Your parents have a lot to say. Tell Me asks them a couple of questions a week, about anything from the street they grew up on to what they did last Tuesday. Every answer is kept, in their own voice, for good. You'll learn things you never knew to ask, and you'll have more to talk about next time you see them.
Most of us have heard the same ten stories from our parents. There are hundreds more they'd happily tell you. Nobody's thought to ask.
Tell Me is a family storytelling app for recording your parents’ life stories. It sends your mum or dad a “Tell me…” question twice a week by WhatsApp, email or a simple storyteller app — they reply with a voice note, and every story is kept in your family archive.
It's for anyone who's ever thought “I should ask them about that”. If your parents are still telling stories at family dinners, you don't need a reason to start. You just need something to ask.
Four steps. A lifetime of stories.
Tell us about your mum or dad
Tell us what you call them, who matters in their life, and anything they'd rather not be asked about. Choose WhatsApp, email or our own storyteller app. Nothing arrives until they say yes — their first message asks if they'd like to take part.
Not sure how to bring it up? What to say so it sounds like the lovely idea it is →
Their full name
What do you call them?
How do we reach them?
Hi Margaret! 👋
Sarah has set up Tell Me because she'd love to hear more about you.
You'll get friendly questions starting with "Tell me..." — just reply with a voice note whenever suits.
Reply YES to get started, or STOP at any time.
11:02 am
They reply in their own words
Twice a week, a warm, personalised question — and they answer however feels natural: a voice note, a video, or a few typed lines on the days they'd rather. Attach an old photograph and "Tell me about the day this was taken" doesn't get a text message back. It gets a story.
Tell me about the day this photo was taken.
9:14 am
9:22 am ✓✓
Look at that kitchen! Tell me more — whose house was it, and who's the little one on the chair?
9:45 am
Beautifully told, kept safe
Their voice note becomes a story — gently shaped, still in their phrases and their personality. The original recording and their exact words are kept alongside, always. We shape, we never replace.
We queued from six in the morning in the pouring rain — my mother was certain I'd lost my mind. And when they finally came on, you couldn't hear a single note. Just screaming, and me screaming with them.
"...we queued from, ooh, six in the morning, in the pouring rain, and my mother she was certain I'd lost my mind. And when they, when they came on, you couldn't hear a note, not one, just screaming, and me screaming with them..."
A growing family archive
Every story lands in your searchable archive — browse by theme, search by name or place, listen to the original recording whenever you want.
Mum's stories
47 stories · 2h 14m
“Tell me about the best day of your trip, Mum” gets you the wrong turn, the perfect lunch, and the laugh in her voice telling it. That's your mum, exactly as she is now.
Some questions reach back sixty years. Some are about last Tuesday. Both tell you something you didn't know.
Good morning, Margaret.
A question from your family
Tell me about the best day of your trip, Mum.
Take your time — there's no rush.
Dads are the hard ones. You ask about his first job and you get “the bakery, six till two, hated it.”
So we ask about the bakery. And what six in the morning was like in January. And who else was on that shift.
He doesn't have to be a talker. He just has to answer, and the follow-up questions find the story in it.
Tell me about your first job.
9:00 am
The bakery. Six till two. Hated it.
9:31 am ✓✓
Six till two! Tell me what six in the morning was like in January — and who else was on that shift.
9:33 am
6:48 pm ✓✓
When a story lands, you can send a heart or a few words straight back — and they get it on a day when no question is due. Not a notification in an app they'll never open. A message, where they already are.
It sounds small. It's the difference between someone telling stories and someone doing homework.
Tell me about Sunday roasts when we were small.
“I can smell it from here. Yorkshires at yours next month?”
Hi Margaret! Remember that story you shared about Sunday roasts when we were small? Sarah loved it. ❤️
“I can smell it from here. Yorkshires at yours next month?”
Your next question will arrive on Thursday.
9:00 am
It gives you more to talk about.
You'll still ring on a Sunday. You'll just have something better to ask than what the weather's doing.
I didn't see this bit coming
I speak to my parents more now, not less. Their answers have turned into the best conversation starters I've got — “tell me more about that, Dad” is a regular phrase in our house these days, usually on a Sunday, usually about something I'd never have thought to ask.
Not a transcript — the actual recording, and every photo they sent with an answer. Searchable by name, place and theme, on your phone, and yours to download in ordinary files that play without us.
One of you sets it up. All of you get the stories. Invite your siblings to the archive and nobody has to forward voice notes round the family group chat.
There's no finish line. Keep asking for as long as they have stories, or stop when it feels right.
Not something for a shelf. The thing you'll open on a Sunday night to hear them tell it again.
‹ Back
Mum's stories
104 stories · 5h 12m of her voice
Tell me about the house you grew up in.
Tell me about your first day at the bank.
Tell me about the day this photo was taken.
Tell me about Sunday roasts when we were small.
Tell me about the night you met Dad.
Tell me about a song that takes you back to being twenty.
Tell Me for iPhone — the archive in your pocket. Or use it in any web browser, on any phone.
Want the fuller picture? How Tell Me works, explained in ten minutes →
The stories live in the app. The best of them can live on a shelf too.
Tell Me is digital first — the home for their stories is the app on your phone. But for a family that wants something to hold, once there are enough stories we'll print the best of them properly, with a QR code beside each one that plays their actual voice.
Order it when there's enough worth printing. What it costs ↓
“One question revealed I almost didn’t exist.”
A line or two from some of Tell Me’s storytellers — the full stories run far longer, and belong to their families. Every one began with a single question.
Swipe the top card away to read the next one.
Tell me about your grandparents.
In 1960, when I was two, we were all set to emigrate to New Zealand. At the very last moment my granny fell ill, my dad stayed to care for her - and the move never happened.
“If Granny had never fallen ill, Dad and his family would have moved, he'd never have met mum, and I'd never have been born - that's a lot to take in!”
Tell me about the house you grew up in.
The house I grew up in was heated by coal my father collected at night from the railway line beside the house - coal that had fallen from the passing steam trains.
“Crazy to think if the trains had been generous that week, the house would have been warm. If they hadn’t, you wore your coat indoors and didn’t complain.”
Tell me about bedtime when your children were little.
When David was wee he demanded the same book at bedtime, every single night - The Enormous Crocodile. I coped by skipping pages and making bits up.
“Turns out I was doing the exact same thing to my daughter when she asked for the same book, only 30 years after mum did the same to me.”
Tell me about the night you met Grandad.
He asked me to dance three times at the Locarno and never once gave me his name. I only found out who he was on the Monday - he worked two benches along from my brother, and had been too nervous to say.
“Granny Margaret has been in my entire life and I never knew the story about how she met granddad.”
Tell me what you bought with your very first pay packet.
My first Friday at the yard I was handed a small brown envelope with my name on it. I carried it home without opening it — you gave it to your mother, that was the rule — and she handed me back two shillings at the kitchen table.
Tell me about Sunday dinners when you were a girl.
My mother made the same soup every Sunday for forty years and never once wrote the recipe down. You learned it standing at her elbow, being handed things to stir.
Stories nobody had thought to ask for.
From the people who set Tell Me up — and the storytellers themselves.
“I signed my mum and dad up to it and it was so simple, they had absolutely no issues with answering the questions. It all just works and the stories are amazing!”
“I knew all the big stories, but there's so much I didn't know, and my mum loves answering every question she's asked!”
“I look forward to my question every other day at 9am. Opened up some real memories I'd forgotten all about.”
“My mum is never off Whatsapp so at least now she's putting it to good use!”
“Loved the idea, but I was worried my dad wouldn't be too keen. How wrong I was! Who knew that quiet man had so many stories?!”
“Tell Me has opened up memories I'd forgotten about. I love it when I can find a photo to go with the question.”
Me and the question-askers
I'm David, and Tell Me started with my own parents.
I'm turning 40 next year, and my kids have decided that makes me officially old — they ask me endless questions about my life. And it hit me: I don't know half of these things about my own mum and dad.
So I tried a question every Sunday. Life got in the way — one week I was busy, the next they were — and on the rare Sundays I did ask, I had no way to keep the answer. It was said, and then it was gone.
So I built this. It asks my parents a couple of questions a week, and they reply in their own time, in their own words — and every bit of it is kept.
They love it. “Tell Me” has become part of our family's vocabulary, and “tell me more about that, Dad” a regular phrase in our house. I speak to my parents more now, not less.
Tell Me holds my own parents' stories, so I've every reason to look after yours.
The original audio or video stays with the story, on every plan.
You can switch between the shaped story and the words they actually said, on any story.
We use AI to shape their words into something readable. We never change the meaning, and your family's stories are never sold or shared.
Start free. Pay when you're ready.
Every storyteller starts with 10 free stories.
About a month of listening.
No card, no commitment.
When you're ready to keep going, choose a plan.
Cancel whenever you like. A free story is only used when they actually reply, so questions they skip cost you nothing. And whatever happens with your plan, we never delete a story — you can download everything, free, at any time.
Asking both parents? Each gets their own personalised questions and archive.
If you ever stop the questions, every story and recording stays open, exactly as you left it, for every storyteller on your account. Starts a year after your subscription ends, and isn't needed while anyone's still getting questions.
Optional, and later: the best of their stories printed properly, with a QR code beside each one that plays the recording. One payment, nothing renews.
We never delete stories. Not if you cancel, not if your card expires, not if you forget about us for ten years. These aren't data. They're someone's life.
What do you give a parent who has everything? The chance to tell you about it.
Looking for something different for your mum or dad? Give them a year of Tell Me. Pick the day — Christmas morning, a birthday, whenever suits — and we'll send it to them then, with their first question ready and waiting.
Let's answer the obvious ones.
It could reach your mum or dad tomorrow morning — and the answer will be a story you've never heard.
Ask your first questionIt's late, you're knackered, and asking mum and dad about their lives feels like a job for a better day. Honestly, it took me weeks to get my own parents started, and I built the thing. So tell me when's better, and I'll give you a nudge then.
Done. I'll see you .
Send this to your mum or dad right now, from your own WhatsApp. No signup, nothing to download.
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