zenly 5.0

hi everyone 👋

excited to get zenly v5 into the hands of millions of people around the world! we built v5 to take our vision of creating a map that’s truly personal, social, contextual, and fun, to the next level

this new update is our biggest redesign to date and combines a social app with all the utility you’d expect from a map app. you’ll see new features like public profiles and auto check-ins for places (this is our antidote to curated posts on other social platforms - simply express yourself by where you spend time IRL). you’ll also find your footprints (your virtual scratch map) that shows all the areas you’ve uncovered and haven’t yet been on your map

also be sure to check out the new search on zenly, where you can search for friends, places, and addresses. with search, we wanted to find a better way to give you info on a place than just an anonymous review - so you’ll see info that’s unique to zenly on place profiles, like whether your friends have been there before etc.

Our 75 person Paris based team worked really hard on this one over the last 3 months - it’s our biggest and boldest update yet. hope you’ll love it as much as we do 🙂

This update is killer!

Release Notes:

5.0.0 oh hey stranger. i have some BIG news to share with you:

i’ve started a new chapter in my life, leaving some of my past behind me. i want to give you the best version of myself and i’m so excited to start this new future together :) today you can download the all-new version of zenly that comes with:

a new design! things are going to look a little different (ok, a lot different) but i really hope you’ll love it

a new map!! the biggest change? your footprints are now on the main map!! as you explore new areas they’ll uncover on your map, like your own virtual scratch map. you can also add places to your map, more on that in a little bit

a new search for friends, places AND addresses! search for your friends, but also now for places and addresses and get directions directly there. plus, get helpful information about places like whether your friends have been there before and if it’s a neighborhood fav

check-ins!! check-in to places to let the crew know exactly where you’re hanging. just open up the places tab on the bottom right of your map and i’ll automatically detect where you are and who you’re with! checking in will add that place to your map and create a highlight for your friends to view for 24 hours (so they can get a quick recap of your daily adventures)

share your world on your public profile! and when you add those places to your map they show up on a brand new section on your profile called my world. if you opt-in, your world will show publicly on zenly so that people can see the places you hang and the areas you’ve uncovered. think of it as the realest way to show the world who you are, based on where you spend your time IRL

so that’s it. the all-new zenly where you can build your own world, bringing together the people and the places that make it uniquely yours

so… let’s sit up all night and watch the sunrise together?

zenly your world bisous x

This app using to be fun & colorful and it’s now boring.

It doesn’t respect my appearance choice (light/dark) and has accessibility problems like color contrast. Neon icons everywhere, come on!

I also miss what was “my” first feature, the center button on the map which allowed me to travel from one contact to another.

At fist, I thought I was being pranked like “We rewrote zenly for Windows Phone in 1 hour, check it out!”.

But no, this is real. I make sure I was up to date on Snapchat and it’s still fun so it doesn’t seem they inspired this new direction.

I had my teenagers update this morning and the comments were gore!

Zenly was the only French app to be proud of. This is now gone.