Hey Sumo-lings, Leo here — I'm back! 👋

The first Gato GraphQL campaign went great, so here we are with a second campaign.

What is Gato GraphQL in one sentence?

It's a GraphQL server for WordPress that lets you fetch, transform, and mutate your data in a single request — with custom endpoints, access control, caching, and automation built in.

What’s new since last time?

• Better AI support — Added fields to better support AI use cases (e.g. feeding structured data into LLMs).
• New extensions — Bricks, JetEngine, and WooCommerce extensions are now available.
• Updated clients — All GraphQL clients have been updated to their latest versions.

Why pick Gato GraphQL over the REST API or WPGraphQL?

Same story: one request, one query — fetch, transform, and mutate. No round-trips, no duplicated logic across apps. Custom endpoints and access control so you expose only what each client needs. Plus persisted queries and automation (hooks, WP-Cron) so you can run GraphQL from inside WordPress, not only from external apps.

Support

I’m still the one behind the product and support. If you hit a wall or have a “can I do X?” question, reach out — I’m here.

Let's have a great campaign — see you around,

Leo

What are past projects, failures, or successes you’ve had in your career?

Gato GraphQL is my first personal endeavour as an entrepreneur. Before that, I was a software developer working for a handful of companies.

I've been working on the engine powering Gato GraphQL for around 10 years. During that time, I was mainly a technical writer for several online magazines (including Smashing Magazine, CSS Tricks, and the LogRocket blog), describing what I had learnt while coding the engine.

The engine started as a personal project for my own website. In 2020 I learnt about GraphQL, and noticed that my engine could perfectly satisfy the GraphQL spec. That's when I decided to build Gato GraphQL, and attempt to launch it as a commercial project.

I released Gato GraphQL v1.0 in September 2023, and been working full time on it ever since.

What 3rd party tools is your product critically dependent on?

Only WordPress.

Where is your customer data stored?

My customer data is handled by Lemon Squeezy. In their Privacy page (https://www.lemonsqueezy.com/privacy), they state:

> The personal information we collect is stored and/or processed in United States, or where we or our partners, affiliates, and third-party providers maintain facilities.

What is your current monthly recurring revenue (MRR)?

202.67

How many customers do you have today?

20

What’s the origin of the idea for your product?

I've been working with WordPress since 2013. I believe it's a great CMS for managing content.

In 2020 I discovered GraphQL, and immediately loved how convenient it is for developers.

So I decided to marry the two of them, building a GraphQL server for WordPress.

WPGraphQL already existed by then. However, noticing that it was not extracting the full potential of GraphQL, I decided to go ahead with my project.

I envisioned Gato GraphQL to unlock further possibilities for developers. Hence already from day 1, I've been releasing features that my competitors don't have (such as Multiple Query Execution -which nowadays I can't imagine myself doing without-, the @oneOf input object, composability of fields, and several others)

What problem is your product solving and how?

Gato GraphQL allows to expose an API to power a mobile app, headless site, newsletter, or any external application. But this can also be done by the other APIs 😄

What sets Gato GraphQL apart is how powerful and versatile it is, and that it can be used also internally, to perform admin tasks for the WordPress site.

Some things you can do with it, that you can't with the other APIs:

- Make the API faster by combining multiple queries into a single one, and executing them all together in a single request

- Expose custom endpoints for different apps and clients (granting access to different parts of the database)

- Create a query to perform some admin task, store it in the DB, and execute it as needed (similar to code snippets, but using GraphQL instead of PHP)

- Interact with external services (such as rewriting a post content via ChatGPT)

- Automate executing queries when some event happens (triggered by a hook or WP-Cron), and without limitations (i.e fetching any piece of data from the DB, connecting to any external service)

What’s the #1 thing you’re looking to gain from the AppSumo campaign?

Get new customers, to grow the number of active installs and positive reviews for the plugin on the WordPress plugin directory.

What are your plans with the customers, cash, and learnings from the AppSumo campaign?

Use the cash to fund my living expenses. If there's any cash left, hire a developer to help creating new integrations.

Keep new customers engaged in the development of the product, asking them for feedback on what integrations they need. And ask them to recommend the plugin to their friends and colleagues 😀

What's up, Sumo-lings! 👋

This is Leo, creator of Gato GraphQL, a powerful and versatile GraphQL server for WordPress.

I'm super happy to launch my product in AppSumo, and here I am to share it with you.

What's so special about Gato GraphQL?

There are other APIs for WordPress, such as the WP REST API and WPGraphQL, so why would you need Gato GraphQL?

Those APIs allow an external application to fetch and mutate data (such as updating a post). But it doesn't scale very well: You'll need to code the same logic for each of your apps, violating the DRY principle (Don't Repeat Yourself). And fetching and mutating data is done as separate steps, requiring an HTTP request each, making your app slower.

Gato GraphQL re-imagines what the API can provide: Fetch data, transform it as needed, and mutate it, all within a single query, executed within a single request. The same logic coded in the query is accessed by all apps, becoming DRY. The end result is an application both faster and easier to maintain.

Make the most of WordPress as a CMS

WordPress can be used as the single source of truth for your content. You may have your company's blog, a newsletter powered by Mailchimp, and social media content for 5 different platforms, all receiving content created in WordPress.

Gato GraphQL can help you manage who can access what content. Thanks to Custom Endpoints and Access Control, make sure that only the intended users can access their data, increasing the security of your offering. And via its HTTP client, distribute content across a multitude of sites.

More than an API

Use GraphQL to manage WordPress! The features offered by Gato GraphQL can also be used internally: Your queries can be stored in the DB, and executed as needed, via a user interface in the wp-admin.

You'll be able to: Import content from an external source (an HTML page, another WordPress site, an RSS feed, a CSV or JSON file, or a service such as AirTable), rewrite your content using ChatGPT, subscribe users to Mailchimp, search and replace content in bulk, send notification emails, and much more.

Interact with external services

Access any piece of data from your site, and from any external service that offers an API, and have them interact with each other.

Automate

Have your queries be executed automatically, whenever a WordPress hook or WP-Cron event is triggered.

Create automation workflows to: Rewrite the WooCommerce product's description when published, send an email to your users when there's a new post, daily import new posts from an external RSS feed, create an optimized featured image using generative AI for new posts, and much more.

Support: Here I am

Finally, part of my offering is me, Leo. I'm passionate about this product, I've spent many years building it, and plan to continue doing so for many more. Seeing people use Gato GraphQL fills me with joy.

If you come across any issue and need support, you can count on me 😀

Hey everyone!

If you are wondering what you can use Gato GraphQL for, well let me show you how this tool satisfied my own needs, when preparing for this same AppSumo campaign: https://gatographql.com/blog/running-an-appsumo-campaign-for-gatographql-with-gatographql-and-lemonsqueezy

Basically, as a requirement for the AppSumo campaign, my team had to send 10.000 redemption codes to AppSumo, and we'd need to convert these into a corresponding "100% discount code" for users to redeem their plugins, using my marketplace provider LemonSqueezy.

Gato GraphQL made it a breeze! I could create a query that did everything (create the codes, store them in LemonSqueezy, and produce a list of the 10.000 codes, that I could hand to AppSumo) in a few minutes. 💪

Not only that, but when I recently updated the campaign by adding a tier 6, I simply executed that query again, and my campaign was ready again, in just a few minutes. 🙏

If you need more ideas on what Gato GraphQL is useful for, check out the queries library: https://gatographql.com/library

Any inquiry you have, please do reach out to me, I'll be here 😀

Cheers, Leo

Hey everyone, I have great news: I've decided to increase the number of domains in each tier! 🙌

So if you have already purchased any tier, well, you'll now get a nice gift 🎁 

And also I added an extra tier 6, offering 120 domains! 🚀

In particular tier 6 offers an incredible value, since it is less than half the price of the LTD for 100 domains on my site, while delivering even more features: Premium extensions "Automation" and "Polylang" (which you'd have to purchase separately on my site).

I'm doing all this because I got requested to increase the number of domains to 100 (here: https://appsumo.com/products/gato-graphql/questions/upgrade-price-1309594/), and I complied (and delivered a bit more too 😀)

People come to AppSumo because they want really good deals. So I promise I'll give you a pretty good deal 🙏