Clause 00 — the agreement
Keep your word to yourself.
You would never leave a friend on read for three weeks. You do it to yourself constantly. Promise Keepr gives you three promises in your own handwriting, one real human who holds the copy, and a receipt at the end of every month that proves what you actually did.
I promise I'll run before work, four mornings a week, even the short ugly one.
Nadia K.
Real format, invented person. We won't put a stranger's face on a testimonial until we have earned one.
Clause 01 — the problem
You are the only person you are comfortable letting down.
Think about how much effort goes into not disappointing other people. You turn up to the thing you did not want to go to. You send the message you did not want to send. You do the work by Friday because you said Friday.
Then you tell yourself you will start on Monday, and nothing happens, and nobody says anything, because there is nobody there to say anything. The promise had no witness, so it was never really a promise.
That is the whole gap. Not motivation. Not willpower. Not the right app. You are perfectly capable of keeping your word. You have just never had to keep it to yourself in front of somebody.
What people usually try first
- An app that sends a notification you have learned to swipe away
- A streak you protect by lying to a grid
- A friend who says "yeah I'll check in on you" and then does not
- A 4am morning routine copied from someone with no children and a sponsorship deal
- Starting again on the 1st, then the next 1st, then January
What actually changes it
- A promise in words you chose yourself
- Somebody who has read it and will ask
- A daily moment where you tell the truth either way
- Permission to miss without the whole thing collapsing
- Proof at the end that you cannot argue with
Clause 02 — what this is not
This is not an app that pings you. It is a person who read what you wrote.
There is software, and it is deliberately boring: three lines, two taps, then it gets out of your way. The part that works is a human being called a Keeper, who has your promises in front of them, notices when you go quiet, and rewrites the promise that keeps breaking.
Software is cheap and does nothing. Private coaching works and costs £150 to £400 a month. We built the thing that should have been in between.
Clause 03 — how it runs
Five steps. Then it is just two taps a night.
No onboarding maze, no habit library, no personality quiz that tells you which fruit you are.
You write three promises. In your own words.
First person, present tense, small enough to be embarrassing. "I promise I'll put my phone on the kitchen shelf by ten." Not a goal, not an outcome, not a value. A thing you will do, that a stranger could verify. Three is the cap and it is a hard cap.
You sign them.
With your finger, on the screen, like a delivery. It feels slightly silly and it does something. Your signature sits at the bottom of the promise for as long as the promise exists, and you see it every single day.
A Keeper reads them and makes them survivable.
Within 48 hours a named human comes back with the same promises, sharpened. They cut the one you will resent by week two. They anchor each one to something already in your day. They tell you which of the three is going to be the problem, and they are usually right.
Every night you seal the day.
Kept, or owned. Owned means you did not do it and you are saying so. It takes about six seconds. Once a day is sealed it is locked — you cannot go back and tidy last Tuesday, and neither can we.
Every 30 days you get a Receipt.
A plain statement of what you promised and what you did, generated from sealed days you cannot edit. Keep it to yourself, send it to your group chat, put it on your story. It is the only trophy here and you did not write it.
Clause 04 — the four rules
Built so that telling the truth is always the easy option.
Most trackers reward a tidy grid, so people tidy the grid. These four rules are the reason ours cannot be gamed into meaninglessness.
You hold the pen on what it says. We hold the copy.
You write the promise, because a promise in somebody else's language is just a chore with extra steps. But once it is signed, only your Keeper can change the wording — so you cannot quietly move the line at 11pm on a bad Tuesday and call it a win.
Owning a miss counts. Hiding one does not.
Two numbers, never one. How many promises you kept, and how many days you told the truth. Only the second can reach 100%, and the second is the one your Keeper watches. Miss the run, seal it honestly, keep your Word Rate. Skip the seal and nothing is protected.
Three misses and the promise gets rewritten. Not you.
A promise you keep breaking is badly built. Wrong size, wrong time of day, wrong week of your life. On the third miss your Keeper is notified the same day and comes back with a smaller version. Nobody is told to try harder, because trying harder has never once been the answer.
Nobody sees your Receipt unless you send it.
Your Ledger is private. Your Keeper sees it because that is the job. There is no feed, no leaderboard, no friends list, no public streak to defend. The only sharing is you choosing to, and the only person you are accountable to is the one who signed.
Clause 05 — the proof
At the end of 30 days, you get a receipt you did not write.
Everything else in this category gives you a badge for showing up. A badge is a compliment from software. A Receipt is a record.
It is generated from sealed, locked days. It shows the misses. It shows the exact number of days you told the truth. It has a reference code so it can be checked. You cannot fake it, which is precisely why it is worth showing anyone.
Some people frame the first one. Most people quietly screenshot it and send it to one person. A few post it, which is how most of our members find us.
PROMISE KEEPR
30-day statement · cycle 03
SHOWED UP EVERY SINGLE DAY
Word Rate counts the days you told the truth,
not the days you were perfect.
7KQ4 2MPX
Clause 06 — the daily bit
Your Ledger. One page, deliberately boring.
This is a working demonstration, not a screenshot. Seal a day and watch what happens.
Tuesday, day 61
Word Rate 100%Two taps and you're done. There is nothing else to fill in.
Run before work
Trainers by the door — not sealed yet
Phone out of the bedroom
On the kitchen shelf by 10pm — not sealed yet
Last 75 days
kept owned still to come
Run before work — 44 of 61
Phone out of the bedroom — 55 of 61
Days you told the truth — 61 of 61
Nobody can hit 100% on the first two bars. Everybody can hit it on the third.
Clause 07 — the humans
A Keeper is not a life coach and definitely not a bot.
They do a small number of things properly. They read what you wrote. They rewrite the promise that keeps breaking. They send one real message a week, from a phone, with your name in it. They notice on the day you go quiet, not three weeks later.
Every Keeper holds a maximum of 25 people. Not 200. Twenty-five, because past that the messages start sounding like a template and the whole thing dies. That cap is also why founding places run out.
They will not diagnose you, prescribe anything, or pretend to be a therapist. If something comes up that needs a clinician, they will say so plainly and help you find one.
What a Keeper message actually looks like
"Morning. Three runs and a phone-free week — that's the strongest week you've had. The Sunday call to your mum has missed twice now, so I'm moving it to Thursday evening before I let it break a third time. Shout if Thursday's wrong."
Sent on WhatsApp, on a Monday, by a person who read your Ledger first.
Clause 08 — the money
Between a £5 app and a £300 coach, there was nothing.
Here is the honest comparison, including the bits where the app wins.
| A habit app | Promise Keepr | A private coach | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Roughly | Free to £5/mo | £39/mo founding | £150–£400/mo |
| Who decides what you do | You, at 11pm, tired | You write it, a Keeper makes it survivable | The coach |
| Who notices if you vanish | Nobody | A named human, same day | Your coach, at the next session |
| What happens when you miss | The streak dies | You log it honestly and keep your Word Rate | An awkward conversation |
| Who edits your history | You can quietly backfill | Nobody. Sealed days are locked | No record kept |
| Proof at the end | A grid you tidied | A Receipt you did not write | Your memory of it |
If a free app is genuinely working for you, keep using it. We are not for people it works for. We are for the people who have a graveyard of them on the second home screen.
Clause 09 — price
One price. No contract. A real refund.
The Keep
Everything you need and nothing you don't.
£39
per month, cancel any time
£390 billed once a year.
- Three promises, written by you, held by a named Keeper
- A 20-minute promise design call in your first week
- Daily sealing on your private Ledger — two taps
- WhatsApp check-in every week from a real person
- Same-day nudge if you go quiet for three days
- A Receipt every 30 days, yours to share or bin
- Your promises rewritten whenever they stop fitting
Founding price is locked for as long as you stay. It goes to £59 afterwards.
The Keep+
When the stakes are higher than a morning routine.
£89
per month, cancel any time
£890 billed once a year.
- Everything in The Keep
- Up to five promises instead of three
- A live 25-minute call with your Keeper every fortnight
- Same-day response on WhatsApp, seven days a week
- A written 90-day review with your Keeper's read on the year
- Priority when you want to change Keeper
Most people should start on The Keep. You can move up any time.
The guarantee, in one sentence. If you seal your days for a full month and honestly feel it did nothing for you, email us and we refund that month. No form, no exit interview, no offer to stay.
Why exactly 100 founding places? Because we have four Keepers and each one holds 25 people. That is the entire reason. When it is full we will say it is full, and there will be a waiting list rather than a countdown timer.
Clause 10 — from the founder
I built this because I was very good at keeping my word to everyone else.
I have never missed a deadline for a client. I have driven across a city at 11pm because I said I would. I have sat through things I actively did not want to attend, on time, because I gave my word.
And for about six years I told myself I was going to run in the mornings. I bought the trainers twice.
What eventually worked was not an app and it was not discipline. It was one friend who I told, out loud, and who then had the nerve to ask me on the Thursday. That is the entire product. We have just made it reliable, made it somebody's actual job, and taken out the part where you have to ask a friend for a favour they will forget about by Wednesday.
Promise Keepr is new. We have not been running for years and I am not going to invent numbers to look like we have. What I can promise is that everything on this site is either true or clearly marked as an example, and if the first month does nothing for you I would rather refund you than keep you.
Calvin Kudzai
Founder, Promise Keepr
Clause 11 — before you start
The questions people actually ask.
What if I miss a day?
You seal it as owned and your Word Rate stays intact. That is the design. The only thing that damages anything here is going silent, and even then your Keeper messages you rather than the app taking your streak away.
How much time does this take?
Around four minutes to write your first promises, a 20-minute call in week one if you want it, and roughly ten seconds a night after that. The weekly message from your Keeper takes as long as you want it to.
Is this therapy?
No, and we are careful about the line. Keepers are trained accountability coaches, not clinicians. They will not diagnose or treat anything. If what is in the way is bigger than a habit, they will say so and point you somewhere qualified.
Does it work if I have ADHD?
Several of the design choices — external accountability, a cap of three, a same-day nudge, rewriting rather than repeating — are the things people with ADHD tend to say help. But we have no data of our own yet and we are not going to claim a clinical benefit we have not measured.
Who reads my promises?
Your Keeper and, if there is a support issue, one operations person. Nobody else. There is no feed, we do not sell data, and you can have everything deleted by sending one email.
Can I pause?
Yes, once per quarter for up to a month, and your Ledger waits for you. Life has weeks in it where three promises is the wrong idea, and pretending otherwise is how people quit entirely.
Make your first promise.
One promise, in your own words. It takes about four minutes, and a real person writes back inside 48 hours.
First month refunded in full if you sealed your days and it did not work for you.