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Dev tools · alternatives · 2026

24 alternatives to The result of donating 8 hours design time

Early this week I offered to donate 8 hours to any project that needed some design help. There were a few candidates and thanks to everyone that emailed me and posted in the comments. I decided to lend my time to Simple Invoices, an open source invoicing system. You can see the result here: http://jasonstrachan.com/clients/simpleinvoices/ And the original site here: http://simpleinvoices.org/ Comments and feedback welcome.

A designer donated eight hours of pro bono work to redesign Simple Invoices, an open source invoicing system. The project showcases a refreshed interface and user experience for the existing invoicing tool. The… Below are 24 products that do a similar job, ranked by how close each is in meaning and then by launch-day votes. The result of donating 8 hours design time launched in 2010; newer entries below may have overtaken it.

  1. 1

    Create perfect invoices in minutes! Our free invoice generator offers stunning templates and a clean, modern UI. Simplify invoicing and get paid faster - try it today!

    2012 · createmyinvoice.com · its alternatives →

  2. 2IB

    Does this make sense? So, here’s the context: I ran a product design agency for about 3 years and grew it to 6 figures. For those 3 years, we never got the invoice cleared on time. We would chat with the client regularly, 2-3 times a week on average, get some work approved to move on. But, when it came to the invoice, it never got paid on time. So, I thought, how about we turn each task into an invoice that gets auto paid on approval from the client. Like an escrow, but on a much granular-task level. This ensures work is paid on time regularly, and there’s no need to raise invoices, follow…

    2024 · sectar.co · its alternatives →

  3. 3

    Hey HN. A few weeks ago I realized I gave $1,600 to Stripe to generate PDF invoices. That little checkbox in the dashboard was expensive. So I created ZenVoice, a tool to let your customers generate, edit, and download invoices themselves - 1-minute no-code setup - Reduce customer support - No 0.4% Stripe invoice fee It uses Stripe Restricted API keys to securely connect all your accounts. Marc

    2024 · zenvoice.io · its alternatives →

  4. 4

    Had some time available and wanted to play with user interface design, so I thought of a simple app that lent itself to that. Coding was roughly 8-10 hours for the whole thing, then another 15-20 hours to take the pictures (homemade studio, iPhone for camera, Gimp to edit). Looking forward to your feedback, and I have promo codes available for anyone that wants them https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/simple-knot/id593421479?mt=8

    2013 · itunes.apple.com · its alternatives →

  5. 5

    Hi HN! I built a super lightweight invoicing platform for solo developers, freelancers, and one-person businesses. Most invoicing software costs $20–$40/month and is packed with features you don’t need. Mine is $20/year and focuses on the essentials: • Create invoices in seconds • Send invoices by email • Automatic email reminders • Recurring invoices • Simple dashboard for paid/unpaid tracking • No team features, no CRM, no bloat I built this because I freelance occasionally, and every invoicing tool I tried either felt bloated, overly enterprisey, or was way too expensive…

    Dec 2025 · sidepay.app · its alternatives →

  6. 6

    Create stunning, professional invoices in under 60 seconds.

    2025 · invoiceflow-six.vercel.app · its alternatives →

  7. 7

    Hey HN, I had to create many invoices recently, it was pretty annoying doing the same things over and over. So i created this small tool that work well to create invoice and save them as template for re-usage. the ui is very easy and simple. I hope this tool will be helpful to you as it it to me. ps: you can move around without account Dorian

    2024 · invoicepdf.dev · its alternatives →

  8. 8
  9. 9
    inv.so▲7

    Free, simple invoicing software for creatives & designers

    2025 · inv.so · its alternatives →

  10. 10MA

    Hi there, So a buddy a couple of days ago came up with the idea for a new SaaS product regarding gpt and image generation. We did a quick MVP that barely works, it breaks almost 50% of the time but we still wanted to validate the idea before going all in. We have almost 1k followers on Twitter together. Did a quick post describing the idea with a stripe link in the comments with a 5$ value, no landing page, and no shipped product. In exchange, the buyers become beta users. Around 30 mins later we got our first sale next 30 mins another 5$ and so on. Do we consider the idea validated? The…

    2023 · its alternatives →

  11. 11

    Get paid faster with invoices clients trust

    Jul 2026 · crispinvoice.com · its alternatives →

  12. 12
    Steerd▲9

    One place for the whole job, inquiry to paid invoice

    Sep 2026 · steerd.io · its alternatives →

  13. 13

    Hi HN, I'm a freelance developer, and like many others, I used to manage invoices through clunky spreadsheets, reused templates, and endless email threads with my accountant. To simplify that, I built PlainInvoice.com — a minimal invoicing tool designed for freelancers and small teams. It's clean, fast, and doesn't require sign-up to start. Some features: Generate invoices instantly (no login needed) Save clients, track total billed and actual received (with multi-currency support) Upload attachments (like receipts or contracts) Add teammates or accountants with viewer-only access Works well…

    2025 · plaininvoice.com · its alternatives →

  14. 14

    Easily create professional invoices in seconds — 100% free.

    2025 · its alternatives →

  15. 15

    Hey Ya'll! My name is Steven and Im launching invoicebloom.io for Professional Invoicing & CRM for Small Businesses & Freelancers. Im a software developer and I sometimes work as a freelancer. Since some of freelance jobs were sidegigs I always just required payment in zelle or cash app. However, some of my clients kept requesting me for invoices for record keeping purposes. I also starting noticing that I kept going back to my email to check for client's information regarding past jobs I have done. So I decided to go on the hunt for some software that was cheap and work nicely and I did the…

    2025 · invoicebloom.io · its alternatives →

  16. 16

    Create invoices in 60 seconds. From €3/month.

    2025 · invoicetimer.com · its alternatives →

  17. 17

    Hi everyone, I just saw a vibe coded game on HN, and thought maybe I should post about this here. I'm organizing a vibe coding game dev competition called Vibe Jam. Last year we did it too and there was 1000+ games submitted. This year the deadline is May 1 and you can submit your games until then. There's $35,000 in prizes with the Gold prize being $20,000. Let me know what you think! -Pieter

    Apr 2026 · vibej.am · its alternatives →

  18. 18

    I spent the past few weeks making an open source cloud code editing environment with an AI copilot and multiplayer collaboration! It's fully self-hostable in 5-10 minutes. There's a lot of minor improvements to be made, and some are already listed in the Github issues. Let me know what you think and feel free to try it out.

    2024 · github.com · its alternatives →

  19. 19

    hey hn, I have wasted too much time in my career creating PDF generation systems for invoices, quotes, activity summary, etc... I created this product so that I never waste my time on that again I hope I can help folks with this product, what do you think?

    2024 · transactional.dev · its alternatives →

  20. 20BI
  21. 21

    Create unlimited free invoices

    2024 · invoicing-app-mu.vercel.app · its alternatives →

  22. 22

    I will build the top crowdsourced project idea in 1 week.

    2021 · its alternatives →

  23. 23

    Donate for nothing today!

    2017 · its alternatives →

  24. 24IM

    One week ago, I launched a new directory, which is a curated list of useful and cool Mac apps and tools that are not available on the app store. Initially, I wasn't sure if it was a good idea, but I managed to create it in just one day. I started promoting it on Twitter and some communities, and although I got some views, I didn't make any sales. Then the next day, I wrote a post on a subreddit related to Mac apps about the directory I launched. People loved it so much, and I got 39k views on that post, leading to around 2.5k visitors on my site. Thanks to this exposure, I made my first 4…

    2024 · mactools.pro · its alternatives →

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