The f@ck is Vibe Coding?

Vibe coding is the art (or madness) of telling an AI what you want in plain language, then letting it build the damn thing for you. Instead of typing every line, you give prompts, test, tweak, and guide. It’s shifting from writing code to designing intent. And yeah, somebody named it “vibe coding” (shoutout to Andrej Karpathy) because sometimes it feels like you’re rolling with the flow, trusting the AI to bring your idea to life.

Why It’s Turning Heads (Good & Bad)

What works:

• Speed & prototyping: You go from idea → working demo faster than ever.

• Lower barrier: You don’t need to be a wizard in some framework, just clear about what you want.

• Creative focus: Less time wrestling with syntax, more time imagining the experience.

What kills you:

• Maintainability & readability: The AI’s output can be opaque garbage if you don’t understand it.

• Security & bugs: You may introduce vulnerabilities or edge-case failures the AI didn’t foresee.

• Complex systems struggle: Managing multi-layered architectures or integrated services is still hard.

• Loss of ownership: If you didn’t write it, do you really own it?

Yes, critics call it toy-level. Yes, it's risky to trust it blind. But for early-stage work, experimentation, or concepting? It has teeth.

Major Platforms & Tools You Can Use Today

Here are some of the big names in the vibe coding game (right now):

• Replit / Replit Agent - combines prompt-driven code generation with interactive editing.

• Cursor / Cursor Composer - one of the AI tools Karpathy referenced when defining “vibe coding.”

• Lovable - a platform pushing non-technical users into vibe coding UI + web apps.

• Other emerging ones: many AI coding tools (DigitalOcean list, Zapier list) mention a number of LLM-based environments.

How It Works (Rough Loop)

1. Prompt your intention (“Build me a login form with email & password”)

2. AI generates code—frontend, backend, or both

3. You run / test / observe

4. Refine via prompt feedback or corrections

5. Repeat until it works (or you give up)

This iterative, conversational loop is the heartbeat of vibe coding.

Use Cases & When You Shouldn’t Use It

Good for:

• Prototypes and MVPs

• Side projects

• Proof-of-concept apps

• Non-critical internal tools

Bad for:

• Mission-critical systems

• High-security apps

• Complex codebases with many moving parts

• Projects that demand human-readable, maintainable architecture

My Take

Vibe coding is seductive. It whispers, “Tell me what you want. I’ll make it.” But behind that voice is chaos. If you lean on it before you understand the craft, you're building on sand.

Still: used wisely, it’s a rocket fuel for ideation. Use it to explore, not to anchor. Guard what you build, learn to read the code that the AI writes, and always keep your own hands in the design of the system.

Vibe coding won’t replace engineering. But it will change the role of the engineer. Designers, product people, entrepreneurs; they’ll have new weapons. The question is: will you be the one waving them, or getting hit by them?