✉
· A LETTER
For the people you love
The thing you keep meaning to say. A long apology. A thank-you. A goodbye that doesn't feel rushed because you didn't have to write it in a hurry.
· A QUIET KIND OF SAFETY NET
Write the things
you'd want them to know
if you couldn't tell them.
Heartbeat is a small service that watches for your absence. You write letters; we hold them, encrypted, and only deliver if you go quiet for too long. Otherwise, we're invisible. That's the entire idea.
· THE WHOLE THING
Three small habits, one big peace of mind.
01 · STEP
Write your letters
A letter for your sister. Instructions for your partner. Passwords for your accountant. Whatever you want them to have, in your own words.
02 · STEP
Live your life
Sign in occasionally. We notice — and we notice GitHub, calendar, and Telegram activity too, if you want. We only nudge when we genuinely haven't heard.
03 · STEP
If we go silent
After a long quiet stretch — with reminders along the way — your letters go to the people you chose. Until then, no one sees a thing.
· QUIETLY EVERYWHERE
We watch in six soft ways.
Most check-in services nag you. We try not to. Just signing in counts. Pushing code counts. A reply to a Telegram bot, a tap on an email link, a passkey ping — any of these reset our clock. You'll rarely hear from us.
- ✓ Just signing in
- ✓ GitHub commits
- ✓ Telegram reply
- ✓ Email link tap
- ✓ Passkey check
- ✓ Personal URL
EXAMPLE NUDGE · DAY 31
From: heartbeat <hello@heartbeat.app>
Hey Alex,
It's been a quiet month. No worries — we just wanted to make sure you're still around. Tap below to let us know.
I'm here →· WHAT PEOPLE WRITE
Letters, instructions, and the keys to everything.
☐
· INSTRUCTIONS
For when they have to figure things out
Where the will is. Which lawyer to call. The pet's vet. How the heater works. The boring, useful sentences nobody else can write for them.
⚿
· SECRETS & KEYS
Passwords, vaults, recovery codes
Your 1Password emergency kit. The crypto seed phrase. The bank login. The Google recovery codes. Encrypted at rest, only revealed if your letters are delivered.
· ON SECRETS, SPECIFICALLY
Your vault, on your server, unsealed only when time runs out.
Heartbeat is self-hosted. Your secrets never sit in someone else's vault — they live on hardware you control, encrypted at rest and in transit. We use time-boxed encryption: keys are mathematically locked until your grace period expires, so even with full database access, no one can read your letters early. Not us. Not an admin. Not a subpoena.
- ✓ Self-hosted (Docker / k8s)
- ✓ Encrypted at rest (AES-256)
- ✓ Encrypted in transit (TLS 1.3)
- ✓ Time-boxed key release
- ✓ Zero-knowledge to operators
- ✓ Audit log, append-only
⚿ 1PASSWORD RECOVERY TO: SAM ───────────────────────────────────────────── Service : 1Password Email : alex@example.com Master hint : the cafe in Lisbon, 2017 Emergency : see encrypted attachment.pdf ───────────────────────────────────────────── 🔒 SEALED · 2,140 BYTES · NOT YET DELIVERED
· FROM A USER
"I used to keep a sealed envelope in my desk drawer. This is that, except I don't have to tell anyone where the drawer is. And I can rewrite it whenever I think of something else."
Begin with one letter.
Pick someone you love. Write the thing. We'll keep it safe.
Start your first letter →