February 24, 2026
AI ate Next.js for $1,100
How we rebuilt Next.js with AI in one week
One dev + AI remake Next.js in a week — fans cheer, critics rage
TLDR: One engineer used AI to create vinext, a faster, cheaper drop‑in for Next.js, for about $1,100. Comments split between “historic milestone” hype, fears about Cloudflare support and AI clones, and jokes about Vercel beef — making this a flashpoint for how software gets built and sold next
An engineer with an AI sidekick just dropped vinext, a Next.js look‑alike that claims up to 4x faster builds and 57% smaller downloads — and it deploys to Cloudflare Workers with one command. The twist that sent comments into orbit: it cost about $1,100 in AI tokens to build. Cue the cheer squad vs. rage brigade.
Supporters like htch call it a “milestone moment,” saying it’s obvious in hindsight but still jaw‑dropping. The drama escalated with jdthedisciple’s “shots fired at Vercel,” since Next.js is Vercel’s crown jewel. Skeptics were loud: verdverm slammed Cloudflare’s customer support and warned that “AI‑Next” will be pain wrapped in hype. Meanwhile, switz worried about the new AI reality — the better you document your work, the easier it is to clone it — predicting a shift to “open core, private tests,” like the SQLite playbook.
Memes flew: “AI intern replaced the web team,” “Next vs. Vite in a steel‑cage match,” and a running joke about a $1,100 receipt that “ate Next.js for lunch.” Under the humor, a real split formed: some see a faster, cheaper future powered by Vite and vinext; others fear support nightmares and a world where open source gets more closed to dodge AI copycats. Either way, everyone’s watching — and refreshing those benchmarks
Key Points
- •An engineer and an AI model created vinext, a Vite-based, drop-in replacement for Next.js that deploys to Cloudflare Workers.
- •vinext reimplements the Next.js API surface (routing, SSR, RSC, server actions, caching, middleware) as a Vite plugin, not a wrapper around Next.js.
- •Early benchmarks on GitHub CI show vinext builds up to 4.4x faster and generates client bundles up to 57% smaller than Next.js 16.1.6/Turbopack.
- •The project cost about $1,100 in AI tokens and already has customers using it in production.
- •The article critiques Next.js deployment in serverless contexts, noting OpenNext’s fragility and dev-time constraints due to Node.js-only runtime; Next.js adapters API is early-stage.