Has the cost of building software just dropped 90%?
by martinald on 12/8/2025, 7:00:48 PM
https://martinalderson.com/posts/has-the-cost-of-software-just-dropped-90-percent/
Comments
by: debo_
> I'm sure every organisation has hundreds if not thousands of Excel sheets tracking important business processes that would be far better off as a SaaS app.<p>Far better off for who? People constantly dismiss spreadsheets, but in many cases, they are more powerful, more easily used by the people who have the domain knowledge required to properly implement calculations or workflow, and are more or less universally accessible.
12/8/2025, 8:09:25 PM
by: nine_k
Had the cost of building custom software dropped 90%, we would be seeing a flurry of low-cost, decent-quality SaaS offering all over the marketplace, possibly undercutting some established players.<p>From where I sit, right now, this does not seem to be the case.<p>This is as if writing down the code is not the biggest problem, or the biggest time sink, of building software.
12/8/2025, 8:15:59 PM
by: JohnMakin
This article mentions cost to ship, but ignores that the largest cost of any software project isn't consumed by how long it takes to get to market, but by maintenance and addition of new features. How is agentic coding doing there? I've only seen huge, unmaintainable messes so far.
12/8/2025, 8:04:41 PM
by: BigHatLogan
Good write-up. I don't disagree with any of his points, but does anybody here have practical suggestions on how to move forward and think about one's career? I've been a frontend (with a little full stack) for a few years now, and much of the modern landscape concerns me, specifically with how I should be positioning myself.<p>I hear vague suggestions like "get better at the business domain" and other things like that. I'm not discounting any of that, but what does this actually mean or look like in your day-to-day life? I'm working at a mid-sized company right now. I use Cursor and some other tools, but I can't help but wonder if I'm still falling behind or doing something wrong.<p>Does anybody have any thoughts or suggestions on this? The landscape and horizon just seems so foggy to me right now.
12/8/2025, 7:58:54 PM
by: jdmoreira
I must be holding wrong then because I do use Claude Code all the time and I do think its quite impressive… still I cant see where the productivity gains go nor am I even sure they exist (they might, I just cant tell for sure!)
12/8/2025, 8:23:02 PM
by: recursive
Did I miss something or is there actually no evidence provided that costs have dropped?
12/8/2025, 7:58:46 PM
by: bdavid21wnec
I keep seeing articles like these popup. I am in the industry but not in the “AI” industry. What I have no concept of, is the current subsidized, VC funded, anywhere close to what the final product will be? I always fall back to the Uber paradox. Yes it was great at first, now it’s 3x what it cost and has only given cabs pricing power. This was good for consumers to start but now it’s just another part of the k shaped economy. So is that ultimately where AI goes? Top percent can afford a high monthly subscription and the not so fortunate get there free 5 minutes per month
12/8/2025, 8:19:15 PM
by: neilv
Copying GPL code, with global search&replace of the brand names, has always lowered the cost of software 'development' dramatically.
12/8/2025, 8:04:10 PM
by: paoaoaks
> written an entire unit/integration test suite in a few hours<p>It’s often hard to ground how “good” blog writers are, but tidbits like this make it easy to disregard the author’s opinions. I’ve worked in many codebases where the test writers share the authors sentiment. They are awful and the tests are at best useless and often harmful.<p>Getting to this point in your career without understanding how to write effective tests is a major red flag.
12/8/2025, 8:08:22 PM
by: an0malous
Then why is all my software slower, buggier, and with a worse UX?
12/8/2025, 8:05:35 PM
by: e10jc
I totally agree with you. I am working on a new platform right now for a niche industry. Maybe theres $10m ARR to make total in the industry. Last year, it wouldn’t be worth the effort to raise, hire a PM, a few devs, QA, etc. But for a solo dev like myself with AI, it definitely is worth it now.
12/8/2025, 8:22:37 PM
by: mwkaufma
Feels almost too on-the-nose to write "Betteridge's Law of Headlines" but the answer is obviously no. Look no further than the farce of their made-up "graph" of cost over time with no units or evidence.
12/8/2025, 7:24:30 PM
by: andrewstuart
If you’re quicker then competition heats up management wants more done, efficiencies are soon forgotten and new expectations and baselines set.
12/8/2025, 8:00:39 PM
by: on_the_train
Ai saves me like an hour per month tops. I still don't understand the hype. It's a solution in search of a problem. It can't solve the hard coding problems. And it doesn't say when it can't solve the essay ones either. It's less valuable than resharper. So the business value is maybe $10 a month. That can't finance this industry.
12/8/2025, 8:09:32 PM
by: qwertyastronaut
I don’t know if it’s 90%, but I’m shipping in 2 days things that took 2-4 weeks before.<p>Opus 4.5 in particular has been a profound shift. I’m not sure how software dev as a career survives this. I have nearly 0 reason to hire a developer for my company because I just write a spec and Claude does it in one shot.<p>It’s honestly scary, and I hope my company doesn’t fail because as a developer I’m fucked. But… statistically my business will fail.<p>I think in a few years there will only be a handful of software companies—the ones who already have control of distribution. Products can be cloned in a few weeks now; not long until it’s a few minutes. I used to see a new competitor once every six months. Now I see a new competitor every few hours.
12/8/2025, 8:03:08 PM
by: more_corn
Ask someone who builds software for a fee. Are you able to do 90% more? Fire 9/10 engineers? Produce 90% faster?<p>No, no, and no.
12/8/2025, 7:56:27 PM
by: jackie293746
[dead]
12/8/2025, 8:19:05 PM