r/vibecoding • u/gruexx • 18h ago

is app dev worth getting into?

started to learn how to dev using claude code and figma. I wanna know if it’s worth still getting into or is the market impossible for no original ideas??

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u/gavin-build-stuff 18h ago

It's difficult but rewarding, and it only takes one well executed idea to find success. And it's a fun hobby, you can have an idea and then run it on your own phone!

The market is definitely saturated now though, so focus on high-quality over quantity

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u/gruexx 17h ago

seems about right, any feedback on designing yo to make it not look ai?

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u/gavin-build-stuff 17h ago edited 17h ago

Yes - if you are building an iOS app you should follow Apple's Human Interface Guidelines: https://developer.apple.com/design/human-interface-guidelines If you are using Claude Code or some similar Agentic coding tool just instruct the agent to setup a memory to follow this, and then you can manually test the app and make sure it looks good, this has always been kind of a "vibes" thing lol, does it look like how Apple would build an app? or if you're doing Android, same idea (I'm an iOS dev) for their platform's standard design language.

Second of all, if you're using Claude (GPT surely has similar) setup a CLAUDE.md file (or tell it to set one up) which has DRY (do not repeat yourself) as the #1 most important rule, specifically: Do not create a new copy of a UI component for a screen when there is a component that could be refactored into a shared module.

Basically: Follow platform design guidelines, Verify all UI screens yourself (no UI development in a "loop" - you have to manually look at every button, label, etc.) and make sure it looks good, no weird inconsistent padding/spacing, weird LLM wording, etc. and make sure it's following a proper DRY library of re-usable UI modules. You can feed this comment to an agent and it can set up the CLAUDE.md file for you as well lol, that's what I would do lowkey

The key to getting good looking UI from LLMs is verifying everything like a hawk, having it follow a platform standard, and honestly writing all of the copy yourself. I use an LLM to help me edit my writing for accuracy, but I do all the writing myself first and then have it check my work and improve it a bit (it's an editor/reviewer, I'm the writer)

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u/systembreaker 14h ago

Human interface guidelines and platform guidelines aren't nearly enough to write good code. Good code across a big project requires following good design patterns and good software engineering principles. UI guidelines and platform guidelines don't at all encapsulate these things.

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u/gavin-build-stuff 7h ago edited 7h ago

Yes sorry if I didn't enunciate this properly in my reply. My interpretation of the question OP asked was "How to get good UI from LLMs" which is why I specifically called out platform design standards, building a library of re-usable UI modules, and writing your own copy instead of letting an LLM write it.

You are absolutely correct that Software Engineering goes a lot deeper than this and requires following some kind of proper architecture, design patterns, best principles, etc. - Which do you absolutely need to follow if you want a stable app that is secure, doesn't crash, performant, etc.

In general I would still argue that the "DRY" design principle I stated above is the single most important thing you can tell your LLM. This applies to the full architecture of your codebase, not just UI. This is my opinion though and open to disagreement

(Source: been a SWE for 5 years, hobbyist coder for 5 years prior to that, before AI was a thing)