New York App Week 2026 named seven Shippies winners on October 20 at the Intrepid Museum, sending each winning app to a Times Square billboard. The week closes Thursday, October 22, with Shipaton Demo Day in Times Square, a free event open to the public with no registration required.
Key Takeaways
- New York App Week runs October 19–22, 2026, with more than 30 community-hosted events across Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens.
- Seven apps won Golden Shippy awards at the Intrepid Museum on October 20, and each earned a Times Square billboard spot.
- App Growth Annual runs October 21 at The Glasshouse on 12th Avenue with five keynotes and 36 workshops.
- The AI For NYC Hackathon in Long Island City challenged participants to build solutions for New York City using open data and APIs.
- Shipaton Demo Day runs from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on October 22 in Times Square, with no registration required.
New York App Week Turns One Conference Into A Citywide Calendar
New York App Week runs on a simple organizing rule: anyone can host an event, and anyone can take part. RevenueCat, the subscription software company behind the week, anchors the schedule with two events of its own, App Growth Annual and the Shippies award show. The community fills in the rest, with more than 30 sessions spread across four days and three boroughs.
The format says something about how the app business works in New York. Instead of concentrating everything inside one convention hall, the week moves from a Long Island City hackathon to a Chelsea fitness studio, a DUMBO padel court, and the deck of a former aircraft carrier on the Hudson. Each event sets its own RSVP rules, so a founder without a conference badge can still build a full week of meetings.
That loose structure suits a startup economy already moving quickly. New York App Week adds an in-person layer to a city where capital keeps flowing into young companies, as shown by a single week of New York startup deals that topped $400 million.
Seven Apps Take Home Golden Shippies At The Intrepid Museum
The Shippies award show took over the Intrepid Museum on the evening of October 20, with a red carpet and the museum’s retired space shuttle as a backdrop. The awards recognize apps shaping the subscription economy. Each winner received a Golden Shippy along with a Times Square billboard spot. The 2026 winners are:
- Runna, recognized for growth
- Audiomack, recognized for monetization
- Structured, recognized for simplicity
- Reading.com, recognized for learning
- Suno, recognized for AI experience
- Fitbod, recognized for ongoing value
- CardPointers, recognized in the indie developer category
The spread of categories is telling. Alongside growth and monetization, the awards recognized simplicity, learning, and ongoing value, which suggests the subscription app market is rewarding products people keep using, not just products that win the first download. CardPointers’ win in the indie developer category shows that a small team can still share a stage with venture-scale apps.
AI For NYC Hackathon Points App Builders At City Problems
The clearest civic thread of New York App Week came on Monday, October 19, when the AI For NYC Hackathon gathered builders at Pursuit, 47-10 Austell Place in Long Island City. Participants used open data and APIs to build practical solutions for New York City, then pitched their projects for prizes.
The hackathon stood apart from the rest of the schedule. Most App Week sessions focus on paywalls, retention, and paid acquisition, the mechanics of turning downloads into revenue. The Long Island City event asked a different question: what could those same skills do for the city hosting the week? For New York’s tech community, that kind of programming connects a growth-focused industry with the public data the city already publishes.
App Growth Annual Anchors The Week At The Glasshouse
App Growth Annual 2026 runs from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. on October 21 at The Glasshouse, 660 12th Avenue, with a livestream for online attendees. The program includes five keynotes and 36 workshops covering paid user acquisition, monetization, retention, and AI economics. RevenueCat also uses the day to preview its 2027 product roadmap.
The agenda leans toward operating questions rather than trend talk. Sessions on AI economics and retention address what it costs to run AI features inside an app and how to keep subscribers past their first month, issues that shape whether a subscription app can sustain itself.
Smaller Rooms Shape New York’s App Founder Community
Much of New York App Week happens in rooms built for small groups. On October 19, iOSoho hosted IndieDev Talks at 307 West 38th Street, offering practical growth talks for independent iOS developers both in person and online. The next day, the Women in Apps brunch brought together women building, designing, and marketing apps, followed by a Women in Apps art cafe where attendees painted ceramics with their phones put away.
Photo Credit: Unsplash.com
Thursday, October 22, opens with a 5K along the Hudson River that starts and finishes at Chelsea Piers, and closes with founder dinners and community meetups in Manhattan and Brooklyn. The pattern repeats across the week: small, topic-specific gatherings where founders compare notes on what worked and what failed.
Shipaton Demo Day Brings App Builders To Times Square
New York App Week ends its public-facing program on October 22 with Shipaton Demo Day in Times Square, running from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Winners of Shipaton, RevenueCat’s app-building challenge, will staff demo pods, show their apps to passersby, and collect feedback throughout the day. The event is open to the public, and no registration is required.
Moving app demos onto the street turns a week built for industry insiders into something any New Yorker can walk into. For the founders behind those pods, an afternoon of unfiltered feedback from strangers can be as valuable as a day of workshops.
FAQs
What Event Is In NYC This Week?
New York App Week runs October 19–22, 2026, with more than 30 events for app founders, developers, and growth teams across the city. Its final public event is Shipaton Demo Day in Times Square on October 22.
What Is App Growth Annual?
App Growth Annual is RevenueCat’s yearly app growth conference, held October 21, 2026, at The Glasshouse in Manhattan and streamed online. The 2026 program includes five keynotes and 36 workshops on acquisition, monetization, retention, and AI economics.
What Is RevenueCat?
RevenueCat is a software company that provides subscription management and revenue tools for mobile and web apps. Founded in 2017, it organizes New York App Week’s two anchor events, App Growth Annual and the Shippies.
Who Won The 2026 Shippies?
The 2026 Shippies winners are Runna, Audiomack, Structured, Reading.com, Suno, Fitbod, and CardPointers. Each received a Golden Shippy and a Times Square billboard spot.
Is Shipaton Demo Day Free To Attend?
Yes. Shipaton Demo Day is open to the public in Times Square from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on October 22, 2026, and no registration is required.
