My Claude + Design Impressions

Recently I wanted to share the app development process I went through with Claude and the notes I took. Building on my previous Cursor post, this time I raised the bar a bit and brought up a product from scratch with Claude.

Here is the summary of the process: an iOS app with SwiftUI, a backend with FastAPI (Python), and a VPS set up from scratch on Hetzner. A complex structure that makes calls to various AI models in the background. The strangest part is that I never went back and looked at a single line of code on either the SwiftUI or the backend side, and I never opened an IDE. I only dealt with the processes on the App Store Connect side.

How Did the Process Work?

From the app’s idea all the way to its architectural decisions, I moved forward entirely with Claude’s guidance. It very quickly solved serious mathematical and technical concepts that I couldn’t easily design on my own, and it helped me set up the right structure.

My usage habit was as follows:

• Terminal Focused: I used Xcode only for project setup. I ran the entire rest of the development process through the terminal with the Superpowers skill.

• TDD: Even though I didn’t go into the code and look, watching tests being written in the background and seeing those tests turn green one by one at every step gives tremendous confidence. Moving forward while being sure that the code it wrote works sped up the process a lot.

One of the rough spots of this process was the famous overconfidence of AI agents. While developing the project or after it is finished, you have to give the use cases one by one and definitely have them verified. Sometimes it skips such simple scenarios that, unless you ask, it won’t fix them on its own. As a solution here, you can either bring in various ‘review skills’, or, as I prefer at this stage, move forward with manual checks.

The other critical point is the need to feed Claude on backend and app security topics. Even if we have no knowledge of these topics, we need to raise our concerns and nudge the agent a bit so that it finds a solution. I’m adding this graphic I mentioned before: https://x.com/urklc_/status/2039460672077996308?s=20

Claude Design and the “Polish” Phase

The topic of design has always been a bit painful for me. When Claude Design came into play here, the whole picture changed:

• It suggested three app icons to me. I had a hard time choosing because they all looked very professional.
• Then it presented three different themes (design systems) and showed them on a few of my pages. I picked one of them. They were all extremely detailed and professional.
• Even better, it automatically applied the design I chose to all the existing SwiftUI views in the project on its own.
• Just as planning ahead while writing code greatly affects quality, here too it is critical to know what you want and to guide Claude Design correctly. It already shows you the way during the process.

Usage Limits

I use the Claude 5x Max plan, and even in intense 3 to 4 hour sessions I didn’t hit the hourly limits. The entire setup, brainstorming, and bug-fixing process consumed only 20% of my weekly limit.

On the design side as well, it was enough to develop a 7 to 8 page app with all its details (icons, themes, view updates). Only for dark mode did my weekly limits fall short.

But I have an important warning: as the app grows, managing know-how becomes critical. If you don’t keep the project’s knowledge as a summary and feed it correctly into new sessions, then while you build the app spending 20% of your limit, you start spending 30% of your limit to fix a simple bug. I will share my experiences with this “context management” and how it changes the rules of the game later.

Conclusion

The arguments of those who say “AI can’t write code”, “It gets stuck on large projects”, “It doesn’t understand UX and users” lose their validity with each passing day. AI doesn’t just write code; from the project’s idea phase to its design and architecture, it takes initiative at every moment and steers the project.

Right now my only wish is for my Claude Design limits to reset as soon as possible. I’m ready to give Anthropic whatever it wants to have that limit reset right away. :)