‘Vibe Coding’ Is The New AI Phenomenon That Lets Anybody Build Apps & Games
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If coding once meant long nights, caffeine-fueled syntax errors, and endless debugging, it might now just mean… catching a vibe. ‘Vibe coding,’ a phrase coined by AI researcher and OpenAI co-founder Andrej Karpathy, is gaining momentum among developers and non-coders alike. The idea is radical but simple: describe what you want your app, game, or software to do—in plain language, one must add—and let artificial intelligence handle the rest.
In other words, it’s programming, minus the programming.
Karpathy introduced the term in early 2025 to describe how he was using AI to build software without touching traditional code. Instead of writing lines of JavaScript or Python, he speaks or types out what he wants. Then, tools powered by large language models—like OpenAI’s GPT-4 Turbo or GitHub’s Copilot—translate those requests into working software. He called it “not really coding,” and for many, that’s precisely the appeal.
There's a new kind of coding I call "vibe coding", where you fully give in to the vibes, embrace exponentials, and forget that the code even exists. It's possible because the LLMs (e.g. Cursor Composer w Sonnet) are getting too good. Also I just talk to Composer with SuperWhisper…
— Andrej Karpathy (@karpathy) February 2, 2025
“I just see stuff, say stuff, run stuff, and copy paste stuff, and it mostly works,” Karpathy described.
This is wild.
— Min Choi (@minchoi) March 21, 2025
Vibe coding with AI just completely changed the game.
People can't stop creating games with Grok, Windsurf, Cursor & Claude 3.7 Sonnet.
10 wild examples:
1. Fortnite meets Minecraft on Three.js 🤯pic.twitter.com/towhyg0oYv
"vibe coded" (🤢) a procedural dungeon generator pic.twitter.com/6g5nkialrr
— Alex Veenendaal (@odogono) March 20, 2025
What makes vibe coding notable is just how accessible it makes software development. As it removes the need to understand syntax, logic structures, or frameworks, the technique (or lack thereof) opens the door to people who previously saw code as a barrier. Platforms like Cursor and Replit have leaned into this trend, letting users build apps with conversational prompts. Now, projects that might’ve taken months can be prototyped in days, or even hours.
I just vibe coded a whole iOS app in Swift (without having programmed in Swift before, though I learned some in the process) and now ~1 hour later it's actually running on my physical phone. It was so ez... I had my hand held through the entire process. Very cool.
— Andrej Karpathy (@karpathy) March 23, 2025
Entrepreneur Pieter Levels proved just how quickly this approach can pay off—literally. Using AI tools and zero previous experience in game design, he created Fly Pieter, a simple flight simulation game built in half an hour. Amazingly, it now reportedly earns over US$50,000 a month. While Levels’ story may be an outlier, his game demonstrates that vibe coding can produce real, working, profitable software.
The thing about fly.pieter by @levelsio is that it's actually fun as heck shooting down other guys.
— Freddy (@TheStudioBigly) March 8, 2025
Really hitting that arcade hotspot. pic.twitter.com/Jp80Dg6YJo
Decrypt also jumped into the vibe-coding hype, tasking Anthropic’s Claude AI with building a functional game using nothing more than conversational prompts. The result was a playable, browser-based zombie survival game developed over a few hours through back-and-forth chat. The team provided direction in natural language—such as asking for enemies, movement mechanics, or game-over logic—and Claude responded with working JavaScript code. While the game wasn’t polished or particularly complex, the process demonstrated just how feasible it is to build basic games without formal training in programming.
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Still, seasoned developers may have some reservations. Even though vibe coding is great for speed and experimentation, it’s not always built for clarity. Debugging AI-generated code can be tricky, especially when it breaks and no one fully understands how it works. An overreliance on AI might lead to code that’s functional but fragile—good enough to run, but hard to maintain or scale. Further, users need to remain ethical and ensure they don’t share confidential data with their chatbots lest it gets leaked in outputs.
just made a simple sleek website in just 5 mins for vibe coding game jam 2025.
— ᴘᴜʀᴜꜱʜᴀ (@purusa0x6c) March 24, 2025
rate this on the scale of 10. https://t.co/JWCNbBccU9 pic.twitter.com/6HL91ai8qK
Vibe-coding is still somewhat limited only to techies
— Neer Varshney (@neer_varshney) March 24, 2025
Yet, you as somebody who hates code to the guts or dense scared of it, are the best candidate to give it a shot.
I shared the ex. of vibe-coding a resume/portfolio website without spending a dime in my latest newsletter pic.twitter.com/miWBG4il9D
Even so, industry voices like Y Combinator CEO Garry Tan believe the benefits outweigh the risks. Tan sees vibe coding as a force multiplier for startups, allowing lean teams to build faster and cheaper than ever before.
My stupid vibe-coded side project started making money $$.
— Shyjal (@shyjal) March 24, 2025
Whether you coded it yourself or used AI tools to build it doesn’t matter.
Make something people want, and you’ll see results. pic.twitter.com/yZIwBee7eP
[via Ars Technica, Business Insider, Decrypt, 404 Media, images generated on AI]
