John Rush Profile picture
May 29 48 tweets 18 min read Read on X
I've tried all (46 😵‍💫) AI Coding Agents & IDEs

[Factory, Cursor, Heyboss, Windsurf, Emergent, Wrapifai, Copilot, Lovable, Bolt, v0, Replit, MarsX, Canva, Devin, Github Spark, IDX, Stitch & more]

The most complete list ever made (with demos & notes):
1. @FactoryAI

An advanced AI coding tool: generates complex apps, docs, works well with large existing projects, has access to web search, MCPs, can run code on my local machine + UX is 🤌 . best for coders.

I'm building "Inbox agent" using this tool, gonna report back soon
2. @heybossAI

I'd say the most creative AI Coding tool on the market (.
Can build production grade apps, with backend and database.

I'm building my inbox agent here too, so far, I really love the design output.
Works great for non-coders.
3. @EmergentLabsHQ

Agentic Vibe coding tool. Handle entire apps with frontend & backend.

Works pretty fast and feels like a CTO or a tech cofounder.
The multi agent thing(coding agent, testing agent...) are cool too. I think it might turn into smth big.
4. Wrapifai.com
- best for form based apps(calculators, ai generators, etc)
- I use it to build mini tools for SEO or lead magnets
- 100% nocode. Super easy to use

I built this little app today listingbott.com/domain-authori… with 1 prompt and 1min.

5. @create_xyz
- it can clone a product when you drop the link to it
- has connections to things like the movie db, hackernews and more
- auth with one prompt

Good if you wanna create functioning products with just a few prompts.

6.
- perhaps the best for generating mobile apps from your phone
- also it's mobile-first iteself, basically "generate mobile app from your mobile"
- produces React Native apps (not just web wrappers)
- uses Claude 3.7 Sonnet

a0.dev
7. Cursor.com
- the best
- works best for coders and not such a good fit for nocoders
- can assist, autocomplete, refactor and even build entire modules/projects
Here its been asked to migrate from Tailwind v3 to v4

x.com/ericzakariasso…
8. @boltdotnew
- started as a side project of stackblitz and went huge raising $105M
- works for everyone(coders, nocoders, marketers...)
- has out of the box integration with supabase for data, auth..

I built several lead magnets using bolt

9. @lovable_dev
- fastest-growing EU based startup today ($10M ARR)
- native supabase integration
- the best AI+NoCode mix on the market (the wysiwyg part)
- takes in screenshots as an input and can produce full web apps

I use it instead of Figma 😃

10. @windsurf_ai (works well for advanced apps. my top 3)
- acts as a true agent
- can use the web search
- has a memory.
- best for lazy coders

11. Stitch from Google

- best for prototyping
- can be used by founders, designers, nocoders
- much faster than all the others

12. Grok Studio from X AI

My favorite way of playing with code. I think people could use it to learn coding (I strongly suggest all vibe coders to learn coding)

13. Canva Code

Perfect for lead magnets for founders, nocoders and marketers.

14. @augmentcode

- works in vs code and jetbrains
- built for coders
- can execute code, run terminal, find issues and analyze the code

Find performance optimization ideas in prod:

15. @buildwithmocha

- for non coders
- builds full stack apps from prompts
- 100% complete(auth, db, hosting, emails...)
- perfect for non tech people, e.g. for your grandma

16. @rork_app

text to app AI agent
- builds mobile apps
- publishing directly on TestFlight
- perfect for building mobile apps for noncoders

17. Clark

- ai agent to build internal enterprise apps
- can build an app from jira tickets
- a mix of prompting, figma like editing and coding

18. GitHub Copilot ( the OG of this game, started back in 2020 )
- can generate code
- handles large codebases
- can merge PRs, fix bugs, search code
- supports agent mode now and also it's open sourced

19. @Replit AI
- most advanced AI Agent for coding imho
- has two modes: Agent or Assistant
- true full stack app generator. Has its own server, db, hosting...

Here is the real app I built using it

seobotai.com/broken-link-ch…
20. v0 from Vercel
- best for making well-designed web pages or UIs
- doesn't work well for fullstack apps
- can use figma as a starting point
- lets you edit elements one by one

21. MarsX (my own product)
- a mix of AI, NoCode and High Code
- I built
@seobotai, @listingbott and @indexrusher using marsx
- it takes the whole coding world to the next level since it isn't a website builder, but "SaaS builder"

22. Devin
- not expensive anymore
- targets the corporate world
- acts as a junior dev in a dev team
- sends pull requests, works alongside you or your team. Doesnt work as well for me yet, idk why, feels like it works well for good repos. Mine is a mess

23. Webdraw
- best for people with zero coding experience
- totally genius UX
- free
- turns sketches into web apps

24. Tempo Labs
- Generates full-stack apps using a text or image prompt
- It starts by making an architecture and diagrams
- I think they have the best AI Coding UX, wow

25. Trae
- goes all the way from 0 to 1 via prompting
- free
- from Bytedance
- can do fullstack web apps
- for coders

26. Cline
- VC code plugin
- works for large codebases
- supports any LLM
- runtime awareness

27. Databutton
- from my friends from Norway
- backed by VCs who backed one of my startups
- has very unique approach, different from most of the players
- works great for true nocoders

28. Continue dot Dev.
- an open source alternative to Cursor
- great for those who wanna build their own AI IDE (like maker from Pear AI who forked it)

Image
29. Base44
- for noncoders
- all in one
- creates dashboard-like apps pretty well

30. Qodo
- for coders
- can write tests, refactor and generate code
- supports all llms(including deepseek)

31. Caffeine AI
- new player
- too early to say anything. for now just putting them into the list to come back to them later when they launch

32. Aider
- can genereate most of the things out of prompts
- has cool terminal UI
- acts as a pair programmer
- works locally

33. Pear AI
- entered into YC
- had a huge drama around forking a github repo
- had a mentor call with them, two very talented guys taking an alternative path on competing with cursor

34. Github Spark
- works well for small or demo apps
- still behind the "waitlist" for the technical preview

35. IDX
- free alternative to cursor
- can build mobile apps
- uses gemini

36. Tabnine
- mostly works as an advanced AI Autocomplete
- slowly getting into AI code gen

37. Amazon CodeWhisperer
- can generate unit tests
- help with coding

38. Jetbrains
- I'd expect them to be leading this whole AI Cod Gen thing. Back in the day their autocomplete and resharper thing were just so cool. But somehow, they just wasted it all. I hope they catch up.

39. ChatGPT code canvas
- great for nocoders learning tocode

Building windows 95 demo:

40. Haystack - An IDE built on top of a canvas
- really cool and creative idea for UX of a code refactoring with AI
- also does code reviewing

41. Claude 3.7 or 4 Sonnet.
- the best coding LLM

42. Claude Code
can search code, run tests, and push to GitHub.

Claude Code is a CLI tool that lets you delegate engineering tasks to Claude with full access to your codebase, tests, and GitHub - all from your terminal.
43. OpenAI Codex

- for coders
- works for existing repos
- seems like it'll compete with devin

44. Jules from Google.

- for coders
- can be used a bug fixer, or for simple tasks
- can review code

45. @AmpCode from Sourcegraph

- agentic (parallel) coding tool for coders
- from a company that knows what the code is really well
- for coders(IDE plugin)

46. Softgen

It took me 20 minutes to get my app done.
Compared to all other tools I've tried, softgen felt the more autonomous. I didn't have to debug things. It did it all on its own.

47. That's it.
Let me know if you know more.

Here are some of my own startups:
unicornplatform.com website and directory builder
listingbott.com finds all relevant web directories & lists you there
seobotai.com AI Blog generator for SEO
tinyadz.com b2b ad network for tech products & services
↳ More about me: johnrush.me

My newsletter: johnrushx.substack.com
How to build web directories: johnrush.me/directory-guid…Image

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More from @johnrushx

May 26
I acquired Unicorn Platform for almost $1M.

Since then, it went from 25k to 551k users.

I've literally tried every growth method I've heard of.
All my marketing failures & successes:

1. Partnerships with incubators.

I contacted all famous startup incubators and signed deals with most to place unicorn as a "perk" there.

I thought it'd become a passive stream of users, but I don't think I got even one paying user out of this. I canceled all these deals.
2. Paid ads.

I wasted lots of cash on google/meta/x/tt/reddit ads. No results at all for my 2-3 fig/mo budgets. Mostly clicks from bots & non relevant countries.

Now i run my ads on using my own TinyAdz. It works well, I plan to spend 5% of my profit on ads from now on.
Read 25 tweets
May 16
This never works:
→ Startup Idea → Plan → Design → Coding → Marketing→ Audience → 😣

This works ( sometimes ):
I launched 20+ startups using the following playbook:

Audience → Problem → Idea → Validation → Waitlist → SEO → One Feature MVP → Iterate → Marketing → Success.

See a full breakdown of each step 🧵 :
1) Audience.

- X, Linkedin, Reddit, DevTo, HackerNoun,
- 3 hours daily.
- Never skip it, just like a gym.

Every idea must start with an audience (unless u r a Steve Jobs level genius).
It'll help you build smth people actually want. Image
Read 12 tweets
May 12
The Automation Era Has Begun.

We're the first generation to make work & death optional.
I'm contributing to this by building AI agents to replace boring labor.

24 crazy demos (AI Agents, Robots, Coding, Humanoid, Drones, Girlfriends, Sport coaches, Construction robots & more):
1. Tennis robo coach.

I'm looking forward to seeing it play against nr1 tanked human player, similar to the great chess match between Deep Blue and Kasparov.

Most of the sport coaching in the future will be done by robots, that can do 1-1 coaching.

2. AI coding tools exploded the maker world, similar to social media turning everyone into a journalist or a blogger.

Rexan built an ai startup in 9 minutes (its an app that generates studio ghibli images for you) using @heybossAI

Read 28 tweets
May 9
It’s 2012.

I sold my bootstrapped startup, made my 1st mil.

I wanna build a unicorn, raise from big VCs, move to SF.

One day I meet a guy looking like a movie star.
This day is gonna change my life.

He makes a pitch:
“Imagine you sit on a couch with your girlfriend, she wants to watch a romantic comedy and you wanna see an action movie. You open this app, that has sliders for each genre from 0 to 100. You set Drama=40, Comedy=70, Action=60 and it shows you those movies magically filtered this way”.

I’m a big fan of movies, I watched every single movie from the top 500 on IMDB, and the guy looks like the next Steve Jobs, so I say: cool, I wanna join, I’ll be your Woznyak.

I invest around $100k and join as a CTO/CoFounder.
[The Mobile App]

We build this app in a few months and hire a team of people who watch every movie (10,000 movies) and categorize every minute of the movie into genres.
We launch the app and it goes viral.
Back then the app store was empty, people just find your app when you launch it.
We win the App awards, and we get into a 500 startup accelerator. The Startup Founder dream.
Read 20 tweets
May 8
In 2023, I decided to learn marketing & distribution from zero.

I had no followers on social media, no content, sales, or SEO skills.
In 2 years, I built a semi-automated distribution engine.

No team, no marketing budget, just me. The details: Image
Image
Image
1. Social media.

At first, i tried random things, and nothing worked. Once in a while, I'd get semi-viral content, but it didn't lead to a serious spike in followers or clicks.

Then, after trials and errors, I landed on this strategy:

> focus on one platform only until u reach 10k followers

> focus on followers more than impressions, because if people follow you after seeing your content, it means they respect you as an author and will read your next tweets and maybe check out your products

> focus only on high-effort content. Ignore all sh&posting and hypetrains, see content as a product people would pay for. If you dont think people would pay to read your next tweet, then this tweet doesn't deserve to exist.

> stick to one topic, never deviate, no politics, no wisdom, no nothing, just your main topic, so that people associate you with it and you earn the topical authority.

> post every single day. For 600 days. But analyze your past posts, to see how you can improve. See those that bring more followers and use them as positive reinforcement for your next posts

> always schedule your posts, so that you can read them the next day before posting. You'll be surprised but 95% of your own posts gonna look like sh8t when you read them the next day. So produce 3-4 posts per day, schedule them, then unschedul 3 of them and let 1 go live.

> ideally, your content must be useful for the readers, but also showcase your own product. See this thread, I'll be sharing my products organically within it.

P.S. I'm launching a tool for social media called SocialBot this month, it'll be an AI Agent to help you become better at social media, like your personal PR manager. Reply if you wanna be in the first early adopter round.Image
2. SEO.

I'm not gonna teach you on how to score millions of clicks on a highly competitive area, but I do know how to score thousands of clicks in non so competitive areas without doing too much work

> keep your blog under the same domain/blog path

> use .com, .ai, .dev, .io, .org

> try to find the best keywords for your biz and make sure your domain name is similar or it's a direct match (but shorter than 15 chars)

> the web pages should be server side generated, not client side. Otherwise google won't be able to read the text from them easily.

> robots txt should not dissalow google bots (use any online checker for this)

> have a sitemap (again, use online checker for your sitemap). Make sure all pages are present in the sitemap and submit your sitemap to google search console manually

> have meta title and description tags on all pages (do a quick kw research and make sure keywords are similar to the text in title/description. Also have an OG image.

> have h1 and h2 on every page with keywords that have some traffic (use google ads planner to research this or ahrefs/semrush/ubersuggest

> make sure the pages are indexed by google and bing (i have a tool @indexrusher that helps a lot with this)

> back sure you have backlinks to your home page and other pages (i have a tool for this too @listingbott )

> create 10-100 blog articles (my @seobotai can do it, or do it manually, use grok research mode)

> create mini tools to drive seo traffic, (use @wrapifai or other vibe coding tools)

> create a subdirectory under your main domain that overlaps with your topic (if you use @unicornplatform for your website, then it's super easy)

That's the basic effort for SEO. It takes an hour a day or less, and brings moderate results. Worked outImage
Read 12 tweets
May 6
How to be ultra productive:

(I run 20 startups simultaneously)

(( the tips most wouldn’t expect ))
1. Develop great memory, to ditch docs and notes. It’s 100x faster to put & pull information from your memory than from a computer.

I’d say this is the most important for being productive. Memory is like a muscle, the more you use it, the stronger it becomes.
2. Learn to switch tasks & contexts. When I chat with someone, instead of watching a “typing indicator” I switch to another task and then come back. Think of it as a CPU that processes commands on cycles. That’s what I do, evey cycle I touch many tasks, then on the next cycle I touch them all again. So there is never any “idle” time tor me.
Read 17 tweets

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