Modern
Built on a current technology stack, with a UI that stays out of the user's way. Not a clone of what came before.
About SelfManager
Vision - to unleash the power of a person.
SelfManager.ai is a date-centric task manager developed by software engineer Marian Sorca. He came at it as a freelancer who had already figured out how to ship high quality results consistently for clients. The app was built from two angles at once: codifying the methodology that had carried his highly successful freelance client work into a system he could rely on - and share - and learning Angular, Google's then-new framework. Both shaped what SelfManager became.
The web app launched at the end of 2022. The development started in the middle of 2016.
The story
Six years in development - released only when it was good enough to use every day.
SelfManager was launched after six years of quiet development, almost entirely in the engineer's free time. Long before a single user signed up, the app was already running locally on its creator's own device - tested, broken, rebuilt, and tested again against the realities of a working life.
The engineer has been a daily user from the very beginning. Every feature on the public product has first survived months - sometimes years - of personal use. That single constraint, more than any roadmap, has shaped what shipped and what didn't.
Updates are made frequently and the app is improved continuously. Many more capabilities are planned.
The brief was small. Build something that actually deserves to exist.
Four guardrails were set at the start of the project. Every product decision since has had to clear them.
Fast
Sub-100ms in-app actions, instant table loads, real-time sync across devices. Speed is a feature, not a side effect.
Useful
If a feature does not solve a real problem the maker has personally felt, it does not ship. No filler.
Strong technology
Leverage the latest and best technology available to deliver enterprise-grade technology like the top Software companies are doing.
Nine years. 3,700+ commits.
Used every day by its maker.
9+Years in active development since the first commit in mid-2016.
3,700+Git commits across the codebase - and counting.
1,322+Days planned by the maker inside SelfManager.
11AI-powered features available to every paying customer today.
From a sketch on paper in 2016 to an AI-native task manager in 2026.
A year-by-year record of what was built, what was learned, and what the product became. The most recent year is expanded by default.
Q2 2026
SelfManager.ai v5 is live. Codename: BFR Booster.
Our previous major release, v4, was the visible one - full redesign, UI and UX improvements, AI Plan, deeper personalization. You could see the upgrade the second you opened the app.
v5 is the opposite. Almost nothing visual changes. We migrated the entire backend off our previous foundation and onto an enterprise database. Every piece of data was re-modelled and moved over - tables, tasks, comments, notes, AI artifacts, the sharing model. The most important release we have ever shipped, and you can barely see it.
The codename BFR Booster fits. A booster does not look like much from the outside, but it is what gets the rocket off the ground. v5 is the booster for everything coming next.
What you get:
- Enterprise scaling. Built to handle whatever growth comes next - the sky is the limit.
- Multi-region performance. Same speed from Europe, the US, Asia, South America.
- Offline-friendly. The app loads from local cache before the network answers. No internet? Your changes are written locally and sync to the cloud the moment you are back online.
- Pages that load fast and stay fast. Whether you have 50 tables or 5000, opening a week or month view feels the same.
- A platform that lets us ship complex, data-heavy features without friction.
- Source code rebuilt on the latest Google technologies. Google has been our platform since 2016, when the first line of SelfManager.ai was written - using the best available tech has been a founding principle from day one.
- The bedrock for what is coming next.
What we get: features that took two weeks now take a few days. We need that speed - tech and AI are moving at rocket speed pace, and v5 is our booster.
Migrations are not glamorous. No screenshots, no flashy demo. But v4 made the app feel new, and BFR Booster makes it possible to keep making it better and serve more people at a higher standard.
Just watch what comes next.
Customization layer on top of v4. The first batch of personalization features built on the redesigned base:
- Collapsible sidebar - ⌘B (or Ctrl+B on Windows) or click the chevron at the bottom-right of the sidebar to slide it off-screen. A floating restore arrow pins to the left edge of the viewport. Preference syncs across devices.
- Drag-to-resize on desktop - Grab the bottom edge of the hero or the right edge of the sidebar and drag. Hero: 160-1000px. Sidebar: 236-800px. Sizes persist per account.
- "Custom" hero size - After a drag, the hero size picker gains a Custom row showing the current pixel value. Clicking Small / Medium / Large clears the override and snaps back to the preset.
- Per-theme overlay tint - Sidebar and hero each have their own color + opacity, edited independently for dark and light mode. Six presets plus a native color picker. Collapsed by default inside the profile modal.
- Split hero size per platform - Desktop and mobile now store the hero size separately. You can run "Tall" on desktop and "Compact" on mobile without them fighting each other.
- Themed nav pill over hero images - The top navigation pill now switches to a frosted-white variant in light mode when a hero image is set, instead of staying dark-glass. Dark mode keeps its original smoky glass.
Version 4 - the biggest design update since launch. A ground-up redesign of the entire logged-in experience - desktop, mobile, light mode, dark mode, every modal, every dialog.
Mobile feels native. A proper gesture layer replaces the old responsive layout:
- Swipe right on a task -> open settings
- Swipe left -> delete (with confirm)
- Double-tap -> toggle complete
- Long-press text -> select it and use the highlight marker to color-code words
Tracks your finger 1:1, with a haptic pulse at the commit point. Gets out of the way when you're scrolling or selecting text.
Notes are actual notes. The plain textarea is gone. The new editor supports bold, italic, headings, bullet and numbered lists, links, and inline code. Paste from Word or Google Docs and formatting gets cleaned automatically. Auto-save toggle syncs across devices. Version history is two clicks away.
The editor only loads when you open a note, so it never slows the rest of the app down.
Light mode everywhere. Light mode previously stopped at the homepage. Every authenticated surface now respects the theme - modals, dialogs, settings, subscription, AI views.
What changes for existing users. Nothing. Log in and everything feels tighter. All data, tables, notes, and subscriptions are unchanged.
9 years. 3,700+ commits. The version SelfManager always wanted to be.
Dark Mode: Dark mode is now fully available across all components on the homepage. Every section - tables, comments, notes, images, AI chat, and all supporting UI elements - now renders consistently in dark mode.
Empty Day Content Component: When you open a day with no tables, instead of a blank page you now see an educational, inspirational, and motivational section featuring:
- Random Productivity Quote - A curated collection of 100 quotes from thinkers like Steve Jobs, Bruce Lee, Benjamin Franklin, and more. Refreshable with one click.
- Feature Showcase Carousel - Swipeable cards highlighting 15 things you can do with Self Manager, including AI chat, time tracking, screenshots, weekly reviews, and more.
- "How it works" Video Link - Opens a lightbox with the Self Manager walkthrough video.
- Quick Action Buttons - Jump straight to creating a table, viewing pinned tables, or getting an AI summary.
Works in both dark and light mode. The goal is to make empty days feel like a launchpad, not a dead end.
Deadlines: Tasks now support due dates and times. A dedicated Deadlines page was added where you can see all your upcoming deadlines across all tables in one place, making it easy to stay on top of what's due.
Notifications - In-App, Push & Email: A full notification system was introduced with three channels:
- In-App Notifications - A notification panel in the top navigation bar shows your latest notifications in real time.
- Push Notifications - Receive browser push notifications so you never miss an update, even when you're on another tab.
- Email Notifications - Get notified by email for important events like mentions and deadline reminders.
Mention People in Comments: You can now mention collaborators in table comments using @. The mentioned person receives an in-app notification, a push notification, and an email, so they are always in the loop.
Q1 2026
4 Additional Login Providers: We added four new ways to sign in:
- Magic Link - Enter your email and receive a login link. Works even if you don't already have an account.
- Phone Number - Enter your phone, receive an SMS code, enter it and you're in!
- Email + Password - The traditional way was added too.
- Facebook - Sign in with your Facebook account.
The goal is to offer many options for different preferences.
Link All Providers to One Account: If you sign in with any option, you can link all the other providers to your account! So if you're on mobile and created an account with your Phone number, you can link your Google account to it and log in to the same account with Google from desktop.
Pricing Update: We slightly increased our prices to invest more in marketing and growth. Existing customers keep their current price. Read the full explanation here.
Custom Range for AI Period Summary: You can now select a custom date range of up to 3 months (1 quarter) for AI-powered period reviews, giving you much more flexibility when analyzing your productivity.
Search by Comments: You can now search your comments and the associated tables will appear in the results as well.
Domain change: The domain was changed to SelfManager.ai from Self-Manager.net to reflect the direction of the product and the current high number of AI features.
AI Features - Save & History: The AI Chat, Summaries and Follow-ups now have a save button and they appear afterwards on the page AI History. We believe that you should choose if you want your AI data to be saved and not be saved by default. Also, our AI Provider, Google Cloud, doesn't store your conversations or train based on your data and prompts.
Week and Month pages - Full Table Control: Instead of just seeing a preview of tables and their tasks, you now have full control over the tables from a period on those pages. With 1 click the table opens in a modal with full control that you have on the homepage/main page (daily view).
Pinned Tables - Improved Functionality & Design: Now when you click on one of your pinned tables, a pop-up opens with the table's data and you have full control over it.
Linked Tables in Modal: Linked tables inside other tables now also open in a modal (pop-up), similar to updates 3 and 4.
Mobile UI Improvements: The mobile User Interface was improved on the top part of the daily view.
UI Improvements: The User Interface on the page All Dates and some secondary components were also improved.
Built by one engineer who uses it every day.
Marian Sorca
Founder · Engineer · Daily user
SelfManager.ai was developed by Marian Sorca, a software engineer who set out to learn a then-new framework from Google and, in the process, discover what allows a single person to plan, work, and reflect with clarity. Read the full origin story in his article on the date-based system behind the product.
The engineer behind SelfManager.ai also runs abz.global, a software development and design company, and 2lol.ro, a directory of funny content. The work across all three projects is coordinated, planned and reviewed inside SelfManager itself.
From the very first commit, the priority has been to build a tool the maker would actually rely on. A decade later, that constraint still runs the roadmap: every feature ships only after surviving daily use.
The full origin story - how a date-based system was created to understand work-life progress - is told in Marian Sorca's article.
Ready to plan your days the way the maker does?
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