter, LinkedIn
• 11. Bannerbear ($83,333/month)

  Bannerbear is an API and no-code tool that auto-generates social media images and videos, allowing designers and agencies to create templates once then programmatically generate hundreds of variations with different text, images, and data. Jon Yongfook (Jon Cockle), a corporate product manager who left his full-time job at age 38-39, started Bannerbear as TRUE SOLO (2019-2022) before hiring a small team of 5 full-time remote employees as of 2023 (still founder-led but no longer solo). The $83,333 monthly revenue (from $1M ARR as of September 2024, with progressive milestones: $10K MRR in 2021, $20K MRR in 2022, $27K MRR in 2023, $50K MRR in mid-2024) comes from 284 subscribers at the $20K MRR phase with average customer value $70+/month. His growth strategy included a "12 Startups in 12 Months" challenge (tried 7 products before Bannerbear), 50/50 time split (1 week coding, 1 week marketing), building in public on Twitter, Zapier partnership as major growth driver, open startup sharing all metrics publicly at bannerbear.com/open, programmatic SEO, and aggressive pricing ($49-$399/month vs initial $9), with the first 6-7 products making $0 or minimal revenue before Bannerbear took off.

  Sources: Twitter, LinkedIn, Bannerbear Open
• 12. GoRails + Suite ($83,333+/month)

  GoRails provides Ruby on Rails screencasts and tutorials, while Jumpstart is a Rails app template with pre-built features, and HatchBox helps deploy and manage Rails apps, all built solo by Chris Oliver (@excid3), a Ruby on Rails developer and educator based in the US. Chris, a former employee who wanted to build a sustainable business creating educational content and tools for Rails developers, built all three products solo and is known in the Rails community for teaching and open source contributions. The $83,333+ monthly revenue (calculated from $1M+ total revenue annually) comes from a subscription-based screencasting model providing steady MRR versus volatile course launches, with low churn due to the educational subscription model. His growth strategy focused on building for an audience he knows well (Rails developers), creating multiple complementary products in the same ecosystem, using success from one product to fund others, focusing on sustainable revenue versus rapid growth, community engagement in the Rails ecosystem, and open source contributions that built his reputation, all bootstrapped from his own savings and time.

  Sources: Indie Hackers Podcast, GoRails
• 13. A Self Guru ($78,000/month)

  A Self Guru sells DIY legal templates for bloggers and online businesses (25 legal templates available including privacy policies, terms and conditions, disclaimers, and contracts), plus blog coaching and legal audit services. Amira Irfan, a full-time practicing attorney for 10+ years who witnessed her father's business get sued for $90,000 (inspiring her legal focus), explicitly manages everything herself as a solo operation while maintaining her law practice. The $78,000 monthly revenue in a specific disclosed month (2022-2023 timeframe) breaks down to $67,375 legal templates/services + $8,245 affiliate marketing/sponsorships + $2,755 paid interviews, with previous months at $60,000 and $44,000, notably making $1,000 in her first month blogging with barely any traffic and $210,000 in her first year. Her growth strategy centered on Pinterest traffic as the primary source, SEO optimization with RankIQ tool, 30+ affiliate programs, email list building (30,000+ subscribers), creating valuable legal content ranking on Google, diversified income streams, and a "done is better than perfect" philosophy, with features in International Business Times, Forbes, and CNBC, plus a generous affiliate program (40% commission, paying $120,000+ annually to affiliates).

  Sources: A Self Guru, A Self Guru Homepage
• 14. TypingMind + Portfolio ($45,000/month)

  TypingMind is a better UI for ChatGPT with advanced features, DevUtils is a Swiss Army knife for developers with 40+ tools, and Xnapper beautifies screenshots, all developer tools coded by Tony Dinh himself. Tony, 30 years old from Vietnam and a former software engineer with 7 years experience before quitting in September 2021, explicitly states building solo though he hired 1 full-time employee (support/marketing) and 3 freelance developers by year 2, with core development remaining solo. The $45,000 combined monthly revenue (September 2023, 2-year anniversary, with roughly 90% profit margins: TypingMind ~$30K/month, DevUtils ~$200-500/month initially, Xnapper $6K/month, plus he sold Black Magic for $128K) comes from working an average 4 hours/day while traveling. His growth strategy focused on building in public on Twitter daily (4 hours/day initially on Twitter, now 97,000+ followers), creating multiple products to diversify income, focusing on developer tools where he understood the audience, newsletter growth to 20,000+ readers, rapid product iteration based on feedback, featured on Indie Hackers podcast (September 2022), and launching on Product Hunt and Hacker News, with TypingMind making $1K first day and $22K in first 7 days (March 2023).

  Sources: Indie Hackers, Tony Dinh Newsletter, TypingMind
• 15. Closet Tools ($38,000/month)

  Closet Tools is a Chrome extension and SaaS platform helping users sell more on Poshmark (online clothing marketplace), providing automation and tools for resellers on the platform. Jordan O'Connor (@jdnoc), based in the United States with student loan debt, learned to code while working full-time and raising a family, building and operating Closet Tools entirely solo (he coded everything himself). The $38,000 monthly revenue (roughly $456K/year, disclosed in a 2020 Indie Hackers podcast) comes from identifying an underserved niche (Poshmark sellers) needing automation, with low churn rate since it's a mission-critical tool for sellers. His growth strategy centered on SEO-focused content to attract users searching for solutions, integrating directly as a Chrome extension for easy discovery, focusing on actually helping people with a mission-driven approach, building features based on user feedback and pain points, and organic growth through word-of-mouth in the Poshmark community, notably doubling revenue while on paternity leave (showing the business systems work) and being listed as #1 solo founder by verified Stripe revenue on Indie Hackers at the time of the podcast.

  Sources: Indie Hackers Podcast, Closet Tools
• 16. Liinks ($25,000/month)

  Liinks is a "link-in-bio" tool and mobile-optimized website builder competing with Linktree, allowing users to create simple, customizable landing pages to house multiple links from social media bios. Charlie (full name not disclosed, developer and entrepreneur who previously worked on Colors of Motion poster business with upper five figures revenue and VSUAL print-on-demand marketplace with six figures GMV), taught himself design while building side hustles in college and during the pandemic took a full-time job for financial security but continued working on Liinks nights and weekends. The $25,000 monthly revenue as of August 2024 when he quit his day job (4.5 years after launch) comes from competitive pricing (initially undercut competition at $3/month, now $4/month Premium, $10/month Pro for up to 5 profiles) targeting the price-sensitive market. His growth strategy focused on early shipping (launched in just 2 weeks to get user feedback quickly), niche targeting (initially artists and designers due to founder's background), word of mouth letting the product speak for itself in the creator community, going with the flow (adapted based on what gained traction), simplicity (core functionality rather than feature bloat), free trial/freemium allowing users to test before converting, product-led growth (users discover through other users' Liinks pages), and gradual price increases (started $3/month, raised to $4/month as value increased).

  Sources: Indie Hackers, Liinks
• 17. HabitKit + WinDiary ($22,000/month)

  HabitKit is a gamified habit tracking app for iOS and Android with GitHub-style contribution visualization, while WinDiary is a mood tracking app, both built by Sebastian Röhl, a German software developer. Sebastian, who graduated university and worked as a corporate web developer/software engineer, first quit his job in April 2022 to build apps full-time, returned to a job when it didn't work out, then quit again in February 2024 when HabitKit gained traction (he built WinDiary in just one month while employed). The $22,000 average monthly revenue (first 5 months of 2024: $110K total revenue, with December 2023 at $12K total ($5K MRR) and January 2024 spiking to $33K due to New Year's resolutions) comes from 120,000 downloads in 2023 and $51,000 revenue in 2023 (first full year), with 98% of revenue from HabitKit. His growth strategy centered on building in public on Twitter/X with his first viral tweet getting 800 likes for a HabitKit screenshot, App Store Optimization ranking top 10 for key habit tracking keywords in May 2023, minimal marketing spend with organic growth, seasonal advantage (New Year's resolutions for habit trackers), being featured by MKBHD/The Studio channel (December 2024 causing huge spike), RevenueCat New York Times Square feature (June 2024), appearing on podcasts (Happy Bootstrapping, RevenueCat SubClub), and active presence on social media and Threads.

  Sources: Indie Hackers, Sebastian Röhl Substack, RevenueCat
• 18. NoCodeAPI ($18,036/month)

  NoCodeAPI was a service allowing non-technical users to integrate with various APIs without writing code, built and scaled entirely solo before being acquired for 6 figures by a founder from South India (age 25 when started in 2017, not fully disclosed, Master's degree with internship as web developer and 8 months at full-time job before quitting). The founder operated from South India after quitting his job just 8 months into his career, wanting to build a "company of one" lifestyle with skills in Angular.js, web development, and APIs expertise. The $18,036 monthly revenue as of 2022 before acquisition (peak MRR $5,000+ before acquisition) came from launching in January 2020 (pre-COVID) after building in November 2019 and growing organically through product-led growth. His growth strategy focused on solving a real problem (API integration complexity), targeting the specific niche of the no-code movement, building side projects and selling them to fund his lifestyle, growing NoCodeAPI to $2K MRR in first year, with a documented journey showing 2017: $2,500 total ($208/month internship), 2018: $6,500 total ($542/month job + freelance, quit after 8 months), 2019: $24,691 ($2,058/month, sold first project for $22K), 2020: $42,124 ($3,510/month, NoCodeAPI grew to $2K MRR), 2021: $153,609 ($12,800/month, NoCodeAPI $3.5K + sold 2 projects for $95K), 2022: $216,433 ($18,036/month, NoCodeAPI $5K MRR, then acquired for 6 figures), building a side project in 11 hours and selling for $5K within a month, now building TableApps.io (new SaaS project).

  Sources: Hacker News, NoCodeAPI, TableApps.io

Each of our market clarity reports includes a study of both positive and negative competitor reviews, helping uncover opportunities and gaps.

• 19. Cassie Scroggins Blog ($10,004/month)

  Cassie Scroggins runs a mom lifestyle blog helping moms "rediscover themselves after motherhood," selling products including Ultimate Blog Planner, Ultimate Mom Planner, Pinterest templates, and an eBook, plus blog coaching services. Cassie, who got married at 19, became a mom at 20, and started her blog at 21 (2016), was inspired by another mom blogger's income report showing $12,484/month and explicitly discusses balancing her solo business with childcare (stay-at-home mom of 4 who uses childcare/co-working space 3 days/week, home with kids other 4 days). The $10,004 monthly revenue in January 2023 (her first 5-figure month, previously averaging $7,000+/month in November 2020) breaks down to sponsorships $5,541 (Instagram $3,232, Pinterest $2,309), ads $3,034 (AdThrive $2,921, YouTube $113), products $1,002 (planners, templates, eBook), and affiliates $428. Her growth strategy centered on Pinterest traffic (primary source), SEO optimization, social media (Instagram 27K, Pinterest 21K, TikTok 6K), email list building (30,252 subscribers), brand partnerships and sponsorships, ad revenue through AdThrive, and content focus on goal-setting, motherhood, and blogging tips, notably taking most of 2021 off (had 3rd baby) and rebuilding to $10,000/month by January 2023, with the blog able to "mostly run itself" for passive income during breaks.

  Sources: Cassie Scroggins, Cassie Scroggins Homepage
• 20. Make Book (~$2,000/month)

  Make: Bootstrapper's Handbook is a digital book/course teaching how to bootstrap businesses to $10K+/month without funding or teams, covering ideation, building, launching, growing, monetizing, and automating as a solo founder. Pieter Levels (@levelsio, covered in detail at #7), created this after the success of Nomad List and RemoteOK once he had a proven methodology to teach, with the book based on his experience building 70+ projects and sold as a $39 PDF/eBook. The estimated ~$2,000 monthly revenue (part of Pieter's $176K+ portfolio) comes from leveraging his existing audience of 422K+ Twitter followers, SEO from his brand recognition, word of mouth from the success of his other products, and positioning himself as an authority on bootstrapping. His growth strategy for this product specifically included cross-promotion with his other products, teaching his exact frameworks and lessons learned from 70+ projects documented, sharing his "zero employees" philosophy, and using it to complement his other products while generating steady passive income as a digital product with relatively small but steady revenue stream.

  Sources: Make Book, Levels.io