Vibe Coders Are Striking Gold Inside a Payment App: Korea’s Toss Mini App Gold Rush

Featured photo: Teheran-ro in Gangnam, Seoul’s startup and tech corridor. Photo: S h y numis / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.

In Korea, the people churning out apps with AI aren’t flocking to the App Store. They’re heading into Toss, a money-transfer app. Its mini app marketplace, Apps in Toss, has taken in 17,000 apps in the 15 months since it opened, and two out of three partners who put apps there are solo developers.

Toss is a Korean finance app with more than 30 million sign-ups that handles transfers, payments, banking and stock trading in one place. A mini app is a small app that opens right inside Toss with nothing to install, the same idea as WeChat’s mini programs in China.

When the install button disappeared, the apps poured in

Apps in Toss launched in July 2025 with about 100 mini apps. It passed 1,000 in February 2026, 5,000 in June and 10,000 in August, and by mid-October it had 17,000 (Toss official announcement, eNewsToday, October 20). It added 7,000 in the last two months alone. Over a similar period, HTML5 games inside KakaoTalk, the messenger nearly every Korean uses, grew from 25 to 78 (Aju Business Daily, September 21). While Korea’s national messenger let in dozens, a payment app let in thousands.

The secret to the speed is that there’s no install button. For a solo developer, the hard part isn’t building an app, it’s getting people to install it. On Toss that step disappears, because the app opens with one tap inside an app 30 million people already have. Picka, a mini app that tells you about card benefits, gathered as many users on Toss in 10 days as it had in three months on global app stores (Toss official English newsroom, August 14). A worry-counseling service built by three college students passed 350,000 users in six months (same announcement). Apps in Toss had 4 million monthly users as of August.

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AI builds the app, Toss brings the customers

The stars of this marketplace are individuals, not companies. In data Toss released in August, 67% of Apps in Toss partners were “solo makers” who plan, build and run their apps alone, and 63% of partner accounts had revenue. More than half of the solo makers were making money (Toss official announcement).

What makes that speed possible for one person is AI coding tools. The front page of the Toss developer center opens with “It’s fine if you’re new to development. Build a mini app with AI,” and the first tabs in its AI tool setup guide are Claude Code and Codex. Toss even opened its developer console to AI tools over MCP so it can be operated by talking (Apps in Toss Developer Center). A finance company is teaching AI coding tools in its official documentation.

People on the ground say the same. A former developer on DC Inside’s “The Singularity Is Here” board wrote, “Used Codex, Claude Code, Cursor… built apps and launched them as Toss mini apps,” and summed up, “It actually is possible to go from planning to launch, marketing and monetization all by yourself” (June 2, 2026). On YouTube, “Apps in Toss earnings reveal” has become its own genre. Developer YouTuber JoCoding’s “Build a money-making mini app with vibe coding in 1.5 hours and launch it to 30 million users” has passed 97,000 views (checked October 28, 2026). One YouTuber said he built more than 600 apps with Claude Code and automation tools, got some of them approved and made 13 million won (about $9,800) in July alone (YouTube, Cosart, self-reported). Another team said it built and launched five games a day and has made 13 million won in total (YouTube, AI Seo Daepyo, self-reported).

Decade-old games came back to life in a payment app

Newcomers aren’t the only ones mining gold. Wemade’s Anipang 2, released in 2014, joined Apps in Toss in January and rose to No. 4 in popularity. NHN’s Hangame Single Matgo reached No. 2, and the 2015 game Infinite Stairs also settled near the top (Sidae Ilbo, May 6). Raise the Hero Squad, four years old, hit 800,000 sign-ups a month and a half after joining and 100 million won (about $75,000) in revenue over two months, and Doldoldi passed 200 million won (about $150,000) a month (same article). At the time, most of the game makers in the top 10 were small, unlisted companies. Games pushed off the App Store charts are living a second life inside a payment app.

The bottom of the gold mine: launching isn’t the same as being found

Not every pickaxe hits gold. One solo developer posted on the developer blog platform velog under the title “I thought if I put a game on Toss, users would follow,” and wrote, “Launching and getting users were two separate things” (October 2, 2026). It was a confession that in the end, attracting people meant spending money on ads and rewards. The video from the team that revealed 13 million won also shows a period when the ad-view rate fell from 80% to 39%, and one app from a guest on the same channel earned 240,000 won (about $180) in ad revenue over three months (YouTube, AI Seo Daepyo, disclosed by the guest).

The platform has started narrowing the door too. Since July, Toss has tightened its review standards, added a double check by system and dedicated staff, and re-reviewed mini apps already listed, pulling some from view (eNewsToday, October 20). In Toss’s words, the principle is “keep the door open, but keep raising the bar” (Aju Business Daily, August 14).

In August, 10,000 apps were splitting 4 million monthly users. In the two months since, 7,000 more apps have arrived.

Sources

• Toss official announcements: Toss Newsroom, August 14, 2026 (English), Aju Business Daily, August 14, 2026
• eNewsToday, October 20, 2026 (17,000 apps, stricter review)
• Aju Business Daily, September 21, 2026 (KakaoTalk HTML5 games)
• Sidae Ilbo, May 6, 2026 (Anipang 2, Raise the Hero Squad, Doldoldi)
• Apps in Toss Developer Center: build a mini app with AI, use the console with AI (MCP)
• DC Inside “The Singularity Is Here” board, June 2, 2026
• velog @kirin765, October 2, 2026
• YouTube: JoCoding, Cosart, AI Seo Daepyo, 13 million won, AI Seo Daepyo, three-month payout (views checked October 28, 2026)
• Currency conversion: about 1,325 won per dollar (Seoul FX close, October 27, 2026)