lean-coffee

        ) )
       ( (
     .-------.
     |       |]
     |       |
     `-------'

  brainstorm         vote            discuss           export
 ────────────     ───────────     ─────────────     ──────────
  + retros          retros ❤❤❤     ┌───────────┐    # Summary
  + deploys         deploys ❤❤     │  retros   │
  + onboarding      onboarding ❤   │  ⏱  4:23  │    ✓ retros
                                   └───────────┘    ✓ deploys

A structured meeting facilitator for Lean Coffee sessions. Open it on a shared screen, no sign-up required.

Live demo →

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What it does

Lean Coffee is a meeting format where participants propose topics, vote on what to discuss, and timebox each item. This tool runs the whole session from one browser tab — brainstorm, vote, discuss, export — without accounts, a backend, or anything to install.

Phases

1. Brainstorm — anyone at the table calls out topics; the facilitator types them in. Participants are tracked by name for the export.

2. Vote — each participant gets a fixed number of votes to spread across topics however they want. Topics auto-rank by vote count.

3. Discuss — topics play out in ranked order, each with a countdown timer. Extend time by 1 minute with one click. Key takeaways are auto-saved as you type.

4. Export — a full session summary shows discussed topics, takeaways, time spent, and any topics that didn't make the cut. Copy as markdown or download as a .md file.

Sessions survive a page refresh — localStorage keeps everything intact until you start a new session.

What's included

• Configurable votes-per-person before voting starts
• Per-topic discussion timer with 1-minute extension
• Phase-level timer visible throughout the session
• Auto-saving takeaways (every 2 seconds, only on change)
• Confirmation dialogs before advancing between phases
• Markdown export with stats, takeaways, and participant list
• Keyboard and screen reader accessible phase transitions

Stack

• React 18 + TypeScript
• Vite for builds
• Tailwind CSS for styling
• Lucide for icons
• GitHub Pages for hosting, via GitHub Actions

Why

I kept reaching for sticky notes or a shared doc to run Lean Coffee at work. The multi-user tools required everyone to sign in or sync on a separate device. This is just a URL on the projector — the facilitator drives it, everyone else participates verbally. No friction.

Run it locally

npm install
npm run dev