What is vibe engineering?
Vibe engineering is the name Simon Willison proposed on 7 October 2025 for the other end of the spectrum from vibe coding: seasoned professionals using LLMs and coding agents to work faster while staying accountable for the software they produce. On 23 February 2026 he added that “agentic engineering” was coming out on top as the name for it.
Origin Simon Willison proposed the name on 7 October 2025 in “Vibe engineering” (opens in a new tab), after Sergey Tselovalnikov’s “There is no Vibe Engineering” (opens in a new tab) of 31 March 2025 and Brendan O’Leary’s talk (opens in a new tab) dated 29 April 2025 had already used the words.
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Why it matters.
Willison’s post says LLMs “actively reward existing top tier software engineering practices”, among them automated testing, planning in advance and a culture of code review, so its advice carries over to agentic engineering, the name that won. For a policy, a job ad or a team charter, prefer that name: Addy Osmani wrote on 4 February 2026 that “the word ‘vibe’ carries too much baggage. It signals casualness.” You will still meet vibe engineering, as Manning’s book of that name is due in print in November 2026 (estimated).
Vibe engineering vs vibe coding
Willison named vibe engineering as the other end of the spectrum from vibe coding. The difference he draws is accountability for what ships.
| Criterion | Vibe coding | Vibe engineering |
|---|---|---|
| What it names | A practice: prompt, glance at the result, accept it | A discipline for “seasoned professionals” who stay accountable for what they ship |
| Who writes the code | The model | LLMs and coding agents, iterating in a loop |
| Who checks it | Nobody reads the diff; the human watches behaviour | The accountable professional, backed by automated tests, planning, code review and manual QA |
| What stops the loop | “It mostly works” | Production quality |
| Where the name came from | Andrej Karpathy, X post, 2 Feb 2025 | Proposed by Simon Willison, 7 Oct 2025; used earlier by Sergey Tselovalnikov (31 Mar 2025) and Brendan O’Leary (29 Apr 2025) |
| Where it breaks | When the software is for other people: Willison calls it “grossly irresponsible” there (6 May 2026) | As a name: Osmani says “vibe” “signals casualness” (4 Feb 2026), and agentic engineering is “coming out on top” (Willison, 23 Feb 2026) |
From vibe engineering to agentic engineering: how the name changed
One idea, two names: vibe engineering in 2025, agentic engineering by February 2026. Brendan O’Leary’s talk page shows the switch as a before and after.
| Date | Who | What happened |
|---|---|---|
| 31 Mar 2025 | Sergey Tselovalnikov | Posts “There is no Vibe Engineering”: “If an agent is used to generate a quick prototype and validate it with tests, that’s coding – not engineering.” |
| 29 Apr 2025 | Brendan O’Leary | Gives the talk “From Vibe Coding to Vibe Engineering”; its page reads “From Vibe Coding to Agentic Engineering” by 7 Feb 2026 (Wayback Machine captures) |
| 7 Oct 2025 | Simon Willison | “I propose we call this vibe engineering, with my tongue only partially in my cheek.” |
| 4 Feb 2026 | Andrej Karpathy and Addy Osmani | Karpathy calls “agentic engineering” “personally my current favorite”. Osmani, the same day: “the word ‘vibe’ carries too much baggage. It signals casualness.” |
| 23 Feb 2026 | Simon Willison | Adds to his post: “It looks like the term ‘Agentic Engineering’ is coming out on top for this now.” |
Questions about vibe engineering.
How is vibe engineering different from vibe coding?
Simon Willison described vibe coding on 7 October 2025 as covering “the fast, loose and irresponsible way of building software with AI”, “entirely prompt-driven, and with no attention paid to how the code actually works”. Vibe engineering is his name for seasoned professionals who accelerate their work with LLMs “while staying proudly and confidently accountable for the software they produce”.
Did Simon Willison coin vibe engineering?
He proposed it as a name on 7 October 2025: “I propose we call this vibe engineering, with my tongue only partially in my cheek.” The words were already in use. Sergey Tselovalnikov titled a post “There is no Vibe Engineering” on 31 March 2025, and Brendan O’Leary’s talk “From Vibe Coding to Vibe Engineering” is dated 29 April 2025.
Which name won, vibe engineering or agentic engineering?
Agentic engineering, by Willison’s own account. On 23 February 2026 he added to his post: “It looks like the term ‘Agentic Engineering’ is coming out on top for this now.” Brendan O’Leary retitled his talk “From Vibe Coding to Agentic Engineering”, and Addy Osmani explained the preference on 4 February 2026: “the word ‘vibe’ carries too much baggage.”
Is there a book on vibe engineering?
Yes. Manning lists Vibe Engineering: Best practices, mistakes, and tradeoffs by Tomasz Lelek and Artur Skowroński. Its early-access program began in December 2025, and the Manning page gives November 2026 as the estimated publication date, as of its September 2026 update.
The vocabulary of AI-driven development
Every name below is defined against vibe coding: who writes the code, who checks it, and what stops the loop.
Read the long-form guide: agentic engineering vs vibe coding
Sources.
The primary sources outside this site that this page relies on.
- Vibe engineering (opens in a new tab) Simon Willison
- There is no Vibe Engineering (opens in a new tab) Sergey Tselovalnikov
- From Vibe Coding to Vibe Engineering (talk page, Wayback Machine capture of 13 May 2025) (opens in a new tab) Brendan O’Leary
- Agentic Engineering (opens in a new tab) Addy Osmani
- Post on X about the name “agentic engineering” (opens in a new tab) Andrej Karpathy, X
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