Vibe coding with Claude: Use AI to Build Apps from Scratch in Days

You can build an entire app without coding expertise.

Don’t believe it?

Just ask computer scientist Andrej Kaparthy, who said in 2023:

"The hottest new programming language is English."

With basic knowledge and help from AI, you can “vibe code” your way to creating functioning apps.

Even expert coders are jumping on the band wagon, because it’s a fast, fun, way to test new ideas.

In this article, we’ll explain what vibe coding means and how you can use AI tools like Claude Code to bring ideas to life in days instead of months.

What is vibe coding?

Vibe coding is a relaxed, AI-assisted coding style.

You work with an LLM, giving instructions and letting AI generate the code. Instead of worrying about perfecting the syntax and structure, you take on a supervisory role of guiding, reviewing, and refining.

Vibe coders:

• Work with an AI-assisted coding platform like Claude Code

• Give high-level goals and feedback to the AI assistant

• Accept AI-generated completions liberally

• Focus on building momentum and getting something workable, not trying to perfect the details

Above all, you talk to the machines in natural language rather than manually typing out lines of code.

Karpathy claims it’s all about:

"Fully giving in to the vibes, embracing exponentials, and forgetting that the code even exists."

Who can vibe code?

Pretty much anyone.

As long as you have some basic knowledge of how apps work and know how to prompt AI tools, you can vibe code all day, all night.

Complete beginners learn on the go

Vibe coding allows total beginners to start producing software without the extensive training and skills required for software engineering.

It’s a practical way for newbies to learn coding.

You let AI generate code, and ask it to explain what everything means. Tools like Claude and ChatGPT are great tutors, so you can ask it to explain specific lines and learn as you build.

Entrepreneurs create prototypes

If you’re an entrepreneur with big ideas and limited technical expertise, you can prototype ideas and test for product market fit, without investing heavily in engineering.

Vibe coding is ideal for spinning up an MVP or just trying out new ideas.

After building a basic tool with the help of AI, you can test whether there’s enough demand for a fully developed product, at which point you can enlist engineers to develop on what you’ve already built.

Experienced coders iterate faster

Even advanced coders can benefit from vibe coding.

By collaborating with AI, they can handle the boring setup work, like writing repetitive, standard code—known as boilerplate—much faster.

This allows them to spend more time exploring new frameworks, testing ideas, and building smarter.

With a tool like Claude Code, developers can focus on architecture and decision-making.

How to vibe code with Claude Code

Claude Code is Anthropic’s agentic coding tool that runs in your terminal. It turns natural language instructions into functional code—reading, writing, editing, and even executing across your project.

1. Install Claude Code

2. Navigate to your project

3. Launch Claude in your terminal

4. Describe what you want

5. Review and approve changes

6. Test and iterate

7. Clean your context window

Key Features:

• Runs in your terminal — The terminal is the text-based interface where you type commands to control your computer. You can activate Claude Code in the terminal with no extra interface needed.

• Multistep execution — ****It plans and executes across files, not just one-liners.

• Real project awareness — Understands your codebase structure and dependencies.

• Action-ready — It doesn’t just suggest code, it edits files, runs commands, creates commits, and more.

When vibe coding with Claude, you can choose between planning mode or normal execution mode.

Planning mode is incredible, as it creates detailed, robust plans and you can check everything it’s going to do before giving your approval to go ahead.

Since Claude Code runs in your terminal with access to your full computer, it can handle more than just vibe coding: it can perform practical tasks like cleaning up your files and folders.

Step-by-step: How to get started with Claude Code

Claude Code can be a pair programmer, debugger, planner, and documentation assistant rolled into one.

Here’s how to get started, step by step:

1. Install Claude Code

Open your terminal in your computer, and install Claude Code by pasting the following command:

npm install -g @anthropic-ai/claude-code

Claude Code is distributed via npm. You’ll need to install Node.js 18 (or later) a program that lets you run JavaScript tools on your computer.

2. Navigate to your project

Move into the root folder of your project:

If you’ve already created a project (like a website or app), it will be in a folder somewhere on your computer — maybe on your Desktop, in your Documents, or wherever you saved it. You can drag that folder into the terminal window to automatically fill in the correct path.

If you don’t have a project yet, you can create a new folder and use that.

cd your-project-name

3. Launch Claude in your terminal

Simply run:

claude

Claude will start analyzing your codebase and open a conversational shell where you can start giving instructions.

The commands for steps 1-3

4. Describe what you want

You can use natural language to describe your goal:

add a REST endpoint to handle user registration and send a welcome email

Claude will read the necessary files, create new ones if needed, and explain what it’s doing as it goes.

5. Review and approve changes

If you’re in planning mode, Claude will show you diffs (what it’s adding, removing, or changing) of the code it plans to write or update before executing.

You can:

• Accept all changes

• Accept or reject individual files

• Edit the suggestions manually before they’re written

6. Test and iterate

Claude can also help you write or run tests. You can ask it to:

add unit tests for the registration endpoint

Then:

run the tests

6. Clean your context window

Claude does have a context window, and on the bottom right of your screen it will tell you when the context window is starting to fill up. When this happens, you can choose to Compact, which will summarize everything its done so far. Keep the compacted summary so you can clean up the context window.

I recommend compacting after creating major features, and make sure to update the claude.md file it creates this file in the beginning to track everything.

If you keep updating and referring to this file, Claude will stick to your goal and path better.

Pro tip: Add a CLAUDE.md file to your repo to help Claude onboard quickly with project-specific instructions or context.

For more detailed instructions, refer to the Claude Code overview and Quickstart Guide.

Sample use cases:

1. Internal FAQ bot for your team

“Build a simple app where my team can ask questions about our company processes, and it answers using content from our Notion wiki.”

Claude Code can help generate the code for a basic chatbot app that pulls from your internal documentation so you stop answering the same questions repeatedly.

2. Client onboarding tracker

“Create an app that lets me track where each new client is in our onboarding process and sends them automated emails at each step.”

Instead of juggling spreadsheets and email templates, you get a lightweight app that keeps everything moving, with updates and reminders built in.

3. Feedback collector for early users

“Build a web app where early users can leave feedback on our product, and I can tag and group it by feature or priority.”

Claude can help you spin up a minimal app that gives structure to your user feedback, before you invest in a full customer support tool.

Other AI coding tools to vibe (code) with

Claude Code is fantastic, but it's not the only option. Here are other tools that support the vibe coding style:

• Codex — Great for small scripts, code explanations, and iteration.

• GitHub Copilot — Code faster with fewer errors, now even more powerful with agent mode.

• Base 44 — Perfect for developers who want high quality backend logic and integration-heavy apps.

• Replit — In-browser coding + AI assistant for building and deploying fast.

• Lovable — With a beautiful frontend, Lovable is super easy for complete beginners, and helps you build polished products.

These tools all support different aspects of the vibe coding workflow from ideation to implementation.

Safety and code quality concerns

Vibe coding is empowering and fun. But, there are some risks to watch out for, especially when you’re doing it in a professional environment.

Vibe coding safety concerns:

• Security vulnerabilities — AI-generated code might contain subtle bugs or insecure implementations that go unnoticed.

• Lack of understanding — Developers may use code they don't fully comprehend, making debugging and maintenance more difficult later on.

• Accountability — When AI writes large chunks of code, it can be harder to trace the origin of an issue or make improvements later.

Andrej Karpathy originally positioned vibe coding as ideal for rapid prototyping or weekend projects, not necessarily for production systems.

In a 2025 Ars Technia article, Programmer Simon Willison noted that while vibe coding is a fun way to try out ideas, there are limits to how far it should go.

"Vibe coding your way to a production codebase is clearly risky. Most of the work we do as software engineers involves evolving existing systems, where the quality and understandability of the underlying code is crucial."

The takeaway?

Vibe responsibly. If you aren’t an experienced coder, get a professional (human!) engineer to review, test, and quality control before you ship a finished product to the market.

Ultimately, as always with AI, we humans are responsible for ensuring the final result is up to scratch. AI is a competent coding partner, but our judgement is needed to guarantee quality.

Why you should try vibe coding today

Vibe coding will play a major role in building the tools of tomorrow.

If you give a go today, you can:

• Turn an idea into a prototype in a single day

• Learn coding concepts faster by doing

• Stop obsessing about syntax and start building real things

The best part? You don’t need to go it alone.

AI Operator offers a hands-on training program to help teams and individuals learn to work with AI tools like Claude effectively.

Want your team to get on the vibe coding train?

Our 12-week AI-First Mindset Training will transform how your organization builds and innovates with AI. We customize the course to include whatever AI skills your team members need to master - including vibe coding.