Vibe Design: It's not just Vibe Coding Anymore
As vibe coding goes mainstream, vibe design is emerging. UX’s role - less control, more about curating what feels right.
A few weeks ago, I sat in on a working session with one of our engineering teams. We weren’t looking at mocks or debating edge cases—we were watching someone describe a feature into an AI tool and watching the UI generate itself.
“I just vibe-coded that,” the engineer said casually. Another chimed in about skipping Figma altogether and prompting straight into a working prototype. I remember blinking and thinking—Wait, are we doing that now?
I’ve spent the better part of my career working on developer tools, designing systems, and mentoring teams through complexity. I’ve seen a lot of trends. But this? This felt like a shift. Fast. Fluid. A little chaotic. And undeniably full of possibility.
That moment stuck with me—not because I was surprised, but because I recognized something familiar. That early-stage buzz when something is just starting to crack open.
The vibe was real. But so were the questions.
So, what is vibe coding and vibe designing?
Right now, “vibe coding” and “vibe designing” are buzzy terms, the kind you see flying around X threads, Slack chats, and internal demos with a kind of confident shrug. “Don’t worry, I just vibe-coded it.” “Let’s vibe-design a couple options before we commit.”
They sound casual—but they point to something real.
Vibe coding is when developers use AI tools to build by intuition. Instead of writing everything from scratch, they describe what they want—“a responsive card layout with hover states and a subtle entrance animation”—and the AI gets them a first draft. It’s messy. It’s fast. It’s surprisingly workable. Tools like VO by Vercel, UX Pilot, and Magic Patterns are making this kind of rapid prototyping feel less like magic and more like Monday.
Vibe designing works the same way. Instead of laboring over wireframes, designers prompt AI with emotional tone, use cases, or even brand language—and let the machine sketch first. “An elegant, joyful onboarding flow for a journaling app.” Boom, there’s a direction. Then the designer reacts, refines, redirects.
It’s not about perfect output—it’s about fast alignment. Not building the thing, but shaping the vibe.
Why this matters for design
For years, we’ve been taught to prove our worth through polish. Pixel-perfect UIs. High-fidelity mockups. Precise, logical flows. But in this new landscape, speed and feel are the superpowers. AI gets you to “good enough” in seconds. What it can’t give you—yet—is taste.
And that’s where we come in.
Our role is shifting. It’s less about crafting every screen by hand. More about sensing when something feels off. It’s about understanding tone. Knowing what feels trustworthy, what feels exciting, what feels… wrong.
Designers who cling to old deliverables will start to feel left behind. But those who can guide a team toward a strong, clear emotional direction? They’re not going anywhere.
A trend worth trying—but not the whole story
Here’s my honest take: vibe coding and vibe designing are exciting. They’re fast, weird, creatively energizing. If you haven’t played with tools like Subframe or UX Pilot, go do it. Not because they’re perfect—but because they’ll expand your sense of what’s possible.
But I also think this is exactly that moment in the hype cycle where we need to keep our heads. Just like other AI trends we’ve seen over the last year, some of these workflows will stick—and some will fade.
Whether vibe work becomes the new normal or just a blip depends entirely on us.
On how we use these tools, where we set the bar, and what we’re actually trying to make.
Taste is your job now
If the output is getting easier to generate, then the value shifts to knowing what’s worth keeping.
That’s why developing your taste is the most important thing you can do right now. Feed your instincts. Get out of the design tools and into the world. Go see art. Listen to music. Wander through cities. Notice how lighting changes a space, how rhythm shapes emotion, how good design makes you feel something before you even realize it’s there.
Because here’s the thing: the AI can make it functional. You make it feel right.
What this means for our teams
The shift to vibe-led design and development isn’t just changing how we work—it’s reshaping how we work together.
Engineers are prototyping faster than ever. PMs are experimenting with AI to visualize flows on their own. And suddenly, the walls around who “owns” the product experience are softer. Blurry, even.
That’s not a threat. It’s an opportunity. Try the darn tools already!
When anyone can generate a UI, the value of design isn’t in the tool—it’s in the taste. In the judgment. In the ability to guide, refine, and rally a team around what makes sense and feels right.
This means our role as designers is expanding, not shrinking. We’re becoming creative directors, editors, vibe-checkers. We’re helping our cross-functional partners move faster—but with more intention. We're not handing off a solution—we're shaping the energy of a product together.
The tools are collaborative now. So we have to be, too.
The vibe is real—and the future is ours to shape
Here’s where I land: vibe coding and vibe designing are worth paying attention to. Not because they’re replacing us, but because they’re revealing what we’re really here to do.
We’re here to create clarity in chaos. To bring taste into speed. To shape emotion, not just execution.
So yes—play with the tools. Explore them. Be curious. Be critical.
But also: look up. Feed your instincts. Develop your eye. Talk to users. Make time for beauty.
Because in the end, this work has always been about more than the thing we build.
It’s about the feeling we leave behind.
Tools to vibe with
https://uxpilot.ai/
https://visualelectric.com/
https://v0.dev/
https://www.magicpatterns.com/
https://uxpilot.ai/
https://aistudio.google.com/
Now I want to hear from you.
Have you tried any of these tools? What’s surprised you about working this way? What worked, and what didn’t?
And how are you developing your taste right now?
Drop your thoughts in the comments or reply to this post—I’d love to hear how you’re shaping the vibe where you are.
This sounds super interesting! Do you know of any brands or design agencies that are already using this?