--- title: My Current AI Dev Workflow link: https://steipete.me/posts/2025/optimal-ai-development-workflow/ source: steipete-me published: 2025-08-25T09:00:00Z updated: 2025-08-25T09:00:00Z first_seen: 2026-09-27T19:29:15.293681927Z summary: Went fully back to Ghostty, VS Code on the side, and Claude Code as my main driver. Here's what actually works after months of experimentation. content: extracted html: 2025-08-25-my-current-ai-dev-workflow.html preview: file: 2025-08-25-my-current-ai-dev-workflow.preview-d7946b9d87d4.webp width: 256 height: 134 color: '#efecec' images: - source: https://steipete.me/posts/2025/optimal-ai-development-workflow/index.png original: file: 2025-08-25-my-current-ai-dev-workflow.image-5d002b420656.png width: 1200 height: 630 variants: - file: 2025-08-25-my-current-ai-dev-workflow.image-ed283aba02e3.webp width: 320 height: 168 - file: 2025-08-25-my-current-ai-dev-workflow.image-38fdd09ef822.webp width: 640 height: 336 - file: 2025-08-25-my-current-ai-dev-workflow.image-173762d77fd8.webp width: 960 height: 504 - file: 2025-08-25-my-current-ai-dev-workflow.image-fc66a1805c27.webp width: 1200 height: 630 color: '#fdfafa' - source: https://steipete.me/assets/img/2025/optimal-ai-development-workflow/hero.png original: file: 2025-08-25-my-current-ai-dev-workflow.image-44112335524a.png width: 1000 height: 568 color: '#292c35' --- ![](https://steipete.me/assets/img/2025/optimal-ai-development-workflow/hero.png) **TL;DR: Ghostty + Claude Code + minimal tooling = maximum productivity. [Less is more](https://x.com/steipete/status/1952439355340943534).** It’s time for an [update on my workflow](https://x.com/steipete/status/1960114479028486429), which keeps evolving. After [going all-in on VS Code](https://x.com/steipete/status/1955781673670340796), I went fully back to [Ghostty](https://ghostty.org/) for my main setup, with [VS Code on the side](https://x.com/steipete/status/1954691261279146029/photo/1) to look up code and Cursor/GPT-5 for reviews (sometimes also the CLI). I tried [Zed](https://zed.dev/), just can’t deal with a terminal that looks [like](https://x.com/steipete/status/1955690682477134124/photo/1) [this](https://x.com/steipete/status/1959259921439969326). Still extremely happy with my [Dell UltraSharp U4025QW](https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/dell-ultrasharp-40-curved-thunderbolt-hub-monitor-u4025qw/apd/210-bmdp/monitors-monitor-accessories) - 3840x1620 makes 4 Claude instances + Chrome all visible without moving windows. VS Code’s terminal is too unstable, had plenty freezes when pasting in large amounts of text. Nothing beats Ghostty. ## Tools and Their Reality Gemini can be great, but its edit tools are [too](https://x.com/steipete/status/1942113964231442876) [messy](https://x.com/steipete/status/1955941943218713006/photo/1), so using it less and less. GPT-5 for reviewing plans works even better than Gemini. Yes, all of these work on main. I tried the whole [worktree setup](https://x.com/steipete/status/1956340397900177686), just slows me down. If you pick areas of work carefully you can work on multiple areas without much cross-pollination. Claude often makes a mess but it’s equally great in refactoring and cleaning up. Important to do both to not create too much technical debt. ## Planning and Context Management Having the initial topic in the [statusline + session ID](https://x.com/steipete/status/1958903434322526214) ([gist](https://gist.github.com/steipete/8396e512171d31e934f0013e5651691e)) in case I need to switch accounts or restart a session is super helpful. Using plan mode and iterating is key. Smaller tasks I do right away, bigger I write in a file and let GPT-5 review. Often I manage with small prompts, sometimes I brainstorm and it’s amazing how much sense agents can make out of my [incoherent thoughts](https://x.com/steipete/status/1958233967548850235). When I’m not refactoring I usually run 1-2 agents; for cleanup/tests/UI work ~4 seems to be the sweet spot. All depends on the blast radius of the work. ## The Hard Parts The hardest part is [distributed system design](https://x.com/steipete/status/1958573142726640116/photo/1), picking the right dependencies, platforms and a forward-thinking database schema. I’ve been building an incredible amount of custom infra, [admin pages](https://x.com/steipete/status/1958956225800151465), CLIs to help both me and the agents and that work did speed me up so much. Would have never done that with the old ways. ## Testing Strategy Bigger changes always get tests. Automated ones usually aren’t great, but the model almost always finds issues when you ask it to write tests IN THE SAME CONTEXT. Context is precious, don’t waste it. ## Less is More Even [removed my last MCP](https://x.com/steipete/status/1958679613489524952), since Claude sometimes would go off spinning up Playwright unasked when it could simply read the code - which is faster and pollutes the context less. Pick services that have CLIs: vercel, psql, gh, axiom. Agents can use them, one line in CLAUDE.md is enough “logs: axiom or vercel cli”. “Database: psql + one example how to load env correctly so the loop is faster” ## Results and Comparisons Got an insane amount done with this setup. Other CLIs/models still don’t come close. [Codex can’t search](https://x.com/steipete/status/1954593439347032167) (asking “google best practices” is usually better than context). Cursor/GPT-5 takes FOREVER and doesn’t share its thinking, so it’s hard to steer. GPT-5 also is much more literal in how you have to prompt it - it’s a great model but not the best agent, you have to be more precise and specific. Still don’t see how this could be moved to background agents. I steer the models a lot as I notice them drifting off - that’s much harder if they run in the background. The new rate limits will go into effect August 28 and that’ll definitely suck. Guess I’ll just pay up. No perfect alternative for now.