The Future of Software Development: A Deep Dive into Replit with Amjad Masad

mjad Masad, co-founder and CEO of Replit—an AI-powered platform that’s making coding accessible to everyone. With 34 million users worldwide, Replit is one of the fastest-growing developer communities out there.

In this blog we cover how Lenny and Amjad explore how Replit is unblocking creativity for product builders—think 11-year-olds launching apps and product managers prototyping tools in minutes.

What is Replit? A Vision to Simplify Software Creation

At its core, Replit is about making software development easier.

“Making software today is very difficult, and we want to make it easier.” -Amjad Masad.

The traditional process of coding is fragmented: you need to download an IDE (code editor), set up runtimes (like Python or JavaScript), manage packages, and figure out deployment.

For beginners, this can feel like an insurmountable IT nightmare, and even seasoned developers can get bogged down in the complexity.

Replit’s vision is to streamline this process into a single, intuitive platform. It’s an all-in-one environment where you can write, run, deploy, and even monetize software—without needing prior coding experience.

With the integration of cutting-edge AI, Replit has become what Amjad calls “a developer in your pocket,” empowering everyone from students learning to code to product managers prototyping internal tools.

The scale of Replit’s impact is staggering.

With 34 million users globally, it’s not just a tool for hobbyists; it’s being used to build startups, personal tools, and even production apps in companies.

As Amjad shared, “There’s people everywhere learning to code on Replit, building startups, building personal software, personal tools.”

A Mind-Blowing Demo: Building a Feature Request Dashboard in Minutes

To truly grasp Replit’s power, you need to see it in action. During our podcast, Amjad gave a live demo that left me speechless. He showed how anyone—technical or not—can build a fully functional web application in minutes, using nothing but a text prompt.

Real-World Use Cases: From Startups to Enterprises

Replit isn’t just a theoretical tool—it’s already transforming how people work. Amjad shared several inspiring examples:

SMBs and Back-Office Tools: Real estate agents are building custom tools to manage data, replacing one-size-fits-all SaaS solutions with tailored software.

Prototyping in Big Companies: A public company (name undisclosed) used Replit to build and test a v1 of an app, which was then handed off to engineers for production.

Marketing Innovation: SpotHero’s head of marketing built a competitive analysis app to monitor competitors’ pricing, complete with a database and continuous updates.

Sales Engineering: A partner engineer at X (formerly Twitter) uses Replit to spin up prototypes for customers, showcasing how to use the X API.

Perhaps the most compelling story came from a tweet that went viral: an 11-year-old girl used Replit to build and deploy an app from scratch, simply because she had an idea.

When a skeptic replied, “You have to launch an app, host it somewhere, build a database, deploy it—there’s no way to do that,” her father responded, “No, that’s exactly what Replit did.”

These examples highlight Replit’s power to unblock creativity and execution, especially for non-technical users like product managers, founders, and marketers.

The Technology Behind Replit: A New Kind of Computer

How does Replit pull off this magic? Amjad peeled back the curtain on the technology stack:

Abstractions Layer: At the base, Replit provides a runtime that handles operating systems, package managers, and language runtimes. This means the AI can install any package across any language, including native Linux packages, without user intervention.

Multiplayer Editor: Replit’s editor is built on a multiplayer system, allowing real-time collaboration between humans and AI. The AI is treated as “another user” on the platform, coding alongside you.

AI Computer Interfaces (ACI): This is where things get wild. Replit has built a computer specifically designed for AI agents, distinct from human-computer interfaces (HCI).

Instead of forcing AI to use human tools (which is computationally expensive), Replit provides text-based representations of tools like shells, editors, and package installers, optimized for AI efficiency.

Foundation Models: Replit leverages models like Anthropic’s Sonnet for coding, OpenAI models for multi-agent systems (e.g., critiquing and managing), and custom-trained models for tasks like search.

“Large language models are alien creatures. They’re not like humans, so they have different behaviors. It’s unclear what’s the best way to give it an editor.” This bespoke approach to AI tooling is what enables Replit to deliver such fast, reliable results.

Skills for the Future: Generative Thinking and AI-Native Coding

The rise of AI tools like Replit is shifting the skills product managers (PMs), engineers, and designers need to thrive. In our Lenny's Podcast conversation, Amjad Masad highlighted two critical skills for this AI-driven future: generative thinking and AI-native coding.

Here’s what you need to know, including what to focus on and what to deprioritize.

Skill #1: Generative Thinking

Amjad introduced a powerful mental model: product development is like a factory line, with ideas at one end, execution in the middle, and consumption at the other. Historically, execution was the bottleneck—turning ideas into software took time and resources.

But with tools like Replit, “now you open up that bottleneck,” Amjad explained. “Actually, you become limited by how fast you can generate ideas.”

What It Means: Generative thinking—the ability to rapidly produce, evaluate, and refine ideas—is becoming essential. As Amjad noted, even he, a self-described “generative” person, is “running out of ideas sometimes” because Replit makes execution so fast.

Skill #2: AI-Native Coding

AI-native coding is a new paradigm, distinct from traditional coding. “I think learning a little bit of coding and not the traditional way of learning coding,” Amjad advised.

Instead of mastering tools like Git or algorithms, focus on working effectively with AI tools like Replit—prompting, reading code, and debugging.

What It Means: You don’t need to become a full-stack engineer, but learning just enough to unblock AI agents and understand app structure will amplify your impact.

As Amjad put it, “If you learn a little bit of coding just by talking to an AI, doing a little bit of debugging, building something with Replit, running into a problem and trying to fix it just using AI, you’ll learn a bit of coding.”

Amjad’s Law: Amjad introduced “Amjad’s Law”—the return on investment for learning to code doubles every six months. As AI tools improve, even basic coding skills (e.g., reading code, debugging) yield exponential returns.

“Every six months, these specific engineering skills are becoming more valuable,” Amjad clarified, because “it’s more to unblock the agent and understand the mental model of how this stuff is built.”

What to Deprioritize: For non-technical roles, skip traditional coding tooling. “As a PM, as a designer, as someone who’s not in your code editor every day, don’t worry about all the tooling,” Amjad advised. Tools like Git and package managers are abstracted away by Replit, so focus on higher-value skills.

The Future: A Billion-Dollar Company with Zero Employees?

Looking ahead, Amjad painted a provocative vision of the future. If AI continues to improve at its current pace, he believes it’s possible to build a billion-dollar company with zero employees, where:

Development is handled by AI.

Support is managed by AI.

The founder’s role is to generate ideas and steer the vision.

However, this future raises economic questions. If the cost of software development drops dramatically, how will pricing models evolve? Can you build the next Salesforce if anyone can generate a competitor overnight?

Amjad’s answer: the winners will be those who can iterate and innovate the fastest, staying ahead through generative thinking.

Replit’s New Developments: Meet “Assistant”

Amjad teased a new product called “Assistant,” a cousin to Replit’s existing “Agent.” While Agent is like a developer who builds entire projects from a PRD, Assistant is like a developer sitting next to you, making quick, reliable changes to specific features or UI elements.

It’s faster (operating in milliseconds) and more controllable, giving users the power to iterate rapidly without needing to know how to code.

Advice for Navigating the Future

Stay Agile: Traditional roadmaps are becoming obsolete in an AI-driven world. Be ready to pivot quickly when new AI capabilities drop, as Replit did with Anthropic’s computer use features.

Embrace Fluid Roles: Silos are breaking down, and hybrid roles (e.g., designer-engineers) are the future. Build a culture that encourages fluidity and experimentation.

Play with the Tools: The best way to prepare for this future is to dive in. Go to replit.com, subscribe to the core plan, and start building. As Amjad noted, Replit’s Agent is in open beta and improving rapidly, so now is the time to experiment.

‍