Have you been bombarded with recommendations about the “best” AI coding tools every week? I’ve noticed a growing trend where everyone keeps saying “this tool is the best” or “that tool is revolutionary” – it’s honestly hard to keep up with all the advice flying around in the AI development space.

I’ve been exploring tools like v0, Cursor, Windsurf, Lovable, Bolt, ChatGPT, and my experience has been eye-opening. If you’ve got the money to play around with all these shiny new toys, that’s awesome! But for the average person – especially folks who might be between jobs or bootstrapping their projects – I think there’s a fallacy that could use a bit of a reality check and balanced thinking and approach.

🏗️ The Visual Builder Temptation

Many traditional no-coders are shifting to “vibes coding” using tools like Lovable and Bolt. They’re building visually appealing interfaces and then immediately pushing to production, often skipping crucial security considerations and quality checks along the way.

This is a huge problem when it comes to protecting user data. There’s a baseline level of security that every application should implement before going live, but that sometimes gets lost in the rush to ship something – anything – fast.

I understand both sides of this tension. I have this hybrid mindset as both a builder and someone with a founder’s perspective. The founder part of me gets the “build fast, ship fast” mentality – if it works and attracts customers, that’s what matters, right? But the builder and security-conscious part of me knows we have a responsibility to do things properly and protect user information.

And truly, despite all the hype, I can count on one hand the number of people I know who’ve actually built production-ready secure applications with real users.

💡 A Practical Approach For Real People

So what’s my advice after working through all these tools and experiences? I think you have two main options:

If you’ve got the budget to invest in all these tools and properly test them out, that’s fantastic! Experiment away and find what works for your specific needs.

But if you’re watching your wallet (like most of us), here’s what I think makes more sense:

Use visual builders like v0, Bolt, or Lovable just for creating the UI components of your application. They’re great for that! But at this exact moment, I wouldn’t connect them directly to Supabase or Convex just yet unless you are an experienced developer. I wouldn’t create edge functions or other critical infrastructure through them yet.

Instead, once you’ve built the visual part, download the code to your local environment. Use tools like Windsurf and Cursor to help refine and enhance the code, then carefully implement your data connections to Supabase or whatever database you’re using. Add your environment variables properly, implement security measures, and only then deploy to your hosting platform.

So, Windsurf or Cursor or What?

If you have the funds, I actually recommend using both Windsurf and Cursor together, as they have complementary strengths. Windsurf excels at understanding your entire codebase, answering questions about how everything fits together, and implementing small incremental changes. It’s been spectacular for creating security checklists and implementing them throughout your application.

So where does Cursor come in? I’ve found that Cursor works really great with implementing complex features. My workflow often looks like this: build a small feature visually with V0, implement it to a working condition and security standard with Windsurf, and then take the feature to the next level with Cursor. This combination gives you the best of both worlds.

One thing to watch out for – both of these tools can start to hallucinate if you use them too long in a single conversation with too much chat history. I’ve created a little script that resets the entire application when this happens, which not only resolves any hallucinations but also seems to make the apps work faster.

If you’re not in a rush, you could even use the free daily limits of tools like Volt and Lovable to gradually build your application. Once you’ve got your primary features visually mapped out, download everything and continue development locally with your coding assistants.

⚖️ Finding The Right Balance For You

Everything feels a bit janky right now in this space, if I’m being completely honest. I’ve personally wasted quite a bit of money jumping between all these tools because I thought they’d magically speed up my development process. The reality has been quite different – I’ve run into numerous limitations and issues that ultimately slowed me down.

I genuinely don’t understand how some people claim to be shipping directly from Lovable or Bolt straight to production. That might explain why we’ve seen so many issues popping up recently with AI-built applications.

For most people, I think spending around $40-60 per month on a thoughtful combination of these tools makes sense if it helps you get your MVP out the door and closer to real users. Just don’t fall into the trap of thinking these tools will do everything for you – they won’t.

In my next post, I’ll dive deeper into some specific mistakes I’ve made with these tools and share how I’ve learned to better utilize them (and save money in the process). Because while AI development tools are exciting, they’re not magic – understanding their limitations is just as important as leveraging their strengths.

What’s your experience been with AI-powered development? Have you found a workflow that balances speed with proper security? I’d love to hear your thoughts!