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Vibe coding is arguably one of many hottest tendencies in tech proper now, because it displays a wider adoption of AI and pure language prompts for primary code completion (difficult the standard coding mindset that people ought to full downstream duties).
Google is releasing Sew, a brand new experiment from Google Labs, to compete with Microsoft, AWS, and different current end-to-end coding instruments. Now in beta, the platform designs person interfaces (UIs) with one immediate—and a few builders are already gushing.
“Google dropped probably the most highly effective UI designer on this planet,” Brendan Jowett, proprietor of voice AI firm Inflate AI, posted on X.
Using AI in programming and growth actually isn’t new, however the idea of “vibe coding” — coined by OpenAI cofounder Andrej Karpathy earlier this 12 months — is a more moderen idea incorporating generative AI to automate coding duties usually achieved manually. This goes past current AI assistants and drag-and-drop no-code and low-code instruments: The main target is on the top outcome, not the journey there.
“You lastly give into the vibes, embrace exponentials and overlook that code even exists,” Karpathy wrote on X.
Prime gamers within the built-in growth atmosphere (IDE) area embody Windsurf (previously Codeium), Cursor, Replit, Lovable, Bolt, Devin and Aider. Anthropic additionally just lately launched its command-line AI agent Claude Code.
Bigger gamers along with Google wish to stake their declare, as properly: Amazon Net Providers (AWS) is providing its Amazon Q Developer AI assistant as an add-on for builders to entry straight at any level of their coding; Microsoft launched GitHub Copilot agent mode; OpenAI is trying to prolong its capabilities in vibe coding with its Codex replace and supposed $3 billion buy of Windsurf; and Agentforce is writing about 20% of Salesforce’s code.
Google, for its half, additionally just lately launched autonomous coding agent Jules into beta.
Sew builds UIs with a immediate
With Google Sew, customers can designate whether or not they wish to construct a dashboard or internet or cellular app and describe what it ought to appear like (equivalent to shade palettes or the person expertise they’re going for).
The platform immediately generates HTML, CSS+ and templates with editable parts that devs and non-devs can customise and edit (equivalent to instructing Sew so as to add a search perform to the house display screen). They will then add on to apps or export to Figma.
“Design is an iterative course of, and Sew facilitates this by permitting you to generate a number of variants of your interface,” Google Labs researchers clarify. “Experiment with totally different layouts, parts and kinds to realize the specified feel and look.”
Customers can select a ‘customary mode’ that runs on Gemini 2.5 Flash or change to an ‘experimental mode’ that makes use of Gemini Professional and permits customers to add visible components equivalent to screenshots, wireframes and sketches to information what the platform generates.
Google additionally plans to launch a function permitting customers to annotate screenshots to make adjustments.
Sew is “meant for fast first drafts, wireframes and MVP-ready frontends,” Jowett notes in his X thread.
Some say layouts are ‘unreal’; others name Bolt superior
Many customers have provided early reward. One famous: “I attempted Sew with a ‘crypto pockets dashboard’ immediate and it nailed the format in underneath 10 seconds. Unreal.”
X person “God of Immediate” posted: “Truthfully shocked this isn’t getting extra consideration. An actual UI generator backed by Gemini with Figma export? Instantaneous use-case.”
Nevertheless, others discovered the beta model lower than optimum. Elizabeth Alli of DesignerUp outlined her experiences in a weblog publish: The dev prompted Sew to make an app to assist construct mindfulness habits. She reported that it “missed the mark” on design components (equivalent to the colours she was searching for) and he or she wasn’t in a position to click on round, because the platform solely generated one display screen (and in subsequent prompts she had issue producing the subsequent logical display screen or every other display screen).
Additionally, there aren’t many enhancing choices to select from, and when Alli uploaded a picture from an internet site she designed, she was not impressed by the formatting, typography, shade combos and “dated” shadows and icons.
“I had a lot greater expectations from Google on condition that there are already so many current AI to UI design technology instruments in the marketplace that do that a lot better,” she writes. “Their effort appears half-baked at greatest.”
Whereas it’s in beta, it doesn’t have “wherever close to” the polished output of different choices equivalent to Figma’s First Draft or Uizard’s Autodesigner. “This launch looks like a little bit of a mad sprint to throw their hat into the ring of the AI UI design hype,” Alli notes.
Different early customers agree that Sew might be wonky and underwhelming, that the designs aren’t fairly there but, and that different current instruments are nonetheless superior.
One X person lamented: “I used the identical immediate that I used to generate touchdown pages in different AI instruments which return direct code, however the designs had been so a lot better within the different instruments equivalent to Bolt.”
It’s clear Google has some kinks to work out if it intends to compete with already entrenched gamers. Nonetheless, it’s early within the vibe coding sport, and customers are desperate to experiment with quite a lot of instruments, so it’ll be fascinating to see Sew’s subsequent iteration.
Attempt Sew out for your self right here.
