Andrej is an extremely talented and experienced programmer—he has no need for AI assistance at all. He’s using LLMs like this because it’s fun to try out wild new ideas, and the speed at which an LLM can produce code is an order of magnitude faster than even the most skilled human programmers. For low stakes projects and prototypes why not just let it rip? When I talk about vibe coding I mean building software with an LLM without reviewing the code it writes.

If an LLM wrote the code for you, and you then reviewed it, tested it thoroughly and made sure you could explain how it works to someone else that’s not vibe coding, it’s software development. The usage of an LLM to support that activity is immaterial.

The job of a software developer is not (just) to churn out code and features. We need to create code that demonstrably works, and can be understood by other humans (and machines), and that will support continued development in the future. We need to consider performance, accessibility, security, maintainability, cost efficiency. Software engineering is all about trade-offs—our job is to pick from dozens of potential solutions by balancing all manner of requirements, both explicit and implied.

I think vibe coding is the best tool we have to help experienced developers build that intuition as to what LLMs can and cannot do for them. I’ve published more than 80 experiments I built with vibe coding and I’ve learned so much along the way. I would encourage any other developer, no matter their skill level, to try the same.

As many have pointed out , not all code written with AI assistance is vibe code. Per the original definition , it’s code written in contexts where you “forget that the code even exists.” Or as the fairly fleshed-out Wikipedia article puts it: ”A key part of the definition of vibe coding is that the user accepts code without full understanding.”

Our AI minions are also exceptional tools for learning when you move too far towards the high-vibes-low-understanding end of the spectrum. I particularly like getting Claude to write me targeted exercises to practice new concepts when I get lost in generated functions or fail to implement something correctly sans-AI. Even though doubling-down up on engineering skills sometimes feels like learning to operate a textile loom in 1820.