I was tired of bloated changelog tools, so I built BearLog

John Paolo Bautista — Sun, 01 Mar 2026 11:20:27 +0000

Most changelog tools I tried had one of three problems:

too expensive for solo developer or small teams
abandoned or barely maintained
trying to be everything

I didn’t want a CRM, a feedback suite, and a roadmap app glued together.

I just wanted one thing: a clean way to tell users what changed.

So I built BearLog.

The real problem

If you ship often but users don’t notice updates, your product momentum gets lost.

Yes, GitHub Releases are great for technical users.

But most users never open your repo.

They need updates in two places:

a public changelog page they can bookmark/share
an in-app widget where they already are

That’s what BearLog focuses on.

What BearLog does

Free Forever

Unlimited changelog posts
Public changelog page
Embeddable “What’s New” widget
RSS feed
JSON export anytime
No credit card

Pro ($9/mo)

Remove BearLog branding
Custom CSS for widget
Custom CSS for public page
Email notifications via your own Resend account (BYO email)

I built BearLog around a few non-negotiables:

1) Free should actually be useful

Not a 14-day timer. Not “free up to 3 posts.”

If you’re small, you should still have a solid setup.

2) You should own your email channel

For notifications, BearLog is BYO Resend.

Your domain, your sender reputation, your account.

3) No lock-in

Export your posts to JSON whenever you want.

4) Keep it focused

BearLog is for changelogs.

Not a giant “engagement platform.”

Quick embed example

This is the idea: drop one script into your app and you get a changelog widget.

<script
  src="https://www.bearlog.app/widget.js"
  data-project="YOUR-PROJECT-ID"
  data-mode="floating"
  data-position="bottom-right"
  data-color="#052ba8"
  data-text="What's New"
  defer
></script>

Forem: John Paolo Bautista