Laoshi: Chinese & HSK 3.0
64
Quality Score
Solid
Laoshi: Chinese & HSK 3.0
Medium confidence
✍️ bumetric analysis
“
Laoshi: Chinese & HSK 3.0 is an iOS app from Laoshi Inc. in the News category, currently rated 4.6★ across 461 ratings. Initial signal reads as mostly critical sentiment so far: users flag rough edges and unmet expectations.
Quality Score is 64: Solid (established niche player). For a News app, that means established niche player. The full BU Investment Matrix below scores 8 dimensions including monetisation, growth, and operational risk.
Track changes month-over-month in the Performance section below: live snapshot history and revenue forecast included.
💰 Monthly revenue · now vs forecast
● Right now
$500
per month
→
12-mo forecast
$437 – $1575
per month
→
24-mo forecast
$405 – $3644
per month
INDIE tier
💡 Grow this revenue
Free AI audit of this app’s store listing
- Title & subtitle keyword fit
- Description hook & conversion structure
- Screenshots, ratings, reviews strategy
Typical impact: +2-5× organic installs
📊 Performance Tracking LIVE
Loading…
Rating
—
Reviews
—
Forecast Revenue / mo
—
Snapshots tracked
0
since first record
ONE-TIME · BUILD
💰 Estimated build cost
$110K
↳ What it cost to build · not monthly revenue
Likely range $80K – $150K
$25K · MVP floor
$100K · indie scale
$500K+ · studio build
📈
Pays back in ~2.5y at current MRR
Synthetic estimate. Inputs: category complexity, file size, screen count, monetization layer, platform reach, age × team-size proxy. Calibrated against 2024-2026 indie-agency rate surveys. Full math + source list on /methodology.
Where the money goes
| 🧱 MVP baseline (design + 1-store ship) | +$28K |
| 📱 5 unique screens × $4.5K | +$22K |
| 📦 Asset bundle (254 MB) | +$40K |
| ⚙ News complexity ×1.20 | +$18K |
Total estimate
$110K
ONE-TIME · EXIT VALUE
💵 Estimated acquisition value
$50K
↳ What it would sell for · not monthly revenue
Marketplace range $40K – $75K · 14× MRR multiple
💸
~0.5× build cost (under-water)
Synthetic estimate. Multiple band derived from ad-supported + age, rating quality, category demand, and user-base maturity. Calibrated against 2024-2026 indie-app-marketplace closed-deal medians. Full math + comparable deal list on /methodology.
How the multiple was built
| 📺 Ad-supported base | 15× MRR |
| ⭐ ★ rating ≥ 4.4 (solid) | +8% |
| 🏷 News category multiple | -5% |
| ⭐ Small user base (<1K ratings) | -8% |
Final multiple
14× MRR
👥 Estimated audience size
55K
Lifetime downloads (US-equivalent)
Monthly active
8.2K
Daily active
3.6K
Synthetic estimate from ratings × category benchmarks. Calibrated against 2024-2026 mobile-attribution retention + DAU/MAU reports. Numbers are US-storefront-equivalent — true global audience can be 5-10× larger for international apps. Full math + source list on /methodology.
How we sized it
| 📲 News engagement | ~120 installs / rating |
| 🔁 News D30 retention | 15% |
| 📍 DAU / MAU stickiness | 0.45 |
DAU / MAU
44% sticky
🔬
How we forecast this revenue
LOW CONFIDENCEBaseline
$500/mo · ML-estimated from 234 triggers
Growth rate
+6.0% MoM · INDIE tier baseline (compound monthly)
6 months
$426 – $993
12 months
$437 – $1.6K
24 months
$405 – $3.6K
Compound growth at +6.0% MoM (tier baseline for INDIE). Range widens with horizon — typical noise band ±40% at 6mo.. Ranges widen with horizon — distant futures carry more uncertainty.
📊
BU Investment Matrix
Early-stage solo · 42/100INDIE TIERexpected for tierGrowth Velocity
5.0
Founder Strength
4.6
Product Quality
6.4
Revenue Strength
2.7
Monetization Maturity
1.0
Defensibility
3.5
Market Position
0.3
Operational Safety
10.0
- 💰 Revenue: Marginal — $200 - $1250/mo · INDIE tier · medium confidence, trajectory unclear.
- ⭐ Quality: 4.59★ across 461 reviews — solid.
- 📍 Market: Not yet charting in any of the 9 monitored markets.
- 📈 Growth: dev shipping weekly.
- ⚠️ Risk: Low — no material risk signals detected.
🎯 For competitors: Mixed picture. Worth competing if you have a clear UX or pricing edge — otherwise crowded segment.
💵 For acquirers: Estimated asking range 18-32× monthly = $9K-$16K. Portfolio play ($3K/mo combined) commands premium.
Composite of 8 dimensions computed deterministically from public signals — no LLM, every score traces back to a measurable input. Default weights shown; "compete" / "acquire" / "invest" lenses re-weight without re-fetching.
Range:
💰 Forecast Revenue / mo
MODELRevenue forecast computed from BU's 234 trigger model on each snapshot. Calibrated against ground-truth from 58 verified-revenue apps.
🔬Forecast Breakdown — Why This Estimate?Top 7 of 7 triggers
Our ML model uses 200+ signals from public data. These are the most influential for this app:
| Excellent rating (4.6★)METRIC | +$2,200 | |
| 5 starREVIEW | +$1,800 | |
| Multilingual (10 languages)METRIC | +$1,500 | |
| slowREVIEW | −$1,200 | |
| Established app (5y old)METRIC | +$800 | |
| Ad-supported / freemiumMETRIC | +$600 | |
| Early-stage install base (461 ratings)METRIC | +$400 |
METRIC = structural app data · REVIEW = mined from user reviews · ✓ VERIFIED = Stripe-verified anchor (TrustMRR)
📈 Reviews Growth
LIVECumulative review count from first BU snapshot. Each point = a tracked update.
⭐ Rating Trend
LIVEAverage rating evolution. Updates with each new review batch.
🆕 What's New · v5.7.9
Bugfixes and performance imporvements
Profile & Insights
Everything we know — and don't — about this app and its company.
Identification
- App name
- Laoshi: Chinese & HSK 3.0
- Developer
- Laoshi Inc.
- Bundle ID
- io.laoshi.Laoshi
- App Store URL
- Open in App Store
- Category
- News
- Content rating
- 4+
- Languages
- EN, ID, JA, KO, PT, RU, ES, TH, UK, VI
Company
- Website
- Not found
- Tagline
- Laoshi — Chinese flashcards
- Description
- Learn Chinese with Laoshi flashcards. Master vocabulary, characters, and tones with HSK decks and spaced repetition. Perfect for beginners and advanced learners.
- Founded
- Not found
- HQ / Address
- Not found
- Employees
- Not found
- Logo
- Available
Revenue
- Verified revenue / mo
- Not found
- AI revenue estimate / mo
- Not found
- AI annual estimate
- Not found
- ML model estimate / mo
- $3.6K/mo
- Top-grossing rank
- Outside top 100 in US News
- All-time revenue
- Not found
- Pricing
- Not found
Founder
Founder data not yet collected for this app.
Funding
Funding data not yet collected for this app.
Press & Links
Press & Links data not yet collected for this app.
Contacts & Socials
Contacts & Socials data not yet collected for this app.
📈Ratings growth461 ratings+46000% lifetimeShow 3-year history estimate ▾
Tracked (27 weeks) Pre-tracking estimate (37 weeks) · model-based, ±5% noise · anchored to release date and current value
🌍Geographic ReachNot ranked
This app is currently outside the top 100 grossing in all 9 countries we monitor (US, UK, DE, FR, JP, CA, AU, BR, IN). Niche or new apps often launch this way — popularity rankings appear once daily revenue clears the regional threshold.
🚀Version Release Timeline2 releases tracked
Profile is built from iTunes Lookup + developer site scrape + ML revenue model. Empty fields show "Not found" — additional sources (Crunchbase, X, IndieHackers, Acquire.com) coming.
📝 About this app
Laoshi is a complete Mandarin Chinese learning system built around smart flashcards designed specifically for characters, tones, and grammar.
Join 300,000+ learners who use Laoshi to build vocabulary, master Chinese grammar, prepare for HSK exams (2.0 & 3.0), and make consistent progress every day.
Chinese is different. Characters require writing practice. Tones require pronunciation training. Grammar requires structured explanations. Laoshi combines all of it in one focused system.
Why learners choose Laoshi:… View full description on the official store →
Join 300,000+ learners who use Laoshi to build vocabulary, master Chinese grammar, prepare for HSK exams (2.0 & 3.0), and make consistent progress every day.
Chinese is different. Characters require writing practice. Tones require pronunciation training. Grammar requires structured explanations. Laoshi combines all of it in one focused system.
Why learners choose Laoshi:… View full description on the official store →
App Specs
🔐 Own this app? Claim & verify MRR →💾 254 MB🔞 4+📱 iOS 17.0+🔖 v5.7.9🔄 updated 0d ago🌐 EN, ID, JA, KO, PT +5📂 News💰 Paid
📅
What Worked™ · Development Pipeline
7 EVENTS TRACKEDDetected changes in this app over its tracked lifetime — each event links cause (what changed) to effect (what moved). Sorted newest first.See full history →Version history →
2026-05
⭐
Rating ↑ 3.24 → 4.59 (improved 1.35★)
2026-05
📈
Crossed 50 ratings — social-proof flywheel kicking in
2026-03
⭐
Rating ↓ 4.70 → 3.24 (dropped 1.46★)
2026-03
⭐
Rating ↑ 3.29 → 4.70 (improved 1.41★)
2026-03
📈
Crossed 50 ratings — social-proof flywheel kicking in
2023-02
📈
Crossed 10 ratings — social-proof flywheel kicking in
2020-09
🚀
First tracked snapshot — initial data captured
🔔
Track this app’s revenue
FREEGet an email when revenue moves by your threshold. No spam, unsubscribe in one click.
📝 Description
95
BU Score · Transcendent
Full revenue analysis
Read the article-style breakdown for Laoshi: Chinese & HSK 3.0: category rank, percentile, growth signal, comparable apps, and how the forecast is calibrated against verified-MRR anchors in this niche.
About this analysis
Why medium confidence: 461 ratings · no founder-verified revenue (model estimate only).
❓ Frequently Asked Questions
4 answers · auto-generated from this app's public dataHow much does Laoshi make per month?▴
Based on our ML-calibrated revenue forecast, Laoshi earns approximately $3.6K/mo. This is a US-storefront-equivalent estimate; global revenue can be several times larger for internationally-distributed apps. See the methodology page for the full formula and confidence bands.
What apps are like Laoshi?▴
Browse the full News category catalog to find similar apps with revenue, build cost, audience and tech stack data. Each /p/{slug} page also shows a Compare side-by-side widget with three peer apps from the same niche.
Who makes Laoshi?▴
Laoshi is published by Laoshi Inc. on the Apple App Store. See the full publisher portfolio (other apps by the same developer) via the More by developer block on the product page above.
What is Laoshi's BU Score?▴
Laoshi has a BU Score of 64/100 (Solid). The score combines App Store rating, ratings count, monetization model and revenue signals calibrated against founder-verified MRR anchors. See the BU Score formula.