Why Stripe Test Mode Failed Me: A Solo Developer's 36-Hour Debugging Nightmare
Hey everyone 👋 I'm Usama. By day, I work as a Project Manager. By night, I'm a solo dev building a Kotlin Multiplatform (KMP) notes app called EpicNotes, targeting the "forgotten combo" of Android phones and MacBooks.
The tech stack was hard (KMP, Supabase, local-first sync). But the part that actually broke me was the payment infrastructure.
I thought wiring up Stripe for the Mac app and RevenueCat for the Android app would take a weekend. Instead, I ended up in a 36-hour debug marathon, buying my own subscriptions, refunding them, watching database rows flip, and debugging at 2 AM after a full day of meetings.
If you are an indie dev about to wire up payments, here are the 3 brutal lessons I learned so you don't have to.
1. Test Mode is a Sandbox, Not Reality
Stripe and RevenueCat test environments are great for happy paths, but they...
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