Vibe Coding is the New No-Code: Overhyped and Misunderstood
Vibe coding is being hyped as the future of software development—just like no-code once was. But can AI-generated code really replace engineers, or is this just another tech illusion? Here's why vibe coding is great for Indiemakers in the short term but falls apart at scale.
The Hype: AI Will Replace Engineers
Andrej Karpathy, the AI guru himself, described vibe coding as a paradigm where developers "fully give in to the vibes." The idea? You stop sweating the details, let AI handle the grunt work, and simply steer the ship with high-level instructions. Vibe coding works for early-stage projects, prototyping, and MVPs, but let’s not confuse speed with sustainability. As a project matures, reality kicks in: software development is 90% details and 10% fixing the mistakes caused by ignoring them.
If AI-driven development were the future, Tesla would be all over it. Instead, they still employ thousands of world-class engineers. Software development follows a cycle: there’s a phase for rapid iteration and experimentation, where vibe coding has its place. But when precision and reliability become critical, AI-generated code isn’t a shortcut – it’s a liability.
Vibe coding feels like the new no-code – except instead of automating workflows, it automates impulsive decisions. You “lean into the vibes,” and programmers transform into product engineers who ship 10–100x faster.
Meanwhile, executives rightfully scoff in boardrooms where real money is on the line. Nobody is prepared to stake their career or quarterly targets on vibes.
We’ve seen this before. No-code was supposed to kill engineers. It didn’t. Instead, it created a new category of messy, unscalable software that companies eventually had to pay real engineers to fix. Vibe coding is just an AI-fueled rerun of that same hype cycle. Just like AI-generated art and low-effort YouTube spam are clogging our feeds, AI-generated software will flood the market – half-baked, unscalable, and doomed to be rewritten.
Vibing is Great for Indiemakers – To a Point
Indiemakers love speed, and vibe coding promises precisely that – fast MVPs, rapid iteration, and the ability to test ideas without hiring a dev team. It’s a dream for solo founders trying to get something off the ground.
But here’s the catch: everything changes once real users are involved. It’s only fun until you have to untangle the mess at 3 AM.
When your AI-generated app breaks, you’re the one debugging it. When scaling issues arise, no AI prompt will fix the architectural mistakes made at the start. Indiemakers should absolutely use vibe coding to get started – but they should also have an exit plan for when the vibes wear off, and real engineering needs to take over.
Some makers will thrive in this era. They’ll leverage AI for quick iterations, validate ideas, and pivot fast. But the ones who win will be the ones who know when to ditch AI-generated code and invest in actual software craftsmanship.
The Reality: AI Can Ship, But Can It Scale?
Yes, AI-assisted development lets you build faster. It’s great for:
- Zero-to-one product development
- Rapid prototyping
- Side projects and simple applications
- Startups that just need something functional fast
But here’s what vibe coding evangelists don’t want to admit: at scale, everything falls apart.
- Debugging AI-generated code is a nightmare. Reddit is filled with junior devs panicking because they can’t fix the hallucinations their AI assistant spat out.
- Technical debt piles up fast. Rewriting code instead of debugging? You’re just stacking layers of barely-functional garbage.
- AI doesn’t understand architecture. It can generate working code but won’t design a scalable system that can handle millions of users.
- Enterprise and critical systems don’t play this game. Nobody is vibe coding airline booking systems, financial transactions, or medical software. If failure has consequences, AI-generated code is not your friend.
The Business Model Fallacy: “Just Vibe Code an AI Alternative to Figma!”
People love throwing out hot takes like: Why don’t a bunch of vibe coders band together and build AI-powered alternatives to Figma, Adobe, or DocuSign?
Common sense should tell you that you can’t just replace tried-and-tested software like Figma or DocuSign with AI-generated code held together by duct tape and prayers.
If vibe coding could replace juggernauts with billion-dollar R&D and marketing budgets, we’d already be drowning in AI-powered unicorns.
Spoiler: We’re not. Because building real software is harder than pasting prompts into an AI tool and hoping for the best.
Here’s why that won’t work:
- Software is art. If building Figma was just a matter of writing code, Adobe wouldn’t have spent $20B acquiring it.
- Speed is overrated. Yes, you can ship 10x faster. No, that doesn’t mean people will want to use it.
- Core workflows demand trust. Business users aren’t looking for the cheapest AI-generated SaaS alternative; they need reliability, security, and stability.
- Scalability is more than a buzzword. AI might generate a prototype, but infrastructure costs, performance optimization, and backwards compatibility will eat your lunch at scale.
Software isn’t just code – it’s craftsmanship, design, and trust.
Vibe Coding Projects vs. Commercial Software: The Gap No One Wants to Talk About
It’s fun to create. Humans are wired for it. What’s less fun? Selling software to businesses – dealing with security, compliance, scaling, uptime guarantees, and customers who expect things to actually work.
Vibe coding thrives in the playground of experimentation. However, software that matters needs stability, performance, and trust. Enterprises don’t care how quickly you spun up an AI-generated prototype if it crumbles under real-world load.
The hard truth?
Vibe coding is great for weekend hacks and MVPs, but the moment contracts, regulations, and uptime SLAs enter the picture, you need more than just vibes – you need real engineering.
The Future: What Vibe Coding is Actually Good For
Vibe coding isn’t killing engineering – it’s just replacing cheap labour for:
- Basic websites and CRUD apps
- One-off automation scripts
- Low-stakes internal tools
- Rapid idea validation
- Side projects that don’t need to be maintained
The real winners in vibe coding?
Non-technical founders who can launch faster.
The losers?
Anyone who thinks AI is replacing high-calibre engineers.
Final Word
So, should you learn vibe coding? Sure. It’s useful. But don’t fool yourself into thinking it’s the future of all software development. Because when it’s time to build something real, you’ll still need actual engineers who know what they’re doing.
If you’re building something that needs to last, AI can assist, but it won’t save you. Vibe coding is fun – until you need to build a software business. That’s when the vibes run out.