Drink less, and watch a pet grow
We designed and built Dampling, an Android and iOS journal for adults who want to drink less without necessarily quitting. Every alcohol-free day helps a dumpling grow, and the journal stays on the phone.
Dampling is a drink-less journal we designed and built for Android and iOS. You log a drink in two taps or mark the day alcohol-free, and a virtual dumpling reacts: its mood changes, it gains XP and it grows through 7 stages, and it never dies. The journal lives on the phone, with no account, no ads and no tracking. It also logs cigarettes, vapes and nicotine pouches.
- Client
- Dampling · Drink less
- Sector
- Wellbeing · own product
- Year
- 2026
- Deliverables
- Product and onboarding design
- Flutter app for Android and iOS
- Pet: 7 stages, 5 moods, 8 flavours
- Local journal with opt-in backup
- 10 languages, Arabic right to left
- Services
For people who want to drink less, not necessarily quit
Dampling is meant for adults aged 21 to 45 who want to drink less: sober-curious drinkers, people doing a dry month, people who also want to cut down on vaping. Existing trackers tend to be dull or shame-based, with streaks that reset to zero, and the pet apps lock nearly everything behind a payment after a long quiz, with pets that max out within a week.
Our answer was a pet that grows over months and never dies, a plan with a weekly limit and alcohol-free days, or a full break, and logging that works offline on a night out. From the first screen, the app says it is not for people with alcohol dependence and links to a helpline.
A journal that stays on the phone
The journal is a file in the app's private storage, with no account and no guest session. Because alcohol consumption can count as health data under the GDPR, backup is optional and asks for explicit consent before the first upload; the data goes to servers in Frankfurt. Signing out removes the synced journal from the phone, and deleting the account erases the server data, the local journal and the purchases alias. The app carries no ads and no analytics.
Each drink is stored in grams of pure alcohol and shown the way the country counts it: UK units of 8 g, standard drinks of 10 g or 14 g, or plain grams. The day starts at 4 am, so a drink after midnight counts towards the evening before. Presets cover beer, wine, sparkling wine, cider, spirits, cocktails, seltzer, sake and soju, and on the nicotine side cigarettes, vapes, pouches, cigars and heated tobacco. Anything can be backdated, edited or undone.
The interface comes in 10 languages, with 459 strings in each. The app passes 111 tests, and every screen is checked in Arabic right to left, at 200 % text on a 360 × 740 phone, in dark mode, on a tablet and against Flutter's accessibility guidelines.
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01
A pet that doesn't punish
The dumpling has 7 stages, 5 moods, 8 flavours, 12 accessories and 6 habitats. Alcohol-free days make it grow, a drink never takes away what it has earned, and its mood shifts without blaming anyone.
-
02
Two-tap logging
A drink takes two taps to log, offline. Alcohol-free swaps such as a 0.0 beer or a mocktail count as wins.
-
03
Insights with real numbers
By week and by month: drinks against the limit, alcohol-free days, money spent and saved, calories and nicotine, measured against the habits given during onboarding.
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04
Dated challenges
A 7-day reset, a free weekend, an alcohol-free month and a nicotine-free month are free; four more, such as 100 alcohol-free days, come with the subscription.
The project in pictures
9 images · Open any image to see it full size.
What the user gets
Logging, the pet's growth, insights, reminders, backup and deletion are free and never locked. Dampling Plus, an optional subscription, adds flavours, accessories and habitats, the full 12-month history, every challenge at once and journal export. The evening reminder is a local notification, and its permission is asked in context, never at launch.
The screens and video on this page come from an offline Android build running on the project's test data.
- Alcohol and nicotine in one journal
- UK units, standard drinks or grams, depending on the country
- Journal on the phone; EU backup only with consent
- Version 1.0.1, 111 tests, 10 languages
The questions we hear often
Do I need an account to use Dampling?
No. The journal is stored on your phone and the app works without an account. An account is only for the optional backup, which asks for your consent before sending anything to servers in the EU.
Can Dampling help me quit drinking?
It supports drinking less, taking a break or stopping for good: onboarding offers all three goals. It is not a medical device; if you might be dependent on alcohol, the app advises talking to a doctor before stopping and links to a helpline.
Does it track vaping and smoking too?
Yes. Alongside alcohol, Dampling logs cigarettes, vapes, nicotine pouches, cigars and heated tobacco, with their own nicotine-free days and a nicotine-free month challenge.
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