Vibe Coding Explained: What It Really Is and What the Data Shows
In November 2025, Collins Dictionary named "vibe coding" its Word of the Year. That alone tells you something about how fast this term has moved from a niche developer joke to mainstream vocabulary. But once you look past the headlines and into the actual research — developer surveys, security audits, and adoption data — the real story of vibe coding turns out to be more interesting, and more useful, than the hype suggests. This guide explains what vibe coding actually is, where the term came from, what the data really shows about how many developers use it, and what you need to know before trying it yourself. What Is Vibe Coding? Collins Dictionary defines vibe coding as the use of artificial intelligence, prompted by natural language, to assist with writing computer code. In plain terms: instead of writing code line by line, you describe what you want in everyday language, and an AI tool generates the code for you. The term was coined by Andrej Karpathy — a former T...