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2x, not 10x: coding with LLMs in 2026

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Re: 2x, not 10x: coding with LLMs in 2026

#171

Post by sitzkrieg »

maybe i’m an edge case but for 99% of the day to day work i do (embedded, not x86), llms will confidently give me wrong code so many prompts in a row it’s a 0.5x factor. when i venture out to something more normie, like webdev on either side, it does better but still takes more time than if i sat and did it myself once over. i’m not exceptional, but certainly understand everything that has been generated at any rate.

i think LLMs are only a useful multiplier if you’re working on the plumbing parts, it’s never useful if you’re doing anything novel really.

if this bothers you, i am sorry and i wish you the best with your reddit trained auto complete. i write new code

Re: 2x, not 10x: coding with LLMs in 2026

#172

Post by zug_zug »

spaqin wrote: post #170

I'm pretty sure that just a year or two ago, software engineers were saying that coding was only a small part of the job; the rest is meetings, dealing with requirements, design, testing, maintenance. So, how can we expect a 10x boost in a productivity from improving a small part of the job - especially now if we have to clean up any mistakes the LLM makes?

Yeah that's a good point, in order to see a 10x gain it would require at minimum coding be 90% of your day [7 hours, 20min) (or somehow for AI to replace meetings)

Re: 2x, not 10x: coding with LLMs in 2026

#173

Post by bloaf »

nathell wrote: post #82
pantelisk wrote: post #55

While I agree with the premise, I think this angle only applies on work one was going to do no matter what. The real power of these tools is that there are so many ideas people would like to try, but never have the time or motivation to pursue. So the comparison is not only "built with and without LLM" but "would you even build this if you didn't have the LLM?". The gap in productivity in this case is much more wide.

I think the ideas worth pursuing still require substantial time and motivation, even with LLMs. Otherwise you just end up with a half-baked sloppy artifact that nobody will ever use or study, for a net negative benefit to humanity.

We have entered the era of small software, and no one knows what it will grow to.

Here's an example: my office has a few cars for employees to use as rentals. The number is small enough that it would never be worth any serious software dev to build a tool to manage, but large enough that its a moderate amount of work for someone to manage the requests/getting supervisor approvals/schedule changes due to breakdowns.

AI one-shot that guy a tool. Its now dead simple, he's got a calendar, automatic emails going to people's supervisors with click-here-to-approve links, rescheduling options, fleet management. It doesn't even look bad.

Who cares if its using some un-backed-up sqlite database in the backend, has some placeholder tab for a feature he changed his mind about, or violates the DRY principles a bunch or uses some inferior authentication mechanism. Its an in house tool, isn't mission critical, and it makes his life significantly easier.

Basically everyone is now a few prompts away from their own bespoke tools, and only they will be able to judge the benefit thereof.

Edit: to tie this more directly to the article, I would argue that this is an example of "infinity-x" coding, because the user was in fact not capable of coding a solution on their own without AI.

Re: 2x, not 10x: coding with LLMs in 2026

#174

Post by overflow897 »

twister2920 wrote: post #155
mardef wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not every engineering effort is a product in search of market fit or a community. Some things are already very useful as just a one shot. I just made a quick app to help me pack for a trip, it updated forecasts every day, let me know when rain entered the forecast at one of my stops and gave me a checklist that helped me quell my travel anxiety. The greatest thing that LLMs have done is allow many to achieve things t…

> gave me a checklist that helped me quell my travel anxiety. it's truly fascinating how many positive descriptions of AI gesture at emotional management. I think that's the killer feature of this technology -- it makes people feel good, capable, reassured -- without the risk and vulnerability of interacting with another human. I use Google Weather for my forecasts btw, no need to vibecode an app for that

Gathering forecasts for each leg of a trip only on the particular days for the particular location is tedious. Anyone can do it with google weather but why spend the time when you don't have to.

I can keep track of my expenses on a napkin but i'd much rather use a spreadsheet or dedicated app especially when that app is effectively free.

Re: 2x, not 10x: coding with LLMs in 2026

#175

Post by DrJokepu »

jvuygbbkuurx wrote: post #116
5555watch wrote: post #109

I'm probably a weird outlier. Coming from academia, it's ranging from 1x to infinity-x (as in, certain tasks wouldn't even be touched if not for AI). For stuff that I'm used to (R) I can write nice and compact spaghetti (long %>% pipes). I'm not comfortable when a working script doesn't fit the screen (plus a few scrolls max). My style is probably easy only to me. When I teach, I don't teach it in particular. AI give…

Infinity is a ridicilous statement. Even the work that wouldn't have been done before is now time away from work that needs to be done. At worst it's negative x.

Pretty sure this was one of those so-called “jokes” I have read about in a research paper once. American humor tends to rely on overstatement. This is contrast with British humor that more often builds on understatement.

Re: 2x, not 10x: coding with LLMs in 2026

#176

Post by 361994752 »

spaqin wrote: post #170

I'm pretty sure that just a year or two ago, software engineers were saying that coding was only a small part of the job; the rest is meetings, dealing with requirements, design, testing, maintenance. So, how can we expect a 10x boost in a productivity from improving a small part of the job - especially now if we have to clean up any mistakes the LLM makes?

Now you actually have very long meetings with AI, if you consider all these long design / explorer / post-poc conversations "meetings".

Re: 2x, not 10x: coding with LLMs in 2026

#177

Post by jeffybefffy519 »

sitzkrieg wrote: post #171

maybe i’m an edge case but for 99% of the day to day work i do (embedded, not x86), llms will confidently give me wrong code so many prompts in a row it’s a 0.5x factor. when i venture out to something more normie, like webdev on either side, it does better but still takes more time than if i sat and did it myself once over. i’m not exceptional, but certainly understand everything that has been generated at any rate.…

I do a lot of novel work, that is not setting up a webapp - and totally concur on the novelty point with LLM's failing hard.

Re: 2x, not 10x: coding with LLMs in 2026

#178

Post by bloaf »

moron4hire wrote: post #84
pantelisk wrote: post #55

While I agree with the premise, I think this angle only applies on work one was going to do no matter what. The real power of these tools is that there are so many ideas people would like to try, but never have the time or motivation to pursue. So the comparison is not only "built with and without LLM" but "would you even build this if you didn't have the LLM?". The gap in productivity in this case is much more wide.

Those sort of ideas are unlikely to yield major benefit, though. This is basically replicating the plight of the solo open source dev, writ large. Individual programmers have long built the thing they've cared about on their own time (essentially "for free" because, despite kindergarten economics theory, a programmer cannot usually monetize a marginal hour). And it usually goes that the project never gets adopted any…

I don't think this is the right framing, because I think it confuses the means and the ends.

Its like making a jig in woodworking. The measure of the jig's success is not whether it gets re-used or widespread adoption, its whether it made it easier to achieve some actual objective. Because the jig is a means to some other end.

Lots of these "we wouldn't have done it otherwise" applications are means, not ends.

Re: 2x, not 10x: coding with LLMs in 2026

#179

Post by xXSLAYERXx »

RegW wrote: post #137
bdcravens wrote: post #132

I'm probably in the 5x-10x range, but we are a very small team, and we've been accumulating a backlog of ideas over the years. I drive the architecture, and have almost complete autonomy over the work I do. I think someone in my shoes will see a greater result than someone trying to do the same thing in large team, with all the usual process and ceremony, only wanting to go faster.

Where as I'm stuck in a big team with a legacy codebase and lots of business rules, performing small incremental changes. So I spend my days banging the Esc key and shouting "Shut the f**k up!". Luckily I work remote. I'd turn it off again, but my usage is monitored and I don't want to look like a Luddite. So may be .75x to .8x range.

In my experience a legacy codebase is where LLM shines. What would take days to grok is understood and explained almost immediately. There was a bit of job security with being the one whose worked with IIFEs to manage state.

You must know the codebase well if the LLM is slowing you down.

Re: 2x, not 10x: coding with LLMs in 2026

#180

Post by [deleted] »

tristor wrote: post #157
wannabe44 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you worked with codebases where people produced slop even before LLMs? In such codebases LLMs are a godsend. They can churn around huge amounts of code and find needles in the haystack.

Since I'm on the Product side these days, I don't spend much time delving into the codebase at this point in my career. I can believe it though, as I've done quite a few personal side projects using langchain and various harnesses. The problem I see is not necessarily that LLMs build things badly (although I know that can also be true), its that because people are using LLMs to generate documents, we are then buildin…

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