About Keepsake

General Letters Capsules Billing Contact

Last updated on Dec 24, 2021

What is Keepsake®?

“keepsake” – noun. something that you keep to help you remember a person, place, or event.

Keepsake serves one purpose – to deliver meaningful letters ✨

Went through something memorable with someone? Write about it. Send it to that someone. That someone receives it after 3 months by surprise, reads it then feels all warm and fuzzy inside. That someone is definitely going to be thinking of you.
Have a goal for the future? Write about it. Send it to yourself in the future. Read it in 5 years and rejoice because you’ve made it. Give yourself a pat on the back for pulling through!
Want something more personal? Send an audio/video recording and a picture!! Yes, you can record a short audio/video file AND attach a photo along with your letters 🎉
Feeling down? Simply look back on your letters 😊

The site is still in its early stages, so I might have missed bugs here and there. If you do find some, just give me a message. I’d appreciate it!

Here's an end-to-end demo of how you can use Keepsake:

But also, here's the first ever release video of Keepsake, for the memories:

Why did you make this?

Sometimes, all it takes is a bunch of words to make a person's day.

Hi there! My name is Kenzo. I've always enjoyed receiving friendship day letters in high school. I still have all of them tucked safely in an envelope. When I feel a bit down or sentimental, reading them never fails to lighten my mood. I wanted to bring that experience back and make it a more regular thing, especially in these trying times.

Sure, you can simply send a meaningful & long message through Messenger, DM, email, or even by hand, but really (and sadly), who does that nowadays? The world seems too fast paced for substantial, meaningful messages, so I want Keepsake to start becoming an avenue for that.

Keepsake started as a project for me to learn more about web development during this quarantine period (because of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 which stopped all our lives, and not to mention the feeling of isolation that it has inflicted on all of us), but it became way more than that. I thought might as well finish it and make something people can use. This project definitely kept me busy and became something for me to get excited about during this dark period.

What can this do for me?

Send letters to anyone on Keepsake. Write letters to anyone, even to yourself. The recipient won’t see the contents before the letter is delivered by Keepsake through email. This is my link, for example: https://keepsakeletter.com/kenzojrc (feel free to send something nice 💌).

Make your letters more personal. Attach a cover photo 🖼️ and a short audio 🎤 or video 📹 message to your letters.

Send your letters to the future. Schedule the letters to send on a birthday, or as a surprise on some random day in the future, or on a specific day & hour. Keepsake takes care of all the scheduling and sending so you don’t have to worry about it! All you need to do is to write something nice 😊

Share your letters. On top of that, you can share your letter publicly so that anyone can read, share, react, and comment on your public letter📢

Create collections of letters. With Keepsake Capsule, you can create a customizable time capsule of letters for anyone or anything! Read more about it here. 💊

Why are there ads and a paid plan?

If I could offer this totally for free, I would! But nothing in life is free 😟

Keepsake runs on servers and services which cost money every month. For now, I shoulder them myself. But eventually, if usage of the site goes up, costs will also go up, so I’ll need all the support you can give to keep Keepsake up and running for years to come.

On top of that, the more support Keepsake receives, I may be able to give more time to Keepsake and release more features. 😉

You may avail of a premium plan or donate here.

Is there a big company or team behind Keepsake?

Nope. Just one person (so far), and a lot of ❤️👨‍💻☕

Made in 🌴 Manila, 🇵🇭

What other features do you have in line?

There's still a lot in the backlog, but something interesting I’m looking into is scheduled texts (if you’ve watched the Netflix show Crash Landing on You, you’d probably appreciate this). This list may change as more people use Keepsake.

How did you make this site?

Pretty much with hundreds of hours (or probably almost a thousand hours) of research, designing, coding, testing, and a lot of frustration in between.

I wanted to learn building modern reactive web apps, and I believe the best way to learn how to code is to work on a project.

Warning: some technical jargon coming through

I initially just wanted to learn React (I literally had zero background of it before this), but it then led to learning a bunch more to build a fully working product such as Next.js (because I needed SSR), TypeScript, GraphQL, serverless frameworks, infrastructure as code, payments integration, ads, and a looot of other stuff all at once – and building this site was almost the perfect learning experience. Coming from a Python/Django background where things are pretty opinionated with a set way to do things, modern JavaScript is a whole different world.

There are definitely some things I would’ve done differently if I were to start from scratch again. Maybe I’ll write a blog post about this soon 🤔

Huge thanks to the open source community!

Not the full list but Keepsake wouldn't be what it is without these packages:
React, Next.js, Apollo GraphQL, Jodit, TypeORM, Formik, RecordRTC, VMSG, ++

What does “Random Date” mean when I send a letter?

Basically, a surprise. Keepsake will deliver your letter on a random day 1-12 months from now. It’s the default selection and it ensures that the recipient would receive at least one letter per month in the next 12 months.

Again, the intent of Keepsake is to make meaningful letters a more regular thing (and to make you smile every month), hence this type of scheduling.

Aside from attaching them, can I place pictures and videos in my letter?

Yes, as long as they’re links! Just click on the image/video icons on the editor. Or simply drag an image from the web to the editor. For videos, you can embed YouTube or Vimeo ones.

I can’t record an audio or video file or it gets stuck. Why is that?

Make sure that you are using a modern browser (tested on latest versions of Chrome, Firefox, and Edge) and that you've allowed Microphone/Video access.
For recording audio on iOS, use Safari.

Video recording and playback on Safari & iOS are not yet supported due to missing browser features. Keepsake will be updated once Apple supports these features.

How do I get the Birthday option?

Just enter your birthday in Settings, then it will appear. It's that easy! 🎂

Does Keepsake consider the time zone of the recipient?

Yes! Keepsake letters are time zone-aware. Whenever you write a letter with the specific date option, the time you enter there is in the time zone of the recipient. With birthday letters, the recipient will receive them at exactly 12AM on their next birthday, in their time zone.

What is shown on a public but anonymous letter?

Everything except the sender and recipient. If you want your letter to be totally anonymous, do not put anything revealing in the letter subject, body, and attachments.

What if my letter fails to send?

If Keepsake encounters an error while sending your letter, it will retry every 30 minutes. If it still doesn't work, please contact us.

How timely is Keepsake in delivering letters?

Keepsake will usually deliver your letter within the first few minutes of every hour.

I was charged but it did not reflect in my Keepsake account.

Don't worry! We'll sort it out. Just give us a message on Messenger at the bottom right of the screen or email hello@keepsakeletter.com and walk us through what happened.

Are payments refundable?

Subscriptions for Keepsake Premium and any purchased Credits are non-refundable under any circumstance unless legally required. If you think there has been an error in billing, please contact us.

I need more than 1000 letters in Capsule. Is that possible?

Sure! For large Capsules, just give us a message.

How timely is Keepsake in delivering Capsules?

Keepsake will usually deliver your Capsule within the first few minutes of your delivery date/hour.

What happens to unused letters in a Capsule?

Capsule letter capacity cannot be reduced or reclaimed. To make the most out of your Capsules, it would be best to fully consume the maximum number of letters.