While the tech industry remains wildly male-dominated, a new generation of female founders is shaking that up. In the past decade, the percentage of venture capital deals that went to women founders nearly doubled. To see what some of these women have been up to and support their trailblazing work, check out these 8 life-changing apps created by women.
1. Bumble
Whitney Wolfe
Wolfe recently made headlines when her female-centric dating app, Bumble, IPO-d at a whopping $13 billion. A co-founder of Tinder, Wolfe ultimately set out to build her competing platform with the hope of making online dating a more comfortable, less creepy experience for women; after “matching,” women must be the ones to make the first move.
2. PepTalkHer
Meggie Palmer
After spending 15 years working as a foreign correspondent in Europe, the U.S., and Australia, Palmer founded PepTalkHer, an app designed to close the gender pay gap. The app helps women track their small wins at work — feedback from clients, spikes in sales, etc. — both to improve their own confidence and sense of worth, and to have a place to turn when the time comes to negotiate a pay raise. The app has helped hundreds of women thus far — including landing one an $83,000 raise.
3. ClassPass
Payal Kadakia
Trained as a dancer, Kadakia got frustrated searching for local ballet classes and founded ClassPass, which lets users find and book fitness classes at a variety of studios in their neighborhood. Inspired by OpenTable’s model, the app offers flexibility and lots of options, and became widely popular among those looking to keep their fitness lives interesting.
4. Eventbrite
Julia Hartz
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Along with her husband, Hartz co-founded Eventbrite because she was inspired by the power of events to bring people together. As the CEO, she’s led the company to become a global self-service ticketing platform that serves one million event-creators around the world.
5. HEY! Vina
Olivia June and Jen Aprahamian
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Ever moved or traveled to a new city and found that the only way to meet new people online is by going on a date with them? June-Poole and Aprahamian built HEY! Vina because they recognized both the incredible power of a strong female support system and the challenges of building one in a new place. While Bumble now offers a similar feature, it remains HEY! Vina’s singular focus. Tinder was one of its early investors.
6. Gratitude
Carla White
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We’ve all seen the research showing that taking time each day to be appreciative will make us happier, but forming new habits is hard — and technology can make it easier. That’s what White found when she started Gratitude, which reminds users to track little wins and grateful moments throughout the day. After launching the app, White went on to become an author and podcast host focused on self-empowerment.
7. Gender Fair
Amy Cross
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Based on the idea that we “vote” with our dollars, Gender Fair tracks companies’ commitments to gender equality so that consumers can make informed purchases, investments, donations, and job decisions. Before founding Gender Fair (previously called Buy Up Index), Willard-Cross attended the all-women’s Wellesley College and worked as an author and journalist.
8. Hitlist
Gillian Morris
After spending her first few years out of college travelling around as a journalist and consultant in the Middle East, Morris had spent so much time searching for cheap flights that she decided to build an app for it. Her mission is to help people travel more by guiding them to the best and most affordable routes airlines have to offer.
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Eve Driver is a freelance writer based in Boston. A recent graduate of Harvard College, she writes on climate, technology, and travel and is also working on her first book.
