What Is Vibe Coding? And Why I Think Most People Still Don’t Understand The Risks.

“I built this in an hour with AI.”

You’ve probably seen posts like that all over LinkedIn by now.

Build an app in a weekend.
Launch a SaaS in a day.
Replace developers.
Replace designers.
Replace agencies.
Replace everyone.

And honestly?

Some of it is genuinely impressive.

That’s the important thing people on both sides keep missing.

The AI hype crowd pretend it can already replace entire teams.

The anti-AI crowd pretend it’s all useless garbage.

Neither is true.

Somewhere in the middle is the reality.

And that reality is where things start getting interesting.

So What Actually Is “Vibe Coding”?

Vibe coding is basically directing software into existence using AI.

You describe what you want.
AI builds it.
You refine it.
AI changes it.
You tweak it again.
AI adjusts it again.

Repeat that cycle enough times and eventually something usable starts appearing.

At times, it genuinely feels almost magical.

You can move incredibly quickly.

Faster than anything I’ve seen in nearly 30 years of building websites and applications.

That’s why people are excited.

And rightly so.

Used Properly, It’s Incredible

Let’s get this bit out of the way early.

AI is not going away.

And used properly as a tool, it’s phenomenal.

Need a quick prototype?
Excellent.

Need repetitive coding tasks speeding up?
Excellent.

Need help debugging?
Often excellent.

Need momentum?
Amazing.

That’s the word I keep coming back to with AI.

Momentum.

Because one of the hardest parts of development has always been the speed between idea and execution.

AI massively reduces that gap.

That’s a huge shift.

Possibly one of the biggest shifts our industry has seen in years.

But Here’s The Dangerous Part Nobody Is Talking About Enough

AI can produce something that looks finished long before it’s actually stable.

That’s the real issue.

Because humans are visual creatures.

If something looks polished on the surface, most people assume it’s working properly underneath.

But with vibe coding, that assumption can become dangerous very quickly.

Especially for non-technical users.

Because underneath that polished UI, there can quietly be:

broken logic
security flaws
conflicting scripts
bloated code
poor structure
unstable integrations
database problems
performance issues

And many people won’t even realise they exist.

Not until something breaks.

The Weirdest Part? AI Often Feels Like It Has No Common Sense.

This is probably the hardest thing to explain unless you’ve spent serious time building with it.

AI can write surprisingly complex code.

And then immediately make a completely ridiculous decision five minutes later.

It reminds me of people I’ve met over the years who were academically brilliant but had absolutely no real-world practical common sense.

That’s often what vibe coding feels like right now.

You can ask AI to fix one issue.

It fixes it brilliantly.

Then quietly introduces three new problems somewhere else.

And unless you know exactly what you’re looking at, you may never spot those issues until later.

This Is Why Experience Still Matters Massively

I think this is the part many people are underestimating.

The better you already are before using AI, the better your results with AI tend to be.

Because AI still needs direction.

It still needs oversight.

It still needs judgement.

It still needs somebody capable of spotting when things are drifting off course.

That’s why I don’t currently see AI replacing experienced developers.

I see experienced developers using AI as leverage.

That’s very different.

And This Is Where I Think The Real Problems Are Going To Start

Right now, millions of people are starting to build websites, apps and systems using AI tools without fully understanding what’s happening underneath.

And honestly, I completely understand why.

The speed is addictive.

The momentum is addictive.

The feeling of creating something quickly is addictive.

But over the next few years, I think we’re going to start seeing the consequences of that.

Websites becoming unstable.
Broken integrations.
Bloated systems.
Security issues.
Poor performance.
Maintenance nightmares.

Not because AI is “bad”.

But because people mistake speed for quality.

And they mistake “working today” for “built properly”.

So Is Vibe Coding Good Or Bad?

Honestly?

I think that’s the wrong question.

Vibe coding is a tool.

Like any powerful tool, used correctly it can be incredible.

Used carelessly, it can create enormous problems.

That’s the reality.

And I think we’re still extremely early in understanding where those lines really are.

My Honest Take Right Now

I think vibe coding is real.

I think it’s going to massively change the industry.

I think it will speed up development enormously.

I think it will create huge opportunities.

But I also think there’s a massive difference between:

something looking finished
and something being properly built.

That distinction is going to matter more and more over the next few years.

Especially once businesses start depending on AI-generated systems they don’t fully understand underneath.

That’s the part I’m watching most closely right now.