𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗶𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗱𝗶𝗳𝗳𝗲𝗿𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲 𝗯𝗲𝘁𝘄𝗲𝗲𝗻 𝗺𝗮𝗻𝘂𝗮𝗹, 𝘃𝗶𝗯𝗲, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗰 𝗰𝗼𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴?

Long time ago we coded only manually, but then we started to vibe code. Yet, vibe code is something everyone defines differently.

The question is, can we take the best from both worlds and make something more useful. The answer is yes, and this is 𝗔𝗴𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗰 𝗲𝗻𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗲𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴.

Here is how they differs:

𝟭. 𝗠𝗮𝗻𝘂𝗮𝗹 𝗰𝗼𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴

It means you write every line and understand every decision. Nothing is a black box. The bottleneck is your keyboard, which means it scales to exactly one engineer. For safety-critical systems where every line carries liability, it remains the right call. Everywhere else, it is too slow.

𝟮. 𝗩𝗶𝗯𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴

This represents the overcorrection. You describe what you want, the AI decides the implementation, and you ship it. It feels fast at first. Then something breaks, and you are debugging code nobody on your team wrote or reviewed. Many vibe coded apps shipped with hype, but with security flaws, and even more increased technical debt, that their authors didn't understand. This is a very good example of a Dunning-Kruger effect. Unfortunatelly, many non-coders are in this group.

𝟯. 𝗔𝗴𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗰 𝗲𝗻𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗲𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴

Here you write a PRD before any code is written. Here you may have a few iterations of back-and-forth with agent. Then, the agent implements, opens PRs, and runs tests. You review the output, enforce architecture rules in code. The bottleneck shifts from writing speed to the quality of your own decisions. I except that we push more and more into this direction, recognizing different good paterns and best practices, as well as we did for manual coding.

These three ways of coding are a progression, and most teams are stuck in the middle one thinking they have already arrived.

Which one describes how your team works today?