IDE, CLI, vibe coding tool, …how to decide?

There’s no “best” option.

There’s the best option for this project, today, with your level of experience.

The 3 buckets

Let’s put names on the things we’re comparing:

• Vibe coding tools: Bolt, Lovable, v0, Replit, and similar. You describe what you want, and they scaffold a lot for you.
• IDE + AI: Cursor, VS Code + Copilot, Antigravity, etc. You’re still in a real codebase, but you get an AI pair programmer.
• CLI coding agents: Claude Code and friends. You work in a terminal, and the agent edits files, runs commands, and iterates.

Each one fits a different situation.

If you’re new to coding: pick a vibe tool

If you’re learning, the biggest enemy is friction.

Install Node, configure TypeScript, fight a bundler, set up auth, deploy to production… that’s a lot when your real goal is “make a thing”.

A vibe coding tool removes most of that.

You can focus on:

• what the app should do
• what screens it needs
• what data it stores
• what the happy path looks like

And you get something running fast, which is the best motivation you can get when you’re starting.

My advice: don’t overthink code quality at the beginning, ship the smallest useful thing, and only later learn how it’s built. When that moment comes, start with the fundamentals still worth learning.

Great use cases for vibe tools

• Landing pages
• Small CRUD apps
• Internal dashboards
• “I want to see if this idea is worth 2 weeks of my life”

The main tradeoff

You’re outsourcing a lot of decisions, so you’ll sometimes hit a wall when you need to do something “weird” or highly specific.

When that happens, it means you’re outgrowing this tool for this project.

If you’re a programmer but you’re feeling lazy: also pick a vibe tool

Yes, really.

Sometimes you know exactly how to do the thing, but you don’t want to spend Saturday wiring forms, validation, routing, database migrations, UI components, and deployment.

That’s where vibe tools are fun.

You can treat them like a scaffolding generator on steroids.

You still review what comes out, you still apply taste, but you start from 70% instead of 0%.

If you want more control: go IDE + AI

An IDE is where you go when you want to be in charge.

You want:

• to understand the architecture
• to refactor
• to set conventions
• to write tests
• to keep the code maintainable

That’s hard to do if you don’t work in the codebase yourself.

With Cursor (or VS Code + Copilot), you keep the full power of:

• your editor
• your git workflow
• your project structure
• your linters, formatters, tests

And you still get help with the boring parts.

This is my default choice when…

• the project is not a throwaway
• I expect to maintain it for months
• I care about code quality
• I’m integrating with a real production system
• I’m debugging something gnarly

The tradeoff

You have to set things up.

Even if you use templates, you’ll still deal with dependencies, local dev, build scripts, environment variables, deployment, and all the usual “real app” stuff.

If the project is not visual: use a CLI tool

If you’re building something that’s mostly:

• backend code
• scripts
• CLIs
• data processing
• refactors across a repo
• “please update 25 files consistently and run the tests”

That’s where a CLI coding agent like Claude Code works best.

You can stay in the terminal, keep tight loops, and let the agent do the mechanical work.

Example: you can say “rename this function across the codebase, update the tests, run them, and fix what breaks”, and it can iterate without you copy-pasting files into a chat.

The tradeoff

CLI agents are powerful, but they assume you already have a dev environment and you’re comfortable with the terminal.

If you’re new to coding, that’s an extra cognitive load you don’t need yet.

A simple decision tree

Here’s the quick version:

1. New to coding? Start with a vibe tool.
2. You want to ship a UI-heavy prototype fast? Vibe tool.
3. You want long-term maintainability and control? IDE + AI.
4. You’re working in an existing repo and doing non-visual work? CLI agent.

And yes, you’ll switch tools all the time. That’s normal.

The “real” skill: switching tools without guilt

A lot of people get stuck because they think choosing a tool is a commitment.

It’s not.

Pick the tool that gets you moving now, then switch when the constraints change.

• Start in a vibe tool to explore the product.
• Move to an IDE when you need structure and ownership.
• Use a CLI agent when the work becomes repetitive and repo-wide.

That’s a solid workflow, and it’s one I keep coming back to.

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