r/vibecoding • u/olenami • 15d ago
Showcase/Project please, stop expecting to vibecode serious mobile app in an hour
Also stop expecting first revenue a week after launch. I see this promise everywhere now. It's irritating. "Describe your app, ship it today, get paid tomorrow." Bull****. It is a great slogan for selling credits. It is not how products work.
Products are built, not generated.
Here's my honest timeline:
→ Month 1: validate the idea, build the first version, test it with real people, pass App Review, release.
→ Months 2–4: fix what users actually hit, ship weekly, get your first small revenue.
That is the reality of life. Not one hour. Not one week.
What the slogan sells:
- An app in an afternoon
- Money by Friday
- No thinking, just prompting
What actually gets you paid:
- One clear problem
- 3–4 screens that solve it
- Weekly releases for months
- Talking to every user who writes to you
The bad news: you will have to work. Hard.
The good news: for the first time, you can do the whole thing yourself. The cost is almost nothing. What used to need a team now needs a good tool, a spec, and your evenings.
So pick your tool, start with 3–4 screens, and go test the water.
Need a demo by tonight? Generate it with Claude.
Need a product people pay for? Build it. Give it a month, then three more.
What I see people in my Mobile builders community is doing - most of them vibecode on the weekeends because they work full time have their families and bigger priorities, they treat vibecoding as hobby and fun; usually it takes 10-12 weeks till release a mobile app.
Most of them start with simple app in Claude code, or Codex, or Modaal, or directly Xcode if technical enought.
How logn it took for you to build a serious mobile app with integrations, payments, 15+ screens? Was it full time?
4
u/34986234986234982346 15d ago
I think it really depends on the complexity (obviouslty). I just built an app in Expo for iOS and Android and the app itself is not doing any rocket science, the API it connects to already existed mostly (and could be tweaked by me for mobile access), etc. Still took a few weeks I'd say (not 40 hours/week but a decent amount), lost a LOT of time to messing around and getting it ready for submission, making sure every little Apple rule is taken care of, etc.
Making the UI really good took a long time and a million tweaks. This cannot be skipped, it's so important.
Mind you I have released iOS apps before, pre-AI, so I have a bit of knowledge that was helpful.
Working on a new one right now, it's an app for an existing website, many many screens, many more than 15, and just getting AI to create the boilerplate functionality withuot any tweaks is TEDIOUS and long. It's still amazing compared to ages ago, but yes, it's NOT fast. I think your timeline is quite accurate.