I Ranked Every AI App Builder for 2026: Lovable vs. Bolt vs. Replit vs. Cursor (No Code)

In this video, I want to break down the best AI tools that you should be using to build applications in 2026. And this

is an update to my tier ranking for 2025. And we'll be covering all of the

2025. And we'll be covering all of the best AI coding tools on the market right now. And by the end of this video,

now. And by the end of this video, you'll know exactly which tools you should learn to build any software application from scratch with AI. If you

don't know me, my name is Chris and for the last 15 years, I've been designing apps and advising startups on product and design. And if you want to see more

and design. And if you want to see more videos like this, don't forget to hit the subscribe button. And with that said, let's get straight into the best AI app building tools you should be learning in 2026.

[music] >> So, let's break down the best AI coding tools for 206. And over the last year, I spent hundreds of hours in these tools and built countless applications and also been helping hundreds of people

learn how to build with AI tools and also get real customers with their applications through my school community over at school.com/iapps.

So, I've had a lot of experience here.

Now, I will add one clarifying point is that I am not a developer. I'm a product person and a designer by trade. That's

what I've done for the last 15 years.

I've worked with a lot of software engineers and developers. I've never

actually written code. What I have done is used all of these tools extensively though and built multiple applications with the majority of them. So, I've got a good idea of what tools are the best ones to learn, where you should start,

and which ones are best for all of these categories. And we're going to break

categories. And we're going to break down which tool, not only which tools sit where on the ranking, but also which of these tools is best for internal business apps or personal apps, which one is best for simple web apps, complex

web apps, best for mobile apps, best for desktop apps, and also give you the best allround tool to give you an idea of what you should start learning and where you should kind of start in your app building journey. Whether you're already

building journey. Whether you're already building apps with AI and you just want to understand what tool is going to work best for you or you're just getting started in this journey and you want to understand where to kind of start with

AI coding tools. This will give you a good idea of all of that. And I'm trying to go through this as quickly as possible so that we give you the maximum amount of value in the time and we don't keep this video too long. So with that

said, let's get straight into the tier list for 2026. And I've made some changes to this one based on my previous tier list. So, a couple of the criteria

tier list. So, a couple of the criteria here because you see my previous tier list over here. I kind of had a mix of design tools and enterprise tools and AI coding tools. So, my criteria for this

coding tools. So, my criteria for this one is going to be no pure enterprise coding tools. So, I've taken out factory

coding tools. So, I've taken out factory and Devon cuz these are more like enterprise focused AI coding tools and no pure software engineering tools. And

this is more like warp or tracer and maybe factory as well that are kind of like purely for software engineers and very specifically for developers. I want

to help you as a non-technical person get started building apps with AI or continue your app building journey with the best tools here. And so these are all tools that are going to work for

non-technical people to get started. And

the big things I want to highlight that happening in 2026 is that really Claude Opus 4.5 from Anthropic is really the first step in solving AI coding fully. I

have spent a lot of time using Opus 4.5 in a lot of different coding tools and the amount of bugs that I get with it when you're very specific and give it the right context is so small. It can

kind of build anything. And so if you can build anything, the only thing that stands in the way of that is the actual tool environment and the user interface and the product itself. And also for

2026, design is actually getting good in and and I mean this in terms of like user experience and user interface design for applications with models like Gemini 3 which have great visual

awareness and kind of and this multimodal capability where they can understand and actually design really good websites and applications. So let's

jump straight into the tier ranking and go through these one by one. So on the tier list that we've got here, just to cover all of the apps that we've got here, we've got Vibe Code, we've got Rock, we've got Bass 44, we've got

Orchids, Emergent, Claude Code, Google AI Studio, Google Anti-gravity, Replet, Cursor, Bolt, Devon. I'm going to take Devon out. V0, we've got Lovable, we've

Devon out. V0, we've got Lovable, we've got Leap, and we've got Windfur. These

are all kind of the main sort of AI coding tools for building applications.

I'm actually going to add another one in here as well, which is an app builder called Anything. So we're going to add

called Anything. So we're going to add anything in here as well. So we've got a few more than we had last time we went through this. These are all AI app

through this. These are all AI app builders that all work for nontechnical people. So let's start at the beginning

people. So let's start at the beginning with Vibe Code. Now Vibe Code is a mobile app building tool that is co-founded by Riley Brown who is a big content creator in the kind of AI coding vibe coding space and it basically lets

you build mobile apps directly on your phone. They have a ton of really good

phone. They have a ton of really good things. So just to cover off some

things. So just to cover off some details about Vibe Code before I show you where I'm ranking it. Vio Code lets you add in payments directly in their mobile app or on their desktop app using the Revenue Cat integration. And they

are the first mobile app building tool to actually do that. They have one of the cleanest and most userfriendly experiences for actually building mobile apps or building apps in general of any tool. And I'm a massive fan of Vibe

tool. And I'm a massive fan of Vibe Code. They don't have the best

Code. They don't have the best functionality for getting your code out into something like GitHub and then working on it in another tool. You're

kind of a little bit stuck in Vibe Code.

You can work on your application using SSH in cursor, but that kind of limits you a little bit with what you can do locally. So, I'm going to put Vibe Code

locally. So, I'm going to put Vibe Code in A because I think they've got a really good vision for the future.

They've got a ton of great integrations.

You can generate audio, use a bunch of out of the box APIs, set up inapp payments really, really easily, and then publish to the app store very, very quickly. And they have a really great

quickly. And they have a really great track record of a lot of people using that app, building mobile apps, and successfully publishing them to the app store. Next we have Ror which is also a

store. Next we have Ror which is also a mobile app building tool which is a more traditional kind of vibe coding interface something like similar to lovable or bolt that you would use and

they have a better setup for working between GitHub and a local environment.

So if you wanted to build an app in Ror, sync with GitHub, get your code out locally and start working on it in something like Cursor. And there are some reasons that you might want to do that because you might want to have a little bit more control over the actual

code. You might want to build some more

code. You might want to build some more complex features or you might just want to save a little bit of money by working with a different tool to actually work on your mobile app as well. And that

just gives you a little bit more flexibility. What they don't have is

flexibility. What they don't have is they don't have the same amount of tools and built-in APIs available that Vibe Code does. And they also don't have the

Code does. And they also don't have the pay the inapp payments integration. So

it makes it a lot more difficult if you want to add inapp payments to ro. I'm

going to put rock in this kind of B category because they're kind of sitting in this mo they're sitting in this standard kind of like vibe coding tool space. But when it comes to mobile apps,

space. But when it comes to mobile apps, they they are the most flexible option because it because you can get your code out via GitHub and work on it in a local environment. So I'd say if you're a less

environment. So I'd say if you're a less technical mobile app builder, Vive Code is the way to go. Now, I'm putting it in B here because I think that if you're a more technical app builder and you want to get started building mobile apps, you

could actually legitimately just go straight and to something like Cursor or Claude Code and start building your mobile app that way instead of using a tool like RO and that will actually save you a little bit of money there as well.

But Ror is a good place to get started if you want that control. you don't know if you're going to want to get your code out later and you kind of want to have the flexibility a little bit, but it is going to make it more difficult further down the line to add up to add things in

like inapp payments. And one thing I want to mention about Vibe Code as well is that they are actually using Claude code as the coding agent which is the best coding agent in the world. The best

general purpose agent in the world really right now and that gives you a much higher chance of success when you're actually building your app so that you get less bugs when you're building it too. And I think that is one of the really big features of Vibe Code

that works so well. The next on the list here is Bass 44. And I'm going to put Bass 44 down here in I'm going to put

Bass 44 in D because they base 44 is a really interesting one. I think B 44 works for a certain type of person. It

works for a more nontechnical builder, maybe building an internal business tool or a personal use app, but they don't have the functionality or the features there to allow you to easily get your

code out to easily add things like payments to kind of have visibility of all the things that are going on in your app. You get a database and

app. You get a database and authentication and stuff out of the box, but it's all quite tightly tied to B 44's platform. And so you get this kind

44's platform. And so you get this kind of a little bit of a lockin effect with B 44 as well where it's more difficult to come out of B 44 and less flexible than a lot of the other tools. So I'm

going to put B 44 down in this D category. Now the next tool here is

category. Now the next tool here is Orchids. And Orchids is an interesting

Orchids. And Orchids is an interesting one because they've recently pivoted to being a desktopbased application where you kind of do vibe coding in this traditional kind of like or this very similar to bolt or lovable style

interface. you kind of have your

interface. you kind of have your built-in stuff like your database and authentication, but you're also building your app locally on your computer. So,

it's a mix between like a vibe coding tool and a desktop kind of code um editor or coding tool like cursor or wind surf would be. But for me, I just don't think they've found the right positioning yet. And they're a fairly

positioning yet. And they're a fairly early stage company that is making a lot of changes to their product and they don't quite know where it fits in the market yet. So, I'm going to also put

market yet. So, I'm going to also put Orchids. So, I'm going to put Orchids

Orchids. So, I'm going to put Orchids down in this C category because I think Orchids has potential, but I don't think they've just found the right direction yet. They rank really highly on

yet. They rank really highly on benchmarks. So, you'll get a lot of

benchmarks. So, you'll get a lot of success using the tool, and you do have the flexibility if you have your code locally to be able to use other tools with it, but they haven't quite found the right position for where they sit in

the market. And that kind of also

the market. And that kind of also introduces a bit of a risk for the longer term if you did want to actually use that tool moving forwards because you're not going to be sure exactly how they're going to change like their features or who they're going to cater

towards. But I would recommend trying it

towards. But I would recommend trying it if you are interested in a more kind of like vibe coding friendly desktopbased application. The next one on the list

application. The next one on the list here is emergent. Emergent have a really interesting product that's slightly different to other vibe coding tools in the space where you can create sub aents

and different kind of agents within their vibe coding platform, but it tries to keep things like fairly non-technical on the surface. So, it will do a lot of

these things like testing or like um code review with all of these different sub aents that you can create in emergent. But as you're using it, you're

emergent. But as you're using it, you're still using it fairly similarly to a vibe coding tool where you're prompting it in a chat box and then you're getting a preview on the right hand side. I'm

going to put emergent down here in this C category as well. I think emergent is interesting, but I'm I really struggle to figure out like who emergent is for specifically like is emergent for a

nontechnical or a technical person. and

they kind of had this mix of technical features and nontechnical features. And

I think where a lot of these vibe coding tools that aren't the biggest in the market are struggling is to like find where they sit, find their position in the market that isn't necessarily like

the all-in-one platform like some of these bigger products that are out there. Next on the list, we have Claude

there. Next on the list, we have Claude Code. And Claude Code is honestly

Code. And Claude Code is honestly probably the best coding tool on the market. The best generalpurpose agent on

market. The best generalpurpose agent on the market as well. Claude Code with Opus 4.5 is incredible at building applications. And you have the benefit

applications. And you have the benefit of it's not just in the terminal anymore. You can use it in an extension

anymore. You can use it in an extension in something like Cursor or VS Code. And

you actually get an interface in the chat where you can chat back and forth with it. And it looks a lot nicer than

with it. And it looks a lot nicer than using a terminal. I think using the terminal, if you don't know what claw code is, is basically a coding agent that runs inside of your terminal. Your

terminal is a textbased way of interacting with your computer. That

means that the agent can kind of do anything on your computer, including writing files and writing code. If you

don't want to use the terminal, you don't even want to touch that. A lot of people are put off by that, then you can still use Claude Code because there's the extension. You have the Claude Code

the extension. You have the Claude Code desktop and mobile app. And so you can actually run coding agents from your phone on your desktop in the extension in VS Code in cursor with Opus 4.5 is

the best coding tool on the market. If

you know exactly what you're doing, you have a good plan and you give it the right context. Claude Code is by far the

right context. Claude Code is by far the best pure application building tool on the market right now. is a little bit more technical and requires a little bit more learning because you really have to

know exactly what you're building and also because you really have to know exactly what you want to achieve and also have to give it the right context in order to be able to achieve that through documentation and planning and

all of that sort of stuff. But if you do those things, it is the most powerful tool that you can use for building applications. Next on the list, we have

applications. Next on the list, we have Google AI Studio. Now, I have a really weird relationship with Google AI Studio. I think Google AI Studio is this

Studio. I think Google AI Studio is this strange little vibe coding tool that only works in the Google ecosystem is very difficult to kind of get your code and use it elsewhere and it builds like

a very specific type of app really well.

But a lot of regular kind of web apps like not very well even if you use Gemini 3, which is their flagship model.

And so I think Google AI Studio for me is kind of one to avoid. I know they're working on it and they're going to update and add like a bunch of features, but I think the difficulty that I have

seen people in my community and people building apps with AI in going from Google AI Studio to getting something live where you can accept payments, have real customers, real users actually using your product. It's really quite

difficult. They don't make it the

difficult. They don't make it the easiest and it's really tightly coupled to the Google ecosystem. So, I am going to put Google AI Studio down here in this D. I'm going to put Google AR

this D. I'm going to put Google AR Studio in this C category because I think it's Google. They're going to develop this over the long term. It's

going to become something interesting over time. And maybe it's worth maybe

over time. And maybe it's worth maybe it's worth testing and trying out. It's

really really good for like per little personal apps or little game apps or kind of explainer graphics and like and that sort of thing. But for actual SAS

applications, for real applications where you're getting users, I think it's really difficult to use. Next, we have Google Anti-gravity, which is their kind

of flagship IDE. And I again, I have a lovehate relationship with anti-gravity because I love the concept of anti-gravity of this agent manager kind

of tool for coding agents, but the product is so not polished. It's so far away from where it needs to be compared to something like cursor which is so

much more mature. It feels so much prof more professional. It fails so much

more professional. It fails so much less. I think Google anti-gravity has

less. I think Google anti-gravity has potential but I don't think it's something that you can reliably use for building applications right now. And now

obviously you can absolutely use it and still build an application with any of these tools. The caveat I want to give

these tools. The caveat I want to give is you can absolutely use any of them to build an application, get it live and get it working. It's just the little details that we're kind of debating here, which is really and I do think

honestly like if you're thinking about which tool to use, like actually the approach and learning how to plan and learning how to prompt these tools correctly is a much more important thing

to to learn than to learn a specific individual tool. And so I would

individual tool. And so I would definitely lean towards learning that first. But we're trying to rank all

first. But we're trying to rank all these tools here. So, let's keep going and rank the rest of these. We've got

Replet Next, which is probably quietly the biggest non-technical vibe coding tool on the market. They're doing

incredible things. I really like Replet because they are not scared of the technical stuff. They give you access to

technical stuff. They give you access to all of these tools and they do it in a more kind of friendly vibe coding in more kind of friendly vibe coding style

interface environment. They're also

interface environment. They're also working really really hard to bring in different features as new models are released. Things like design mode,

released. Things like design mode, things like themes, things like connectors which allows you to connect to external tools, adding in MCP tools.

They have open router which is a way of accessing any AI model in your application built into replet. So you

can build any application using any of the AI models on open router which makes replet a really really great starting point for a lot of people. You can also get your project from replet into GitHub

and import from GitHub as well if you want. So you can so you can be confident

want. So you can so you can be confident that you can get your code out of GitHub and actually start working on it in another tool if you did want to. You get

the built-in database and authentication. So, it is a little bit

authentication. So, it is a little bit tied to Replet, but I think there's no reason why you shouldn't be able to build an application. Even with the built-in database authentication, even with a built-in database and

authentication setup in Replet and start getting paying customers, it's honestly a really good tool that continues to be the leader in the vibe coding space. So,

I'm going to put Replet up in this A category as well. Now, we have Cursor.

And Cursor is one of my favorite vibe coding or AI coding tools just in general. It has such a great user

general. It has such a great user interface. It might be a little bit

interface. It might be a little bit technical on the surface because you really do get visibility of all of the code in your project. It shows you the differences in code. It makes all of that very upfront. It's kind of on the

surface feels like a developer tool, but once you get into it and once you get familiar with it, it becomes something that's very, very friendly and easy to use. And so I think Cursor is probably

use. And so I think Cursor is probably one of the biggest and best tools that you can learn to build apps with in 2026, especially if you're serious about this and especially if you want to build

an application that's going to scale to a lot more users. Again, very similar to Claude Code, it requires a lot more planning and a lot more context up front. So you have to know really what

front. So you have to know really what you want to build and maybe how you want to build it as well as creating the context around like planning the app details, what features you're going to build, all of that stuff. But if you

give cursor that stuff and especially if you use Opus 4.5 in Cursor or whatever the latest model is at the time you're watching this from Anthropic, then you're going to be basically set to kind

of build any application. And you also, one thing I really like about cursor, and I actually think the combo of cursor and claude code is probably the best combo out there right now for building

applications with the AI AI, is that you get the browser view and you get the design mode in cursor as well. So, not

only can you code directly in cursor, but you can also see a preview of the app you're working on, even though that's running in a local development environment, right inside cursor, very similar to kind of like a traditional

vibe coding workflow. And then you can edit any of the design details by popping open the design panel and then making tweaks to your application live that you actually push to real code. I

think cursor is an absolute incredible product for building applications with AI and I would massively recommend it.

Now let's get on to Bolt which I think is honestly one of the best beginner vibe coding tools to learn. Again,

similar to Replet, they don't hide the technical stuff and they also use clawed code to build applications. So, if

you're wondering where should I get started on my vibe coding journey? How

do I get started learning how to build applications with AI and start playing around with these vibe coding tools? I

actually think Bolt is probably the best one to get started with because it makes it very very simple. It gives you access to all a lot of the same controls that you're going to be working with. If you

if you move to claude code or cursor things like forward/clear to clear your chat history, things like version control by syncing to GitHub, you get access to create branches in GitHub from

Bolt and you can sync two ways with GitHub. So you can always start a

GitHub. So you can always start a project in Bolt and then move to something like Cursor and Claude Code later. And Bolt is a great platform to

later. And Bolt is a great platform to learn on for building web apps and vibe coding. So, I'm going to put Bolt in

coding. So, I'm going to put Bolt in this A category as well. [snorts] Then

we have V 0. And I think V0 from Versel, especially combined with the Shad CN kind of UI library, which is kind of the the most widespread and widely adopted

UI library in software right now is quietly one of the best tools to build applications with and get started.

Again, you have that two-way sync with GitHub. You have a direct integration to

GitHub. You have a direct integration to Versell, which is a really easy way to deploy your application. You can buy a domain on Versell. You can build your application in V 0. You've got your UI library with Shaden all built in. If you

do want to take your code elsewhere, you can get it out using GitHub and build it, continue to build it in another product. I actually think V0 is a great

product. I actually think V0 is a great tool here to get started with as well.

Very similar to Bolt. You can kind of get started very easily with V0. Then we

have Lovable. And I think Lovable I have an interesting relationship with Lovable. Now, I think Lovable is a great

Lovable. Now, I think Lovable is a great tool to get started with, but they do hide a lot of the technical stuff. And

so, when you're going through using Lovable, you're not necessarily learning all of the concepts that might be useful if you did ever want to switch to another tool or all of the concepts that will be useful if you want to build your

app in the best possible way and reduce the amount of bugs that you're getting and build features where you can be confident that things are going to work.

I think they kind of hide some of those features a little bit. Just little

things like not having an easy way to clear the chat history. Um, those sorts of things like really make me a little bit nervous around using Lovable because

it can have a tendency to kind of do extra little bits that maybe you're not 100% sure of. Also, you can't choose the model that you're using with with uh Lovable, which you can do with all of

these other tools. So, you can actually select the level of autonomy and how powerful a model you want to use if you're using things like Vibe Code, Replet, Bolt, or V0. Whereas, you can't really do that in Lovable. You can only

choose between chat and build mode, which is using their kind of whatever model they choose to use. And I do think one of the best ways to build applications with AI is to kind of choose which model you want to use

depending on the task that you're actually doing. If you're doing

actually doing. If you're doing something simple, you can use a cheaper model. If you're doing something more

model. If you're doing something more visual, you can use a model like Gemini 3. And if you're doing a more complex

3. And if you're doing a more complex task, you can use a model like Opus 4.5 or like a higher autonomy setting. So, I

think Lovable is lacking in some of these areas. But what it lacks in those

these areas. But what it lacks in those areas, it kind of makes up for in other features as well. Things like the Shopify integration where you can basically build a custom Shopify site very very quickly. And I think Lovable

is basically the more consumerfriendly version of Bolt. So Bolt would be like a entry point into software engineering or into building applications. Whereas

Lovable is a kind of non-technical tool if you don't want to go any further and you want to build simple web apps and websites and Shopify stores, that sort of thing. So, I'm going to put Lovable

of thing. So, I'm going to put Lovable in this B category because I really like Lovable, but I think they're limiting themselves by not giving you access to these more technical features, but they're really well positioned if you're a nontechnical person and you just want

to build something simple. Next, we have Leap, which people on this channel will know I am a big fan of. I again am struggling with Leap at the moment. So,

Leap is a great tool for building full stack applications built on top of Encore, which is basically your backend and your database kind of infrastructure layer. and Encore is incredible. But

layer. and Encore is incredible. But

Leap is kind of not really keeping up as much with the current releases in AI right now. Things like the release of

right now. Things like the release of Opus 4.5 and Gemini 3 that really kind of take your AI coding to that next level of like not getting any bugs and also doing visual changes really really

easily and also having that kind of visual context of Gemini 3 to make the design incredible. Leap has kind of been

design incredible. Leap has kind of been a platform that traditionally has a little bit less good design, which is okay if you kind of know a little bit about design and you know how to prompt it. But now they're kind of lagging

it. But now they're kind of lagging behind a little bit with the latest model releases, the latest capabilities.

They have a bunch of great features that are connected to Encore. So you can still absolutely use it to build really really good applications. I have an app that I built in Leap called App Canvas, which is basically an app planning tool,

but I've moved to using Claude Code in cursor to build that now on top of Encore. So, I'm going to put Leap in

Encore. So, I'm going to put Leap in this C category because I think they just really need to keep up with the latest things that are happening in AI right now and in AI coding to kind of

introduce the latest models to find to kind of find their right position in the market as well as this kind of app builder that sits on top of Encore. And

where I see Leap kind of working is is basically very similar to Chef from Convex where Chef is a great tool if you want to build an app that sits on top of

Convex as the backend infrastructure.

And so Leap is a great tool if you want to build an application that sits on top of Encore as the infrastructure. You can

basically get yourself set up, take your code out of there and then work on your app in Claude Code or Cursor from that point instead of carrying on in Leap.

very similar to like if you want to set up a web app that's built on top of convex, you can do that in Chef and then take your code from Chef and continue to work on that in claude code and cursor.

And then the last two that we've got here are Windinsurf and anything. There

was a lot of stuff that happened with the Windinsurf team that got broken up.

Their founders went to Google. They

built anti-gravity. Now the Windsour team is part of Cognition which built Devon. And so I'm really unsure about

Devon. And so I'm really unsure about the future of Windsurf. I don't really know what's going on here. I feel like they have some big plans for 2026, but if you still want to build in Windsurf, you absolutely can. It's basically a

more kind of vibe code friendly version of Cursor. But if you're looking between

of Cursor. But if you're looking between the two, I would just go with what's what is the biggest company here. Which

which company is releasing the best features? Which is the most mature and

features? Which is the most mature and has the best kind of like functionality.

And I think Cursor is kind of the way to go here. So I'm going to put Windsurf

go here. So I'm going to put Windsurf down in this C category as well. And

then the last one we have on our list is anything. And anything is basically an

anything. And anything is basically an AI app builder that lets you build any type of application. Um from web apps to mobile apps. They kind of let you build

mobile apps. They kind of let you build both. And those are two different

both. And those are two different technologies. So it kind of determines

technologies. So it kind of determines from the beginning of your app like which technology it's going to use to build your app and whether you want a mobile or a web app. Although you don't if you're not explicit about that, it

can kind of choose that for you. And if

you don't know what the right path is, maybe you'll end up building an app that you're not 100% sure is going to work in the right place that you want. I've seen

so many people building web apps who actually wanted to build a mobile app in the community only to have to tell them that kind of their entire work that they've done on their web app is almost all lost because you have to rebuild it

from scratch as a React Native mobile app in one of these mobile app specific building tools or cursor or clawed code.

And that can be really really difficult and really devastating if you don't understand why you would build like a web app or a mobile app. And so I'm really unsure about this approach of like you can build any sort of

application across web or mobile. But

they do have a lot of good features in their tool. You can choose the autonomy

their tool. You can choose the autonomy level or the the kind of power of the AI model that you're using in the tool. You

get built-in database and authentication and there's an easy way of adding payments in anything as well. But again,

you don't get that easy kind of access to the code to sync with GitHub back and forth. You can only get your code out of

forth. You can only get your code out of anything. So if you take your code out

anything. So if you take your code out of anything, you then have to work on it and something else. You can't really get it back into anything. And so I'm going to put anything down here in this C

category as well because I think there's some limitations there. So this is the final tier list here. I think if you're going to learn anything in 2026 and you want to build applications, Claude Code

and Cursor is the way to go. I have just released Claude Code and Cursor courses on my community. And I've got videos planned for this channel going through a full build with Claude Code and Cursor

as well. So, if you want to learn how to

as well. So, if you want to learn how to build with Cursor and Claude Code, you can go over to my community at school.com/iapps

school.com/iapps or keep an eye out on this channel for more tutorials on both of those. But

these are the best tools to to learn to build applications with. at the moment.

They're by far the leaders in the space, by far the best coding agents, and you can even use them together. I like to use them together to kind of build apps in the cursor interface with Claude Code as my agent running in the extension. I

think that is one of the best ways to build applications. At the A tier, if

build applications. At the A tier, if you want to build mobile apps, I think Viveode is a great place to start. You

have everything you need in Vibe Code.

You don't need to get the code out if you don't want to. Claude Code is the agent that builds your mobile app.

You're going to have a load of success with Vibe Code. If you do want the flexibility, go with Rock because you can get your code out into GitHub and you have that two-way sync to be able to build it using another tool like Claude Code or Cursor. Or if you just want to use Claude Code or Cursor to build a

mobile app, you can just do that straight away. Replet and Bolt and Vzero

straight away. Replet and Bolt and Vzero are probably the best places to start off. If you're new to Vibe coding and

off. If you're new to Vibe coding and you want to learn the fundamentals, these are going to be the tools that you want to get started. They give you the access to the most features, don't hide the technical stuff and allow you to learn like the best practice and the

ways of kind of doing it without having the technical overhead of something like clawed code or cursor. And so those are really good places to start and actually just really good places to build simple applications as well. If you don't need something complex, if you don't want to

be specific or have full control over the code, you can absolutely build applications in these tools that can go live, get paying users, have everything set up and ready to go and actually scale as well. So you don't need to use

claw code or cursor. I just want to say that in there. And so those in the S and the A tier, these are the ones that I would focus on personally for 2026. And

now let's break down the best AI coding tools by category. I want to just go for through these categories here. So best

for internal or personal apps. I'm

actually going to break this down a little bit more and we're going to say best for business apps, best for personal apps, simple web apps, complex web apps, mobile apps, desktop apps, and best all round tool. So best for

business apps, I think I would go with Replet. It has the most features, the

Replet. It has the most features, the most options. It's the most mature

most options. It's the most mature company about of all the vibe coding tools. It's the easiest to get started

tools. It's the easiest to get started with. They have a load of security and

with. They have a load of security and compliance stuff baked in there as well.

I think Replet is the tool to go for if you're building business apps. If you're

building personal apps, I would go for something like Vibe Code here for mobile apps or I would go for something like Bolt to kind of get started building your app.

>> [clears throat] >> or I would go for something like V 0 to actually get an app up and running. V 0

has a V [snorts] 0 has a great interface to kind of building personal apps that you can use. Best for simple web apps, I would probably go for Bolt. I think it's the easiest one, most userfriendly to

kind of get started with for simple web apps to get things up and running, to get things integrated, and to start getting actual users onto your app as well. For complex web apps, I would

well. For complex web apps, I would absolutely go with Claude Code or Cursor here. Uh, best for mobile apps, we're

here. Uh, best for mobile apps, we're going to go with Vibe Code. Best for

desktop apps, I'm going to say Claude Code here is great for building desktop apps. You don't necessarily need that

apps. You don't necessarily need that cursor development environment. If

you're building a desktop app, you can just run clawed code in the terminal and get your desktop app running so that you can kind of build and then test it in your desktop app whether you're using kind of Tori or Electron to kind of do

that. And then the best all round tool

that. And then the best all round tool here I would say is absolutely cursor.

It covers so much ground in cursor. You

can run multiple agents. You have access to all the models. You have the design features. You have the preview in the

features. You have the preview in the browser. You have testing the agent

browser. You have testing the agent review, debug mode, plan mode, ask mode, all of this stuff. Honestly, cursor is the one to go for for the be as the best all round tool. Now, I realize that all

the apps I'm recommending here are basically black and white and orange. So

there seems to be a visual theme for these as well. But these are the tools that I would learn for 2026 if you're interested in getting started with building apps or you want to take your app building to the next level. And now

let's get into my final thoughts. So

that is my AI coding tool tier ranking for 2026.

The software that you should learn going into 2026 so that you can build any application with AI and then use that application to either build a business, improve your your own business. And I

think there is a huge opportunity for building software with barrier is so low now. All it does is just takes time and

now. All it does is just takes time and planning to actually build something that people will actually want to use to get started building applications with AI coding tools like claude code like

cursor like bolt v0 rep and learning these tools is really something that could absolutely into 2026. So, I highly recommend

into 2026. So, I highly recommend learning them or at least trying them out and experimenting, building little app ideas here and there. And if you are building apps with AI or you do want to get started, I've got a course breaking

down how to build apps with cursor, with claude code, and with how to plan, design, and grow them in my community over at school.com/iapps.

And you'll get full support on your app building journey to help you with whatever kind of goal that you have for building your app. If you enjoyed the video, don't forget to like and subscribe. It means a lot and it grow.

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Thank you for watching and I will see you next time. [music]

you next time. [music]