Why vibe-remote Looks "Incomplete"
If you come from traditional IDE-based workflows, you might notice that vibe-remote is missing features you'd expect:
- No git branch creation or merging UI
- No built-in file editor
- No snippet or skill builder
- No diff review tool
- No merge conflict resolver
This is not an oversight. It is a deliberate design choice.
Designed for AI Native Engineers
vibe-remote is built for a new kind of developer — the AI Native engineer. An AI Native engineer does not manually create branches, edit files character by character, or click through merge conflict dialogs. Instead, they describe intent and let the AI handle execution.
In an AI Native workflow:
| Traditional | AI Native |
|---|---|
| Manually create a feature branch | Tell the AI: "create a branch for the login feature" |
| Open files, find the right line, type code | Tell the AI: "add rate limiting to the auth endpoint" |
| Review diffs line by line | Tell the AI: "review the changes and explain what was modified" |
| Resolve merge conflicts manually | Tell the AI: "resolve the conflicts, keep our auth logic" |
| Write boilerplate, configs, tests | Tell the AI: "add unit tests for the new handler" |
The AI is not an assistant in this model — it is the primary executor. The human provides direction, context, and judgment. The AI does the rest.
Chat Is the Only Interface You Need
vibe-remote provides exactly one control plane: chat. Every action flows through natural language:
You: create a new branch called fix/memory-leak and switch to it
AI: Done. Created and switched to fix/memory-leak.
You: find where the WebSocket connection is leaking and fix it
AI: Found the issue in client.go:142 — the connection wasn't being
closed on context cancellation. Fixed and tested.
You: commit with message "fix: close websocket on context cancel"
AI: Committed. 1 file changed, 3 insertions, 1 deletion.
You: push and create a PR
AI: Pushed to origin/fix/memory-leak. PR #47 created.
Building a branch picker, a file tree, a diff viewer, and a merge tool would add complexity without adding value for the target user. Worse, it would encourage manual work that should be delegated.
The Philosophy
If an AI can do it, you shouldn't have to.
Every feature we consider adding goes through this filter:
- Can an AI coding tool handle this reliably? If yes, we don't build a UI for it.
- Does the user need real-time visual feedback? If yes (like streaming AI output), we build it.
- Is this a human judgment call? If yes (like approving a deployment), we surface it clearly.
This is why vibe-remote has rich session management, real-time streaming, multi-provider support, and file browsing — but no code editor. You need to see what's happening and direct the AI. You don't need to do the mechanical work yourself.
What This Means in Practice
Things vibe-remote handles well:
- Starting and managing AI coding sessions from your phone
- Streaming real-time output as the AI works
- Browsing files and directories to understand project state
- Viewing git status and commit history
- Running multiple parallel sessions across different projects
Things you should tell the AI to do:
- Create, switch, and merge branches
- Edit, create, and delete files
- Write and run tests
- Resolve conflicts
- Generate configs, boilerplate, and documentation
- Commit, push, and create pull requests
Embrace the Shift
The transition from traditional to AI Native development is similar to the shift from assembly to high-level languages. Nobody manually allocates registers anymore — the compiler handles it. Similarly, nobody should manually navigate file trees and type code character by character when an AI can execute intent directly.
vibe-remote is the remote control for your AI. It's deliberately minimal because the AI is deliberately capable.