Yesterday, after one last nervous look through the tiny viewfinder, we pressed the button. 21Pix is now officially out on the App Store and Google Play.
It feels appropriately strange to announce a launch for a camera whose whole point is waiting. But here we are: the app that asks you to slow down is now available, instantly, everywhere phones are sold into impatience.
What you get
If you're new here, the short version: 21Pix turns your phone into a digital disposable camera. You get a roll of 21 shots, framed through a small viewfinder. No previews, no deletes, no retakes. When your roll is full, we print your photos on real glossy 10×15 photo paper and deliver them at home, in an envelope, like it's 1998.
The app is free, and a fresh roll is already loaded when you open it. You only pay when a finished roll is ready to print — see what a roll costs, or browse the frequently asked questions if you want the details on delivery times and digital copies.
We currently ship to the Netherlands, Germany and Belgium, with more countries on the way.
Why this one is different
Disposable camera apps exist, and some of them are lovely. But nearly all of them end where they began: on your screen. You wait the 24 hours, the files unlock, and your "roll" quietly joins the other fourteen thousand photos in your camera library. The ritual is simulated; the result is still pixels.
21Pix is something else: a professional photo printing service wearing a disposable camera as its interface. The wait doesn't end with a notification — it ends with an envelope on your doormat. Real photographs, printed in a professional lab on real glossy photo paper, that you can hold, gift, stick on the fridge, or lose in a kitchen drawer for twenty years. The digital copies are an optional extra. The prints are the product.
Thank you
A launch like this doesn't happen alone. To everyone who shot test rolls over the past months, sent us photos of their envelopes on doormats, told us which shutter sound felt right, and reminded us that the wait is the feature, not the bug: thank you. Half of the small details in the app exist because someone told us a story about their old disposable camera.
What's next
More countries, for a start. And a few small ideas we're saving for when the time is right — all of them in service of the same goal: fewer, better photographs that end up in your hands instead of your cloud storage.
But mostly, what's next is yours: 21 shots, somewhere out there, waiting to be taken.
Download 21Pix and shoot your first roll. We'll have the envelope ready.
— Rick, founder of 21Pix