That idea has a name: vibe coding. The principle is simple: you describe in plain language what you want to make, an AI tool generates the code, and you adjust it until it does what you mean – iterating until it’s right. Tech entrepreneur and podcast maker Alexander Klöpping (known from Blendle) gave a nice concrete example: he built a calculator app for his daughter in five minutes. His summary was as dry as it was recognizable: "I type what I want, the AI puts it together." Where you used to have to learn code for months – or immediately hire a developer – you can now have a working prototype in minutes. The new feeling lies in that leap: from "I have an idea" to "it works", without the classic intermediate steps.
From prompt to prototype: you focus on results, the AI handles the first code version.
Vibe coding in 30 seconds
- Step 1: you describe what you want (function + who uses it).
- Step 2: the AI creates a first version; you test and say what needs to be improved.
- Step 3: you repeat that a few times until it’s "good enough" – only then do you think about scaling up.
Why this works: you don’t need to "know code" first, you mainly need to be good at explaining what you mean.
If you want to go from 'it works' to 'it delivers something', then AI for businesses: this is how you create real value helps to sharpen that step.
Where does the term vibe coding come from?
The term itself has only recently come into circulation. In early 2025, Andrej Karpathy, former AI director at Tesla and co-founder of OpenAI (the company behind ChatGPT), introduced 'vibe coding' as a way of building software by mainly talking to AI instead of writing lines of code yourself. His message was sober and appealing: you focus on the result, and let the tool handle the technical translation – "you give in to the vibes".
The fact that it is taking off so strongly in the Netherlands can also be seen in the numbers. An analysis by Vibe Coding Academy based on search behavior and usage statistics of AI programming tools over 2025 shows that interest here is 35% higher than in Germany and almost twice as high as in France. The same analysis also shows a notable spike starting from Christmas Day.
This timing is not very mysterious, says Albert Barth, founder of Vibe Coding Academy: around Christmas, people finally have space to experiment – no full agendas, no meeting blocks, but time to try something "for fun". And when you then notice that with one prompt you already get something that works, it goes quickly: a bit of tinkering soon becomes "one more improvement", and before you know it, you have something you can actually use tomorrow.
A bit of tinkering becomes iterating with vibe coding: one prompt, one test, one improvement.
Anyone can get started with vibe coding, from real estate agents to students
You can also see this with people who have no technical background but do have concrete irritations and ideas. Take Faisal Manzoor, who runs a real estate agency in Utrecht: he is not a programmer, but he does have a list of things for which he would normally hire a developer – such as a tool to compare properties or a simple system to log and find customer conversations. Since he started using vibe coding, he builds those kinds of tools himself. Not because he has suddenly become a developer – but because the bottleneck has shifted from "being able to code" to "being able to explain what you want".
What people are now building immediately (without a tech background)
- Internal tools: simple logs, checklists, intake forms.
- Comparators/calculators: price comparators, calculation helpers, quotes.
- Content + workflow: automatic summarizers, email helpers, mini-CRMs.
Entrepreneur and 'indie maker' Pieter Levels (known from Nomad List) also immediately set the pace: he shared how he put together a game in ten minutes and put the result online. And it’s not just solo makers. Students at TU Delft built a complete data visualization tool in a week – not by typing lines of code themselves, but by describing more precisely what they wanted to see. It fits into a pattern that you see more and more often: posts with "I built something" that used to mainly come from developer circles, but now pop up everywhere.
The majority of vibe coders have no technical background
There’s also a bigger story behind this: two out of three users of popular vibe coding platforms turn out to have no technical background. They are entrepreneurs, designers, and freelancers who never wrote code before but want to solve problems – from small tools to first prototypes. As a result, programming is slowly shifting from a profession that you have to learn for years to a skill that you can apply in practice: clear formulation, testing, adjusting.
This has an interesting consequence: vibe coding can help to close the digital skills gap, because you are no longer dependent on years of training or immediate developer capacity for a first prototype.
Why the Netherlands is relatively ahead with vibe coding
Why is the Netherlands relatively ahead? Barth sees in his training sessions that mainly no classic developers are coming in. "They are entrepreneurs with an idea. Marketers who want to build a prototype. Teachers who want to create teaching materials. People who always thought: I can’t program." In the podcast AI Report, software developer Wietse Hage sharply explains that difference: you get two groups. Programmers get "a kind of superman suit" through AI, while non-techies suddenly gain access to something that was previously closed off – a democratization of software. And yes, Dutch people are often just pragmatic: if it works, we use it.
Not without risks
However, a reality check is also needed, without immediately acting as if it’s all dangerous. On LinkedIn, Stephan Janssen, innovation specialist at the Dutch police, warned that vibe coding only works well if you actively read the code that the AI spits out. But even then, it remains a gamble whether it saves you time or actually creates extra work, making it ultimately cost more time and effort. Barth acknowledges this: at first, he encountered security vulnerabilities and received code that did not do what he thought. That’s exactly why he emphasizes recognizing pitfalls – and the moment when you do need a developer: when security and privacy are significant, when you work with sensitive data, when you need to scale something up, or when maintenance and reliability become more important than "quickly getting something working".
The future of vibe coding
And in the meantime, it just keeps going. The tools are getting better every few months, lowering the threshold further and making "just trying" increasingly faster "building something". Barth optimistically summarizes: the time when making software was only reserved for people with years of coding experience is over. But the new reality is just as clear: anyone can build – smart building remains a skill.
Anyone can build – using smartly requires three checks.
3 checks before you use something 'for real'
- What data goes in? Customer, HR, and contract data: extra cautious (especially with cyber threats).
- Who maintains this? Is it still understandable and adjustable in two weeks?
- Where can abuse/leaks occur? Think of logins, forms, and connections with other systems.
