Don't list "vibe coding" as a skill on your resume. Its original meaning is building software with AI without reviewing the code, which is the opposite of what an employer wants to hear. Instead, list the project you built, name the AI tools in the bullet, and claim only the parts you can explain and test yourself.
Should you put vibe coding on your resume?
You built a working app in a weekend by describing it to an AI tool. It's live, a few people use it, and it's the most impressive thing you've made this year. Now you're editing your resume and wondering whether "vibe coding" belongs in the skills line.
Short version: put the project on your resume, not the phrase. The reasons come from what the word actually means, and from what employers say they want.
What does "vibe coding" mean, exactly?
It depends on who you ask, and that's the first problem.
The term comes from Andrej Karpathy, a founding engineer at OpenAI and former AI director at Tesla. He described a way of building where you give in to the AI and "forget that the code even exists," and he called it fine for throwaway weekend projects.
Since then the word has spread. When Collins Dictionary named vibe coding its 2025 Word of the Year, as CNN reported, it defined the term broadly: using AI, prompted by natural language, to help write computer code. Under that definition, nearly every developer who uses an AI assistant is vibe coding.
Simon Willison, a software developer who writes widely about AI tools, argued against that broad use in March 2025. In his view, vibe coding means building software with an AI without reviewing the code it writes. If you review it, test it and can explain it, that's just software development with an AI helper. He sees real value in vibe coding for beginners and quick experiments, and advises keeping it to low-stakes projects.
So a recruiter who reads "vibe coding" on your resume might picture either meaning. One sounds current. The other sounds like "I don't know what my code does."
Do employers want AI skills or not?
They do, increasingly. That's the part the sources agree on.
The National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE) reported in July 2026 that more than a third of entry-level jobs in its employer survey require AI skills, nearly triple the share six months earlier, and that nearly 60% of employers are assigning interns projects that use AI tools. Some companies have made it explicit. When Shopify's CEO published his April 2025 memo, it said reflexive AI use was now a baseline expectation, with AI skill counted in performance reviews and hiring.
Notice how NACE describes AI skills: things like asking effective questions of an AI and checking its outputs. Willison's line for his own work is similar: he won't commit code he couldn't explain to someone else. The employers and the practitioners point the same way. Using AI is expected. Using it without checking is not the skill.
Where the sources go quiet
None of these sources says how recruiters actually react to the literal words "vibe coding" on a resume, and we couldn't find good evidence either way. Most pages that answer the question directly come from companies selling AI app builders, so treat their confidence with care.
What you can reason from is this: a resume line is a claim you'll be asked to back up. A vague skill label invites a question you may not want ("So you don't read the code?"). A specific project invites the question you do want ("How did you build this?").
What to write instead: a checklist
Use this before any AI-built project goes on your resume.
- Lead with the project, not the method. Name it, say what it does and who uses it, and link to the live version or the repo.
- Name the tools in the bullet. "Built with Claude Code and deployed on Vercel" is concrete. A tool in a sentence about real work beats a tool in a list.
- State what you did, not what the AI did. Scoped the problem, designed the data model, wrote the tests, fixed the login bug, talked to the users. Those are yours.
- Use real numbers only. "Used weekly by 14 classmates in my lab section" is better than "users" and much better than an invented figure. Small numbers are fine if they're true.
- Run the explain test. For every claim in the bullet, could you walk an interviewer through it on a whiteboard? If not, either learn that part or cut the claim.
- Keep a record. Your commit history, a short build log, and notes on what broke and how you fixed it are your evidence if anyone asks.
| Instead of | Write something like |
|---|---|
| Skills: vibe coding | Built and deployed [app name], a study-room booking tool used by 20 students, with Claude Code and Supabase |
| Proficient in AI coding | Used an AI coding assistant to prototype, then rewrote the scheduling logic and added tests after it failed on edge cases |
| Built a full-stack app with AI | Designed the data model and wrote the API with Cursor; reviewed and tested all generated code |
| AI-powered startup founder | Shipped a one-page tool, got 10 users outside my friend group, and wrote up what I'd change |
The examples above are templates. Swap in your own project, tools and numbers.
What if the project really was vibe coded?
That's allowed. Lots of good learning starts as a weekend experiment where you barely read the code. Be honest about the stage it's at. You can describe it as a prototype, and you can say in an interview that you built the first version quickly with AI, then spent time understanding and fixing it. If you never went back to understand it, that's a reason to do so before it goes on your resume, not a reason to hide how it was made.
If you used AI for a class project, check the course's AI policy before you list it. Some courses require disclosure, and a resume line shouldn't contradict what you told your instructor.
How STARC handles AI-built work
STARC's one-person company cohort assumes you'll build with AI. You don't need to know how to code, and week 0 sets up an AI coding assistant, git and a deploy platform. Even the application includes a 48-hour task: build a one-page tool with any AI tool, plus a short note on what went wrong and how you fixed it.
Each weekly build log asks what shipped, the numbers, what users said, where you're stuck, and how you used AI that week. The result is the kind of evidence this checklist asks for: a live link, real usage data and a written record of how it was built. There's no certificate; the product and the logs are the proof. Common questions are in the FAQ.
The short version
Don't put "vibe coding" in your skills line. Put the project there: what it does, who uses it, which AI tools you built it with, and what you did yourself. Claim only what you can explain, use only true numbers, and keep the commit history and notes that back it up.
Related questions
What does vibe coding actually mean?
The term was coined by Andrej Karpathy to describe building with AI while you "forget that the code even exists." Collins Dictionary, which named it its 2025 Word of the Year, defines it more broadly as using AI prompted by natural language to help write code. The two meanings are part of why the phrase is a poor resume line.
Should I list tools like Claude Code, Cursor or Copilot in my skills section?
You can, if you have used them on real work and can talk about how. A tool name means more next to a project bullet that shows what you built with it than in a bare list.
Will an interviewer ask about code that AI wrote for me?
Assume yes. Anything on your resume is fair game, so be ready to walk through how the project works, what you changed after the AI's first draft, and how you tested it.
Is it dishonest to leave AI out of a project description?
A resume isn't a disclosure form, but don't imply you hand-wrote something you didn't. If a class, employer or program has its own rules on disclosing AI use, follow them.
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Follow on XLast updated: 2026-10-29. Written by the STARC team. Rules quoted here come from our how it works page; if they change, this post is updated.
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