Sonder is not social media. It's social memory.

Mental Health Benefits

Voice journaling offers a unique pathway to mental wellness that writing alone cannot provide. When we speak our thoughts aloud, we engage different neural pathways that can help process emotions, reduce anxiety, and create clarity around complex feelings.

Sonder provides a safe, private space for silent expression—no judgment, no performance, just authentic connection with yourself. Research shows that verbal processing can be particularly effective for working through trauma, grief, and daily stressors.

Sometimes the words we need to hear most are the ones we speak to ourselves in the quiet moments.

Unlike traditional social media that can increase comparison and anxiety, Sonder's approach focuses on reflection and healing, creating space for genuine self-care through storytelling.

Cultural & Family Legacy

Every family has stories that risk being lost forever. Sonder helps preserve the voices of elders and the wisdom of memory-keepers across generations.

Your accent, your laugh, the way you tell a story—these are irreplaceable elements of human heritage that deserve to be preserved. Sonder's Legacy feature allows families, biological or chosen, to build living archives of their most precious memories.

The stories our grandparents tell us today become the foundation stories our grandchildren will treasure tomorrow.

Whether you're documenting immigration experiences, preserving indigenous languages, or simply capturing everyday moments that matter, Sonder provides tools that honor the full depth of human experience.

Digital Dignity

In a world where tech companies profit from your attention and data, Sonder offers something different: genuine respect for your privacy and autonomy.

No ads. No surveillance. Just story.

Your voice recordings belong to you. Your stories are not mined for advertising data. Your emotional moments are not commodified for engagement metrics. Sonder operates on subscription revenue, ensuring our incentives align with your wellbeing rather than your data.

This isn't social media designed to maximize time-on-platform. This is social memory designed to maximize meaning, connection, and authentic human expression in the digital age.

Technology should serve the human heart, not exploit it.

What's Working Today

• • The app interface and prompts are in English
• • Audio Sonders are transcribed into English if spoken in English (via AI)
• • Transcripts are private by default, and are published alongside public Sonders to support our hearing-impaired community
• • All transcripts currently appear only in their original language — translation is not yet available

What We're Building Toward

We're dreaming of a multilingual Sonder — where language is no barrier to truth.

Here's what we hope to introduce in future updates:

• • Translated transcripts of public stories (with language toggle)
• • Localized UI and prompt libraries
• • Multilingual Stream filtering so you can explore stories in your preferred language
• • Auto-detection of spoken language in uploaded Sonders

Why This Matters

Sonder is global at heart. We believe stories should transcend borders and language barriers — not be confined by them.

We're working toward a system where someone can whisper their truth in Arabic, and someone else can read it in Portuguese. Where every voice can be heard, no matter the tongue.

We're not there yet — but it's a core part of Sonder's mission.