Experience Is the Only Thing That Will Set One Product Apart From the Next

Introduction

Something has changed in the last year or so, and I think most of us have felt it.

Building software used to be hard. You needed a team, a budget and months of work before anyone could use what you had made. Now, someone with an idea and an afternoon can build an app tailored to exactly what they need. People are making their own tools, their own SaaS products and their own bespoke apps, often without writing much code themselves.

I think this is brilliant. But it raises a big question for anyone who builds or sells software: if everyone can make the thing, what makes yours worth choosing?

I believe the answer is experience. Experience is the only thing that will set one product apart from the next.

Lots of versions of the same thing

The App Store numbers show the shift clearly.

According to Appfigures (opens in new tab), Apple's App Store saw around 557,000 new app submissions in 2025. That is up 24% on 2024, and it is the first meaningful rise since 2016. Appfigures credits AI tools and vibe coding as one of the main reasons, and adds that this "doesn't mean these apps are competitive on features or experience".

It has only sped up since. Appfigures reported that new releases on the iOS App Store were up 80% year on year in the first quarter of 2026 (opens in new tab). Sensor Tower data, reported by 9to5Mac (opens in new tab), shows new apps roughly doubling to about 560,000 in the first half of 2026.

Downloads have not kept up. In that same period they grew by just 2%, to 17.6 billion. In 2025 they grew by 3%.

So there are far more apps, and about the same number of people downloading them. More products are chasing the same attention. When that happens, being able to build something stops being the advantage. Everyone can. What matters is whether people want to keep using what you have built.

Vibe coding your parents' TV

A good example of this went viral on X on 17 October.

Gathin, a developer, posted that he had "vibe coded" his parents' TV (opens in new tab). Their Xiaomi TV was showing a sponsored ad before they could even get to Netflix. He gave Claude Code the model number, and it found the TV on the Wi-Fi, removed 25 of the manufacturer's packages and wrote a new launcher. In his words, it "looks like an Apple TV now".

The idea spread fast. According to the CleanYourTV project's README (opens in new tab), the post reached 7.4 million views, and people started doing the same to their own TVs. Android Authority (opens in new tab) covered other people doing something similar, along with some sensible warnings about bricked TVs and security.

What interests me is not the technical trick. It is why people bothered. Nobody did this to add a feature. They did it because the experience was frustrating, cluttered and full of things nobody asked for. They wanted something calm, simple and familiar. In fact, they wanted something that felt like a product they already loved.

That should be a wake-up call, and not just for designers working on their own little projects. It applies to large organisations too. If your customers are willing to open up your product and rebuild the experience themselves, the experience was the problem. Your competitor might not be another company any more. It might be your own user with an AI tool and a free afternoon.

Choosing a car by its screen

Cars are where I see this most clearly.

For decades, people chose a car by its colour, engine, seats, and how it looked and felt. Those things still matter, but more and more people are asking a different question first: does it have Apple CarPlay or Android Auto?

The data backs this up. McKinsey's Mobility Consumer Pulse survey found that almost half of car buyers would not buy a vehicle that lacked Apple CarPlay or Android Auto (opens in new tab), and that 85% of owners who have CarPlay or a similar service prefer it to the manufacturer's built-in system. Only 17% of consumers said they were satisfied with their car's existing connectivity offering.

McKinsey's 2024 survey of more than 30,000 people across 15 countries found that no CarPlay or Android Auto is a deal-breaker for 35% of buyers of petrol and diesel cars, and 30% of EV buyers (opens in new tab). When asked what they would do if it were taken away from their current car, only 35% said they would switch to the manufacturer's system. 52% said they would just use their phone, and 14% said they would change brands for their next car.

Think about that for a second. People will pick a car, one of the biggest things they will ever buy, based on whether it lets them avoid the software the manufacturer built.

That is not about features. Most manufacturer systems can do navigation, music and calls. It is about the experience. People want something they already know, that is consistent, quick and works the way they expect. They do not want clunky firmware that feels like an afterthought. A good, unified and memorable experience is now something people weigh up alongside everything else, and sometimes above it.

Make the user feel something

When anyone can build a working product, working is the bare minimum. The products that win are the ones that make someone feel something when they use them. That might be relief, delight, calm or confidence. It might just be the feeling that someone thought about them.

You get that from lots of small decisions done well. A transition that helps you understand where you have gone. A sensible default that saves a step. Copy that sounds like a person. An empty state that actually helps. None of these appear on a feature list, but you notice them, and you notice even more when they are missing.

A great time to be a UX designer

I think this is a great time to be a User Experience Designer.

But I also think the bar is going up. If tools can create a decent interface in minutes, "decent" is no longer what we are paid for. Craft and an eye for detail will separate one designer from the next. That means knowing why something feels right, sweating the details nobody asked about, and caring about how a product feels, not just how it looks or what it does.

The same goes for organisations. Companies that see experience as a finishing touch will find their products swapped out, worked around, or vibe coded over by their own customers. Companies that treat it as the product will be the ones people choose.

Everyone can make the thing now. The ones who make it feel right are the ones who will win.