This free app whispers the hidden history of wherever you're standing

Key points

• Wrinkles, free on iOS and Android, uses your phone's GPS to automatically play audio stories about nearby places as you walk around.
• The app launched with 1.3 million points of interest across 177 countries.
• Museums, tourism boards and hotels pay to add their own content, keeping the app free for users.
• Founders David Stemler and Ryan Hansan say the app works as well on your daily commute as it does on holiday.

The idea hit David Stemler at the British Museum in London. He was using the museum's official tour app, eyes glued to his screen, cross-referencing numbers on exhibits against a list on his phone. By the end of the visit, he'd barely looked at the actual artefacts.

"I spent the entire visit heads-down, matching numbers on the walls to lists on my phone instead of taking in my surroundings," Stemler told TechCrunch. From the airport, he called his old school friend Ryan Hansan and posed the obvious question: if his phone already knows exactly where he is, why can't the places in front of him just speak?

That became Wrinkles, now available free on iPhone and Android. Stemler is a longtime advertising executive. Hansan previously founded ScratchDC, a meal delivery service, and TasteLab, a shared commercial kitchen for independent food businesses.

So how does it actually work?

Open the app, put your phone in your pocket, and walk. Wrinkles detects your location using GPS and automatically queues up audio stories about whatever is nearby: the building you just passed, the street you turned onto, or the fountain at the end of the square.

You can also ask follow-up questions while you listen, like a tour guide who takes interruptions. Standing at Rome's Trevi Fountain and curious where the water actually comes from? Just ask.

Beyond the 1.3 million built-in stories, historians, museums and local creators can upload their own content to the map. A local history society could add a walking tour of your town, and you'd discover it just by passing through.

There's a social layer too. You can follow friends or organisations, save favourite spots, and build custom maps. Families can attach photos and recordings to specific places, pinning a story about a childhood home to the map permanently.

Does it cost anything?

Nothing, for regular users. Wrinkles keeps the app free by charging on the supply side: museums, tourism boards and universities pay to create location-based experiences without building a separate app from scratch. Businesses can also promote their locations and earn booking links for tours or restaurant reservations, with Wrinkles taking a cut of those transactions.

Stemler and Hansan, friends since middle school who built this out of years of travelling together, see it as an everyday curiosity tool rather than a travel app.

"The common thread isn't travel, it's curiosity," Hansan told TechCrunch. "A travel app gets used on one trip a year. Wrinkles gets used on your commute, at the botanical garden, at the zoo with your kids."

We first covered Wrinkles on 4 August 2026, and the thing worth watching now is whether the partner content network fills in fast enough to make the app feel alive in genuinely ordinary neighbourhoods, not just heritage districts. That's the real test of whether 1.3 million points of interest is a floor or a ceiling.

One privacy note: the app tracks your location continuously to trigger stories. Decide whether you want it running all the time or only while the app is open.

Common questions

Does Wrinkles work somewhere like my own town, not just tourist hotspots?

Yes. The 1.3 million points of interest span 177 countries, including ordinary streets. Local creators can add their own stories, so coverage tends to grow over time.

Is there a paid tier with extra features?

Not currently. The founders say they've experimented with a freemium model but are committed to keeping core features free, with revenue coming from partner organisations rather than listeners.