The Web Coding Reality Check: What Works, What Breaks, What to Build Next

TL;DR

AI “vibe coding” tools can spit out clickable toys fast. Real products still collapse at integrations, auth, roles, data modeling, and multi-API orchestration. If you’re building a “Shopify for software,” you’re walking into a buzzsaw of incumbents, converging platforms, and user confusion. Win by: ruthless speed-to-value (10 seconds), guided education for non-technical users, output-first prompting, tool-agnostic integrations via system-prompted “tool files,” voice inputs, instant context ingestion, a sharp landing page with a 30–60s product demo, and a brutal MVP + waitlist + 15-minute feedback loop. AB test everything.

1) The State of Vibe Coding (2025)

• Fast toy generation: One prompt → a “working” prototype. Great demo value, weak durability.
• Where it breaks: Real products need auth, roles, onboarding complexity, 3–5+ third-party APIs, CI/CD, analytics, and reliable data models. That’s where most “apps” turn into toys.
• Platforms racing to full-stack: Lovable, Bolt, Base 44 and others now ship/chat UIs, growing native backends, and opinionated flows. Supabase, Firebase, Convex, etc. are converging on “batteries included.”
• Switching costs are near zero: Connect GitHub, jump platforms weekly, farm free credits, move on. Vendor lock is dead.

2) Personas and the Education Gap

• Two worlds:
• Non-technical builders: need conceptual scaffolding (what is front end/back end, schemas, env vars, webhooks, auth flows).
• Technical PMs/designers/devs: can validate AI output; require control, diffing, and clear reasoning logs.
• Job to be done: Lift non-technical users up to a minimal engineering literacy while not slowing down pros.

Principles

• Show AI’s reasoning and changes, not just code.
• Embed micro-explanations inline. Users who read them learn faster; others can skip.
• Add a skill-level selector up front to choose the instructional intensity.

3) Prompting That Actually Works

• Shift from drag-and-drop to language. Users must learn to describe intent precisely. Most don’t.
• Solution stack:
• Prebuilt prompt templates and “completion scaffolds” per task.
• Output-first responses: in the first reply, show a useful draft, not more questions.
• Tight system prompts that explain decisions, constraints, and next actions.
• 3-turn understanding cap: by turn 3, AI should have enough context to ship an output.

80/20 rule for UX

• User supplies ~20% seed context.
• AI returns ~80% structured output instantly (draft schema, routes, components, integration stubs, checklists).

4) Integration Strategy: Tool-Agnostic or Bust

• Do not hard-lock to one provider (e.g., “Stripe or nothing”). Agnosticism is the point of AI coding; no-code’s “boxed stacks” are exactly what AI is replacing.
• How teams are shipping today: an LLM plus per-tool system-prompt files (“tool files”) that teach setup steps and best practices for each integration (payments, maps, auth, analytics). This avoids months-long BD and still “feels native.”
• Per-use-case routers: e.g., user asks for maps → router picks Mapbox recipe; payments → present viable options, not a single default.

Near-term trend

• MCPs and open connectors from tools like Figma, Stripe, etc. will standardize AI-to-tool handshakes. Plan for plug-and-play.

5) “Shopify for Software”: Reality Check

• Everyone is claiming it. Supabase, Convex, Firebase and vibe-coding platforms are already bundling auth, payments, analytics, and admin consoles.
• If you pre-decide the stack, you limit use cases and lose the AI advantage.
• Your edge isn’t “bundled primitives.” Your edge is:
• Faster value delivery (seconds, not minutes).
• Superior guided flows for non-technical users.
• Clean, resilient integration recipes and recovery from failure.
• Observability: explain what changed and why, with one-click replays.

6) Product UX: Speed to Value in 10 Seconds

• Golden window: users decide in ~10 seconds if your product is “real.”
• First screen must:
• Ask for goal in one line.
• Offer three click-paths (Launch new, Extend existing, Grow).
• Show a ready-to-edit prompt scaffold in the text box.
• Provide “Upload context” affordance (files/links) before the first run.

Video over paragraphs

• Ship a 30–60s product demo above the fold showing: goal → inputs → generated app → live preview → Stripe/auth/analytics connected.

7) Conversational Flow That Doesn’t Waste Time

• Start with:
• “What are you building?” (single line)
• “Who is it for?” (persona picker)
• “Do you have materials?” (upload PDFs, notes, screenshots, ERDs, CSVs)
• “Skill level?” (non-technical vs technical)
• On send, return:
• Skeleton app + routes + schema + basic auth wired.
• If payments requested, present options and generate the chosen integration scaffold.
• Inline explainer on what was generated and what’s missing.

Always return something useful on turn 1. Follow-ups refine, not stall.

8) Voice Input Is Not Optional

• Most prompts are trending to voice. Add Whisper-class capture and command grammar immediately.
• Voice increases throughput for ideation, naming, and quick edits; pair with live transcript and “convert to structured spec” button.

9) Context Ingestion Before Building

• Provide a “Context Vault” per project:
• Folders for specs, market notes, API docs, brand kit, CSVs.
• One-click “memorize” that the model uses as ground truth for generation.
• When users arrive, first ask: “Do you want to load existing materials?” You save 5 prompts of tedious back-and-forth.

10) Stable System Prompts, Rapidly

• LLMs change weekly. Expect to update your system prompts often.
• Keep tool files small, testable, and versioned.
• Bake in error-recovery patterns: detect integration failure, propose a known-good alternate path automatically.

11) Growth vs Launch: Stop Mixing

• “Launch & grow” confuses users. If you promise growth features, users arrive with an existing product and expect campaigns, pricing tests, analytics loops.
• Split flows:
• Launch: scaffold product, auth, payments, onboarding.
• Grow: connect PostHog/GA4, pricing pages, referral loops, email sequences, paywalls, A/B.

12) Landing Page That Doesn’t Lie

• Above the fold: single promise + demo video + CTA.
• Kill vague fluff and logo salad. Your previous explanation in two sentences beat the entire page.
• If you’re “business in a box,” show the box: auth, roles, checkout, customer admin, analytics, and the toggle that swaps providers.

13) Validation, Distribution, and Feedback

• Ship an MVP immediately. Don’t drown in interviews.
• Waitlist with FOMO: capture emails; show queue rank; allow invite-to-move-up.
• Onboarding loop: give early users access codes on 15-minute calls where you watch them use it live. In exchange, give a month free.
• Partnership wedge: become a one-click button inside Lovable/Bolt/Base 44 rather than competing head-on. Distribution beats purity.
• AB test relentlessly: hero copy, first-run flow, provider defaults, video vs GIF, CTA labels.

14) Ecosystem Notes You Must Account For

• Platforms are adding native pieces fast: e.g., analytics integrations (PostHog), deeper Stripe work, native backends.
• Stripe-style BD takes months; tool files ship today.
• Per-use-case defaults are fine (e.g., Mapbox for maps) if they stay overridable.

15) Risks to Plan Around

• Platform steamroll: vibe tools can absorb your value prop quickly.
• User churn: if value isn’t visible in 10 seconds, they bounce to one of ~189 alternatives.
• Over-generalization: trying to “serve everyone” leads to mush. Pick a wedge: persona + use case + integrations you nail.
• Expectation mismatch: promising “growth” and delivering “scaffold” kills trust.

16) Minimum Viable Roadmap (do this, not a novel)

1. Hero experience
• Text box with scaffold + three quick-actions (Launch, Extend, Grow)
• Upload context before first run
• Voice input
2. Turn-1 output
• App skeleton, auth, roles, routes, data schema
• Optional: payments and analytics selector → generate integration stubs
• Inline “what I built” explainer + next suggested actions
3. Tool files
• Stripe, Lemon Squeezy, Mapbox, PostHog, Clerk/Auth, email provider, file storage
• Per-use-case router with overridable defaults
4. Education layer
• Skill-level toggle
• Inline expandable explanations
5. Observability
• Diff view of applied changes
• “Rebuild with variant” and “Rollback” buttons
6. Distribution
• Waitlist with rank and invite climb
• 15-minute live onboarding sessions for the first 100 users
• Lightweight partner embed for major vibe tools
7. Measurement
• Time-to-first-output
• % Turn-1 success
• Completion of payments/auth scaffolds
• First session retention (Day 0), Day 1 return
• Conversion from waitlist to active

17) One-Screen Messaging (example to steal)

• Headline: “Ship a working app in 10 seconds.”
• Subhead: “Auth, roles, checkout, analytics. Your stack, not ours. Upload your context, pick providers, get code and a live preview.”
• CTA: “Generate my app”
• Secondary: “I have a product. Help me grow.”

18) Non-Negotiables

• Output on the first reply.
• Voice input.
• Context ingestion before generation.
• Tool-agnostic integrations via maintainable system prompts.
• 30–60s demo video above the fold.
• MVP now; interviews continue in parallel, not instead.

Deliver this and you’re not “another Shopify for software.” You’re the fastest path from idea to real, integrated product that non-technical users can understand and technical users can trust.