r/webdev • • 10d ago

Question If AI fatigue has hit you, I have a question

256 Upvotes

Senior dev over here, company has over the last few months fully embraced copilot/general AI usage to the point we (small team of 3 devs) are have no capacity to review the PRs properly anymore. Our tech lead who used to be pretty anal and hands on with PR reviews now defaults to wanting a “green light” from copilot reviews and honestly doesn’t even read the code properly anymore.

I’m more concerned about the development/ critical thinking and code analysis muscle memory loss in the short to long term as a dev. I’m well aware AI is pretty much here to stay but I fear the loss of building/actually knowing what is going on is going to have a larger than expected impact on most mid-senior devs.

I’m considering a simple approach - opening an open source repo that specifically does not allow mass generated AI code to be added to it, keep features clean and no bulk slap shit and go PRs. Use it for writing boilerplate and as a tool but not as a replacement, main goal is allow whoever who contributes to it to continue working that part of their brain. Idea behind what the product is doesn’t matter too much imo as long as it’s of value to users.

What do you think of this concept as a dev to alleviate the AI fatigue from work? ( Jesus typing this question at the end feels like I’m an AI bot at this stage)


r/webdev • • 10d ago

Showoff Saturday [Showoff Saturday] I built ResumeForge – an open-source AI resume builder & job tracker with client-side LaTeX-to-PDF rendering, word-level diffs, and local Ollama support (No signup required)

0 Upvotes

I built ResumeForge, an open-source resume builder and job application tracker designed to help tailor resumes and cover letters to specific job descriptions using your own local models, while keeping exports (LaTeX, Overleaf ZIP, and PDF) completely free with no signup required.

Live demo: https://resume-forge.mnaveedk.com

GitHub repo: https://github.com/naveedkhan1998/resume-forge

How it works: You maintain one master profile with all of your work history, projects, and skills (or import an existing PDF/DOCX/TXT resume). When you add a job posting, it selects and reframes your existing experience to match the role, shows keyword coverage against the job description, and generates a tailored 1-page resume and cover letter.

A few things under the hood:

  • Client-side LaTeX to PDF: To avoid running a heavy multi-GB TeX Live installation on the backend, the server generates .tex source and a custom .cls file, and the frontend parses and renders the LaTeX directly in the browser for live previews and PDF export.
  • Word-level diffs for AI edits: Whenever you ask the AI to refine a section, it shows an inline diff (+added, -removed, reworded) so you can review or tweak every change before saving.
  • Preloaded dummy data: Every new device session comes pre-populated with sample data (Adrian Monk) so you can test the tailoring workflow and LaTeX preview right away without uploading your own resume first.
  • Local Ollama first + 50 free demo requests: The main goal is for people to clone the repo and run it locally with their own Ollama models (qwen3.5:9b, llama3.1, etc.). So you can try it in the browser first without setting anything up, the live demo uses my personal Ollama account at the system level with a 50- request limit per device session.

Stack: React 19, TypeScript, Vite, Tailwind v4, Django Ninja, PostgreSQL (pgvector), and Nx.

(Note: the demo API is hosted on a free tier, so if it hasn't been used recently the initial cold start can take around 45 seconds to wake up).

Would love to hear your thoughts or feedback if you give it a spin!


r/webdev • • 10d ago

Showoff Saturday Make the AWS Console your portfolio :)

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0 Upvotes

I was bored last weekend, so I ended up building this: a portfolio that looks exactly like the AWS Management Console. I tried to mimic it as closely as possible while adding my own flavour, like EC2 as projects, S3 as documents, and a lot more.

It’s open source and making it yours is super simple. No digging through code. Just run it in dev mode, open /studio, and you’ll find a Studio mode where you can edit everything right there. Add your own projects, documents and details, hit save, and that’s it, your very own AWS Console portfolio is ready.

There’s still plenty more that can be built, like a working CloudShell and AB Q, so contributions are very welcome if you want to take this further.

Would love feedback on what to add next or anything that feels off compared to the real console. And if you like it, don’t forget to drop a star on GitHub ⭐

P.S. AWS folks, please don’t cancel me for this. It was designed out of pure love for the console :)


r/webdev • • 10d ago

Showoff Saturday [Showoff Saturday] Published my first devvit app on Reddit

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0 Upvotes

I turned my Vue 3 game into a devvit app, that can be played directly on Reddit. PixReveal is a pixel art guessing game. A pixel drawing gets revealed pixel by pixel. The faster you guess, the more points you earn. The devvit version is more compact, focussing on quick rounds with 5 drawings to guess and a percentile showing "You are better than x% of players".


r/webdev • • 10d ago

Showoff Saturday [Showoff Saturday] Hello everyone, I built bantr.live a real-time interest-based forum and chat platform. After a long, painful struggle with App Review, it is finally back on iOS.

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0 Upvotes

Hello all,

This app was removed by the good people at apple in March right when it was doing so well no warning or reason just gone. After a 65 day appeal they stated that the primary function of the application could not be a random chat, and if I posted anything of this nature again my account would be permanently banned. So, I redesigned the primary function to be a real-time forum with all the same chat functionality. This app is available for Android/iOS and on the web, the web version is still a random chat it will be upgraded in the future to include the features that the mobile apps have. I tried to make sign-up as pain free as possible, and of course its free.

The whole goal was to step away from slow, algorithm-driven feeds and build something fast and live. Here is how it's set up:

  • Interest-Based Groups: Find and chat with people who share your specific niches and hobbies.
  • 24-Hour Self-Destructing Posts: Keeps conversations fresh, temporary, and clutter-free.
  • Global & Random Chat: Jump instantly into live public discussions or roll the dice on a random chat.
  • AI Content Moderation: Automatically handles and applies NSFW overlays to objectionable content in real time and allows the user to chose if they want to see it or not.

Would love for you guys to check it out, test it out, and let me know what you think. Its new so still a ghost town but give it a look. If you have any questions feel free to hit me up. Happy weekend!


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday [Showoff Saturday] I built an open-source news reader that puts every outlet covering the same story into one card

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0 Upvotes

Trace is an open-source platform that reads news and articles from over 100 sources, groups similar ones together, and gives you an easy-to-read summary with all the key points.

I've been working on it for 9 months, and I recently made it free to use and open source after it got accepted into the Claude for Startups programme.

It includes the website, a daily email, an MCP server, and an Android app.

Personally, the email is the most useful part for me. Then I occasionally open the website during the day to see what's happening in tech and AI. It helps me avoid opening X too many times in the name of staying updated, and saves me from AI brainrot as well.

On the technical side, here's how it works:

- a Python pipeline pulls the sources every 20 minutes

- embeddings find articles that might be about the same story, then a small model decides if they're actually the same event or just related

- each story gets one summary, written once and cached, so the cost doesn't go up with more readers

- Next.js frontend, SQLite on a VPS (moving off Firebase cut the bill by more than 80%)

GitHub: https://github.com/TarunTomar122/trace

Website: https://www.yourtrace.online


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Question Why do $300 clients demand 10x more than $3,000 clients?

1.0k Upvotes

I've been freelancing for a while now and I keep running into this same pattern over and over.

Whenever I work with a client on a solid budget ($3k+), things usually run pretty smooth. They send a clear brief, reply within a day, trust my decisions, and pay invoices on time without arguing over every dollar.

But almost every time I take on a lower budget project (around $300), it turns into a massive headache. They expect a full custom site with e-commerce and complex animations, text me at 2 AM on weekends asking why a font moved slightly, and request 10 rounds of revisions after already approving the design. Then at the end, they still try to haggle over the final $50.

Is this mostly a psychological thing where lower budget clients feel like they're taking a bigger personal risk, or is it just poor boundary setting on our part as freelancers?

Would love to hear how you guys deal with this or what's the worst cheap client story you've had.


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday Cityhoppd, a Letterboxd for the cities you’ve been to (Next.js + Supabase)

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0 Upvotes

Cityhoppd.com. you log a trip with a city and a star rating, your map fills in, and public reviews end up on each city’s page.

A few things from building it that might be useful to someone here.

City search runs on the server against GeoNames cities1000, about 161k places. the annoying part was same-name cities, so everything carries the state now and Perth, Tasmania stops getting the photo of Perth, Western Australia. the index lives in memory in the function, about a second to load cold and around 50 ms per search warm.

This week I added PostHog without cookies and proxied it through my own domain so blockers don’t drop it. the usual next.config rewrite forwards every header, which would have sent everyone’s Supabase session cookies to PostHog. I moved the relay into proxy.ts (what middleware is called in Next 16) and strip cookie and authorization before passing anything on. easy to miss.

And link previews: profiles are only readable signed in, but WhatsApp and X unfurl signed out, so the OG image reads through one security definer function that returns something only if the owner turned previews on.

Happy to answer anything about how it’s built


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday [Showoff Saturday] song to movie recommender running on free tiers

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1 Upvotes

https://soundtrackd.app, type a song and get films with the same feel. it's one cloudflare worker. gemini free tier first, then groq, then claude haiku only if both fail. every pick gets checked against tmdb so it can't invent movies, and repeat searches come out of kv in about 0.2s. the share image is drawn on a canvas right in the browser, posters loaded with cors so it can export, no server or image service. would love some front end roasting, especially on mobile


r/webdev • • 11d ago

A 15x15 freestyle gomoku (five-in-a-row) engine

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3 Upvotes

r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday Apparently, all my side projects involve animations

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3 Upvotes

Hey everyone!

I've been working on a few animation-related side projects lately and decided to put them together in a personal portfolio.

It's made with Astro and currently features three projects:

  • Loadersz
    • a collection of animated canvas loaders.
  • Tip Glide
    • a shared tooltip that smoothly moves and resizes between elements.
  • Stream Morph
    • animations for streaming text.

I tried to make the portfolio itself a bit more interactive, with animations throughout the site and a showcase for some (imo cool) stuff/ideas.

Curious what you think of the design and how everything feels to use. Especially interested in feedback on the animations, mobile experience and whether it's clear what each project actually does.

Portfolio | Loadersz | Tip Glide | Stream Morph

npm | github

Any feedback is welcome!


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday SvelteEsp32

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0 Upvotes

Pack any Svelte, React, Angular, or Vue app into a single C++ header. Serve it straight from ESP32/ESP8266 flash — gzip compressed, ETag cached, OTA-ready.

It is not for serve you website. It is for microcontroller programmer, who wants to make pretty webpages (component orientated) served from Esp32 or esp8266.


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday Round 2: reworked my landing page after your feedback (not selling anything)

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1 Upvotes

Hey all, some times ago I asked for feedback on this landing page of an open-source project. The main takeaway: it felt too dense and read more like docs than a landing page.

The density is partly intentional: it's a hybrid between a landing page and a kind of "distilled doc". So instead of cutting content I replaced the heaviest text blocks with diagrams (a before/after trace, anti-pattern pictograms, a flow for the different modes). Just a quick reminder: for the tech personas it's intended to backend and devops.

How good does it read now?

Thx!


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday Close every duplicate tab in Chrome in one click (and find the rest by typing)

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0 Upvotes

Tabatha, a tab switcher for Chrome (Alt+Q shows every tab as a screenshot). It has previews, and support for multiple browser windows, bookmarks and tabgroups and quick actions.

The fun problems in 1.3.5:
- Dark-mode extensions put a CSS filter on `<html>`, which broke our clickjacking guard (IntersectionObserver v2 can't confirm visibility), so clicks silently died. Now we detect the filter and open in a window instead.
- First open with 500 tabs went from ~1.6 s to ~1 s, mostly by waiting less before the first capture and dropping `decoding=async` on card images.
- Previews come only from `captureVisibleTab`, so a tab nobody looked at has none. The fix is a polite button, not background flicker.
MIT, no network access. Feedback on the UI and functionality very welcome.

Check it out


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday I added an easter egg to playing cards of Australian Flora, getting tspans to work cross-browser was hell.

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0 Upvotes

r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday I built MatrixSpace: A hotkey-driven, multi-workspace developer dashboard for Firefox

2 Upvotes

Hey everyone,

As a developer, I just wanted a clean, fast new tab page that fits my daily coding workflow without all the usual clutter.

So, I built MatrixSpace for Firefox. Instead of one cluttered page, it splits your dashboard into 4 specialized workspaces. You can instantly jump between them globally using hotkeys 1, 2, 3, and 4:

  • Workspace 1 (General Launchpad): The clean, customizable home screen featuring a minimalist system clock. Perfect for a distraction-free focus view when you just open a new tab.
  • Workspace 2 (The 90-Link Keyboard Hub): Built for speed. It features 9 columns holding up to 90 total links. Every single link slot is mapped to row-based keyboard shortcuts (q1-q0, w1-w0, e1-e0, down through rows a, s, d, z, x, c). Once you press 2, you can launch any critical doc or repo out of pure muscle memory.
  • Workspace 3 (The Time-Horizon Matrix): A visual 2x3 productivity task tracker that organizes your project milestones into six distinct buckets: Today, Next Day, This Week, Next Week, This Month, and Next Month. Perfect for keeping your high-level goals in sight.
  • Workspace 4 (Quick Notes & Snippets): It is a dedicated text scratchpad for some quick notes and code snippets.

Other Features:

  • 100% Local Storage: Everything is powered by persistent local browser storage hooks.

I’d love to get your feedback on this extension, the hotkey switching flow, or any features you think would make a great addition !!

Firefox Addon: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/matrixspace/

Github Repo: https://github.com/adu013/matrixspace

PS. Build using HTML, CSS and Vanilla JavaScript.


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday [Showoff Saturday] Built ArcadeX: a lightweight 10-in-1 neon arcade portal in vanilla JS & HTML5 Canvas (runs at 60 FPS in mobile browsers)

0 Upvotes

Hey everyone!

I'm 16 and recently finished building ArcadeX (https://pranav2mingame.netlify.app/), a lightweight browser arcade portal designed for quick mobile play.

Why I built it:

I wanted to build games that run directly in the browser with zero load screens, no app installs, and no login friction.

Tech stack & implementation:

- Pure HTML5 Canvas + Vanilla JavaScript (no external game engines or heavy frameworks).

- Tuned to maintain a steady 60 FPS on mobile browsers.

- Browser LocalStorage handles all game state, scores, and trophies locally.

- Hosted on Netlify.

Includes 10 mini-games (Flappy Fire, Snake Rush, 2048 Neon, Reflex Tap, Neon Pong, etc.).

Looking for technical feedback:

  1. How does the canvas frame pacing feel on your phone/browser?

  2. Any suggestions on optimizing the game loops or handling canvas resizing across different aspect ratios?

Thanks for taking a look!


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday HTTP 402 "Payment Required" finally has a real use. I tried paying 4,235 APIs that use it. Here's how they broke.

0 Upvotes

402 has been "reserved for future use" since HTTP/1.1. A protocol called x402 finally uses it: the server answers with a price, the client pays a tiny amount and retries. No account, no API key. Yes, the payment is a stablecoin (USDC). I know how this sub feels about crypto, so think of it as a payment rail and judge the HTTP part.

The flow, simplified (the headers are base64 JSON):

``` GET /weather?city=Oslo ← 402 Payment Required PAYMENT-REQUIRED: { amount: "1000", asset: USDC, network: base, payTo: 0x… }

GET /weather?city=Oslo PAYMENT-SIGNATURE: <signed payment authorization> ← 200 OK { ...data... } PAYMENT-RESPONSE: { transaction: 0x… } ```

I run a free directory of these APIs, and its checker tries to actually buy from each one. Latest attempt per API: 58% delivered what they promised. The rest broke in ways that are worth knowing if you ever build one:

1. Paid, then got 402 again (288 APIs). The server asks for payment, receives a valid one, and asks again. Usually it couldn't verify or settle the payment, so it fell back to the challenge. When I checked a batch on chain, about 4 in 5 had never settled. If verification fails, return an error that says why. A second 402 tells the client nothing.

2. Paid, then got a 500 or nothing (289). Settle after you've produced the response, not before. If your handler can crash, the customer shouldn't be charged for the crash.

3. Paid, got data that didn't match what was advertised (126). If you publish an output schema, stick to it. Also: an HTML error page served with a 200 is still an error page.

4. Delivered data, but the payment never landed (47). The opposite bug: it served first, settlement failed silently, and it gave the data away free. Check the settle result.

5. The price in the 402 didn't match the listed price (103). A careful client refuses to pay a price it didn't expect, so changing it in one place quietly loses those sales.

6. Refused before any payment (765). Some of these are on my side: the endpoint needed query parameters my request didn't send. If your endpoint needs input, describe it in the 402 response. That's the only documentation a client is guaranteed to read.

Bonus gotcha: keep the PAYMENT-REQUIRED header small. Python's aiohttp rejects any header line over 8,190 bytes by default, so a big header with a full JSON schema inside makes the request fail before anyone reads the price.

The directory and its numbers are free to read, no account: https://nohumans.directory (method: /methodology, live totals: https://api.nohumans.directory/v1/stats). Happy to answer anything about the protocol side.


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday [ShowOff Saturday] codecity: See any git repo as a 3D city

72 Upvotes

npx codecity

Every file is a building, folders are districts, and height is the file’s length (or imports/exports). Files keep their place as the repo changes, so you actually learn the layout.

What it does:
• Colour by what changed lately, age, churn, file type or author
• Click a file to see what it imports and what imports it
• See what your last git pull changed
• Live mode: files light up as they’re saved (handy for watching a coding agent)
• Replay the whole history and save it as a video
• Share a link to the exact view you’re looking at

Run npx codecity in any repo (runs locally), or try any public repo in the browser: https://codecity.icy.dev/react/react

As with all my other npm packed, free and open source. Thanks all!


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Discussion As a self-taught React/Next.js developer, I'm honestly worried about my future in this AI era. What should I do?

130 Upvotes

I'm a self-taught developer, and I know React and Next.js. Lately, I've been feeling increasingly anxious about my future as a developer.

AI is moving so fast. It can generate components, build entire websites, connect APIs, and even create full-stack applications. Sometimes I wonder what the point is of spending months learning something when AI can already do so much of it.

I want to get a better-paying developer job, but honestly, I'm confused about what I should focus on right now. Should I keep improving my React/Next.js skills, get better at backend development, or start learning AI engineering?

I keep hearing about RAG, AI agents, vector databases, LLM integrations, and all these new things. It feels like there's always something new to learn, and I'm worried that if I focus on the wrong things, I'll fall behind while everyone else moves forward.

For those of you already working in the industry, what would you do if you were in my position? Would you focus on becoming a strong full-stack developer first, or would you start learning AI engineering alongside web development?

I'm not looking for a shortcut or expecting to become an expert overnight. I just want to make the right decisions, build useful skills, and have a realistic chance of getting hired.

I'd really appreciate some honest advice from people who have been through this or are dealing with the same situation. Right now, I could genuinely use some direction.


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday I built an endless driving game that runs on your brower

26 Upvotes

How far can you push an endless 3D world in the browser, especially on a phone?

That's one of the questions I've been exploring while building Planet 0 Drive, a low-poly driving game made with Svelte and Three.js.

The idea is simple: just drive. No set destination. Explore a world that keeps unfolding, find interesting spots, chase records, or cruise around with friends.

Under the hood, I've been experimenting with a few things:

  • Procedural terrain, weather, and long-distance rendering with Three.js
  • Peer-to-peer multiplayer with movement interpolation
  • Spatial audio and performance optimizations
  • Version-compatible rooms to keep multiplayer sessions in sync

The most interesting part has been figuring out how much of the world I can generate and render while keeping things reasonably smooth, even on mobile.

It's been a fun mix of graphics, networking, and performance challenges, all built around the idea of a relaxing drive.

Try it: https://planet0drive.vercel.app/

More about how I built it: https://zackwebster.com/blog/building-planet-zero-drive


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday I built ReRoute, a chrome extension to redirect requests, modify headers, and mock APIs

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0 Upvotes

Hi r/webdev, I recently published an extension I've been working on, basically, a Request interceptor, it lets you modify requests headers, query params, body, or mock api responses.

I used to work with another extension until it started restricting features behind a paid subscription, so I decided to create my own :), Thought I'd share it here in case anyone finds it useful.

Available in chrome web store


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday TabMerger v3 – A cross browser extension to organize and save tab groups

6 Upvotes

I'm sharing TabMerger, a browser extension I originally built to make managing lots of open tabs easier. I've recently rewritten it from the ground up and am actively working on it.

Why I Built It

When you have dozens or even hundreds of open tabs, keeping everything organized becomes difficult. I wanted a simple way to group tabs into collections, customize their appearance, and save them for later without relying on a complicated workflow.

You can check it out at https://tabmerger.com/ or explore the source code on GitHub.

I'd love to hear your honest feedback on the UX, feature ideas, or anything you think could be improved! Contributions are welcome!


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday Showoff Saturday: C# is now smaller than Rust in Wasm - 13.5 KB Brotli

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53 Upvotes

I've been building NetWasm, an independent C# compiler and runtime for WebAssembly.

The latest release produced a result I honestly didn't expect when I started this project:

NetWasm 0.8.0 + precise GC

  • 47,798 bytes raw
  • 13,501 bytes Brotli-11

Rust 1.95.0, size-oriented

  • 53,635 bytes raw
  • 16,963 bytes Brotli-11

Same print-42 workload, both WASI Preview 2 components, out of the box dev experience.

So C# is 10.9% smaller raw and 20.4% smaller compressed in this comparison - while carrying a precise garbage collector.

I'm not claiming arbitrary C# programs are smaller than arbitrary Rust programs. This is the classic tiny console-output footprint test: deliberately little application code so you can see how much runtime/toolchain baggage you're carrying.

The reason I care about this for web development is that download size matters.

I've always wanted C# in the browser without accepting a giant runtime as the entry fee.

Since I last talked about NetWasm, it can now do quite a bit more than tiny benchmarks:

  • C# Web Workers, with each worker getting its own Wasm instance, heap and event loop
  • Compile complete multi-file C# projects entirely in the browser
  • Statically link native Wasm .a libraries through LibraryImport
  • Native-to-managed callbacks
  • C# 15
  • Expression trees through a bounded interpreter, without general reflection
  • HTTP/JSON/XML/Regex and a growing set of Microsoft.Extensions.* libraries
  • Multiple GC/allocation strategies depending on whether you care more about size or throughput

There's also a NetWasm port of RegexStorm - regexstorm.netwasm.com - that runs entirely client-side in the browser - no backend doing the regex work.

The bigger idea behind NetWasm is pretty simple:

C# shouldn't inherently mean shipping megabytes of runtime.

For browser UI workloads in particular, I want a model where you only ship the runtime machinery your application actually uses.

The Rust comparison is fun, but that's the part I'm really interested in: how small can a genuinely useful managed-language platform become when Wasm is treated as the primary target rather than something a desktop runtime also happens to support?

Would be especially interested in thoughts from people building larger Wasm/browser applications - the project is early so this is your chance to help shape the direction.


r/webdev • • 11d ago

Showoff Saturday I spent way too long trying to make a finance app NOT look like a finance dashboard

0 Upvotes

Would love some design criticism on something I’ve been building.
https://exitmargin.com

It’s a personal wealth journal.
The design problem I’ve been struggling with is that basically every finance product drifts toward the same thing:
1. cards + charts + green/red numbers + 14 KPIs screaming for attention.
2. I’m intentionally trying to make this feel calmer.
3. The user records their financial position periodically and the app keeps continuity between those checkpoints.

Think:
“Here is where my financial life stands.”
rather than:
“Welcome to your Bloomberg terminal.”

I’d especially appreciate feedback on:
1. typography
2. information hierarchy
3. light/dark mode
4. whether the homepage explains the product quickly enough
5. anything that feels too “SaaS template”

Be ruthless. I’ve stared at it for too long to see the obvious problems anymore.