Overview
lube is an AI powered tool that helps product teams discover what users really want by analyzing Reddit conversations. While the platform has big ambitions to become a complete product development suite, it currently focuses on one thing and does it well. “Extracting actionable insights from Reddit discussions”
First Impression
The interface immediately stands out with its playful pastel color scheme and delightful animations throughout. The design feels genuinely cute and approachable, a refreshing change from typical analytics dashboards. What makes it especially user friendly is the thoughtful onboarding. Each feature includes small descriptive text underneath explaining what it does. This subtle guidance ensures you never feel lost, even as a first time user. The combination of charming aesthetics and clear direction creates an experience that feels both professional and welcoming.
What is lube?
lube aims to become a fully integrated product development suite that goes beyond what generic task managers like Linear and Jira offer. The founder, after working with multiple product teams from legacy media companies to gaming startups, noticed a pattern that general task managers consistently fail to address product specific challenges like discovery, roadmapping, accurate estimation, goal tracking, and launch workflows. Teams end up hacking together custom workarounds repeatedly just to "kind of" get what they need.
The current version focuses on the discovery phase. It monitors Reddit communities where people share honest, unfiltered opinions about products and services. On Reddit, users talk to each other, not to companies. They name competitors, share workarounds, and vent frustrations they would never mention in a support ticket. lube captures these authentic conversations and transforms them into structured insights.
How It Works
The platform operates in four straightforward steps:
1. Connect Sources You tell lube which subreddits matter to your product. This could include competitor subreddits, your brand's communities, or industry related discussion boards. The system immediately starts monitoring conversations.
2. Automatic Analysis Every day, lube indexes and analyzes the top 100 posts from your selected subreddits. The focus on top posts ensures you get insights from the most engaged discussions, where the most relevant and impactful conversations happen. You can also set up search queries to track specific topics, competitors, or concepts that may not have dedicated subreddits.
3. Extract Insights The AI processes thousands of posts and comments across 10+ languages, automatically detecting patterns like purchase intent, churn risk, competitor mentions, feature gaps, workarounds, and frustrations.
4. Get Recommendations lube delivers prioritized suggestions with effort and impact scores, supported by real user quotes. Every insight links back to the original source, so you can verify the data and confidently defend your roadmap decisions.
Testing lube
To test the platform, I analyzed the “Relationships” subreddit, curious about the couples and relationships niche. Unfortunately there were no purchase intent signals, but it was fascinating to read what concerns couples have, what solutions they suggest to each other, and what questions come up most frequently.
After using lube for a while, lube works for two types of users in my opinion.
For existing products: If you have a product that people already discuss on Reddit, lube saves you from manually monitoring conversations and googling what people think. You get organized, analyzed data about what users want and what problems they face.
For new product discovery: If you have not started building yet, lube helps you discover what people genuinely need in a specific niche. You can validate ideas before investing time and resources, building products that solve real problems based on actual user discussions.
When you are unsure what to build, conventional wisdom says to copy what already sells well. Those products are proven. But lube offers a smarter approach. Instead of just copying successful products, you can analyze complaints and frustrations people have with those existing solutions. By monitoring what users dislike about big company products, you can build something similar but address those specific pain points. This gives you a real competitive edge. You are not just another clone. You are building what people actually wish the original product would do.
Current Limitations
Right now, lube only connects to Reddit. For products that do not have an active Reddit presence, the current version offers limited value. Your product needs to generate enough discussion on Reddit to make the analysis worthwhile. In that case, by comparing what users say about competing solutions, you can identify gaps and prioritize what to implement first to solve real user problems. One feature I wish lube would add is subreddit discovery assistance. As someone not familiar with Reddit (I am Korean and we use Naver instead of Google, with our own community platforms), I spent some time searching for suitable subreddits to monitor. If lube could suggest recommended subreddits based on your industry or product category, or simply provide a browsable list of popular subreddits, it would make the setup process much smoother for international users or those new to Reddit.
Who Should Use lube?
lube is ideal for:
Product managers who need to understand market needs and validate roadmap decisions with real user data.
Founders and entrepreneurs researching market opportunities before building, especially in consumer facing niches with active Reddit communities.
Growth teams tracking competitor mentions, feature requests, and churn signals to inform marketing and product strategy.
Anyone building for communities that actively discuss topics related to your industry on Reddit.
Final Thoughts
lube solves a specific problem well. It turns scattered Reddit conversations into structured product insights. While the current version is narrow in scope, this focus is actually a strength. The platform does one thing reliably instead of trying to do everything poorly.
The long term vision is compelling. If the founder delivers on plans to integrate more data sources and build out the full product development suite, lube could become a powerful alternative to piecing together multiple tools.
For now, if your product or market has an active Reddit presence, lube offers a fast, affordable way to hear what users really think. The free plan makes it easy to test whether the insights justify the investment. For teams drowning in scattered feedback across support tickets, Slack threads, and social mentions, lube promises to find the signals that matter.