Whiteboard IDE
Ranked 6 of 17 code review tools by recommenders
Open-source app that turns code changes into diagrams and an interactive diff view, helping developers check architecture before shipping; critics say you cannot edit files yet.
Open-source app that turns code changes into diagrams and an interactive diff view, helping developers check architecture before shipping; critics say you cannot edit files yet.
41 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 29
- criticize it
- 12
- approval share
- 71%
Recommended in 2 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: not recommended
- February 2026: not recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: recommended
- October 2026: recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 29 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 2.4 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 2 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, not met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Helps understand code changes before shipping
“we've found it super useful to quickly get a sense of your own changes before sending to colleagues or shipping”
Comment from 20 Oct 2026 in “Ask HN: How to deal with shipping AI-written code you don't understand?” “in my own experience, whiteboard is still quite helpful when it's important to understand the change going in”
Comment from 25 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” “This is really cool! I'm pumped for anything that makes it easier to review generated code.”
Comment from 25 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” - Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design”
- Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design”
Polished design and thoughtful details
“we've put in a lot of time and attention into the app especially and hope it shows in the details”
Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” “you can't deny there was some actual thought in the design”
Comment from 25 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” “got it straight away from the animation”
Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” - Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design”
Visual view of architecture and design
“It's always good to have such a visual method to check briefly what's there on architecture and design level”
Comment from 25 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” “we put a lot of effort into the diff viewer, tying the diagrams into the actual code, etc.”
Comment from 28 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” “It’s like CS101 and drawing UML diagrams.”
Comment from 25 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” Diagrams tied to real code
“we put a lot of effort into the diff viewer, tying the diagrams into the actual code, etc.”
Comment from 28 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” “not no-code at all (a big part of this project has been our semantic diffing engine)”
Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” “I think a lot of the value of whiteboard comes from the interactivity”
Comment from 25 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Cannot edit files; not an IDE
“The choice of the word "IDE" seems like it might get you in trouble”
Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” “it's not entirely clear what would make me jump to a new IDE”
Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” “what you wrote here does not sound like an IDE”
Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” - Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design”
- Comment from 25 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design”
Encourages letting go of understanding code
“I guess it's interesting and useful for now, but I don't think people are going to work at the code level much longer.”
Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” “basically encouraging people to "let go" of understanding what exactly your code is doing”
Comment from 25 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” Heavy Electron app, no Windows client
“So it's an electron app but you don't support editing or even viewing on the web? And no windows client?”
Comment from 25 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” “our diff viewer can definitely be optimized - it's 138Mb, yikes”
Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” “90% of the software engineers I know are on Windows”
Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” Diagrams may be inaccurate or outdated
“this will get out of date as a project progresses”
Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design” “One concern about accuracy of the diagrams.”
Comment from 24 Sep 2026 in “Show HN: Whiteboard (YC W26) – An open-source IDE for thoughtful software design”
Other code review tools people recommend
The four most recommended other code review tools, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| GitHub Stacked PRs | 64 | 63 | 50% | 3 | — | — |
| Gerrit | 60 | 12 | 83% | 12 | — | Approved |
| Graphite code review | 52 | 16 | 76% | 9 | — | Approved |
| CodeRabbit | 34 | 32 | 52% | 11 | — | — |
| Whiteboard IDEThis page | 29 | 12 | 71% | 2 | — | — |
What people said
40 of the 51 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“I felt strongly enough abt this to build an oss project around this too”
“we've found it super useful to quickly get a sense of your own changes before sending to colleagues or shipping”
“we put a lot of effort into the diff viewer, tying the diagrams into the actual code, etc.”
“I could use this. Thanks for sharing”
“Cool concept, and kind of fun.”
“I think a lot of the value of whiteboard comes from the interactivity”
“This approach clearly seems like the way to go with agentic coding.”
“This is really cool! I'm pumped for anything that makes it easier to review generated code.”
“you can't deny there was some actual thought in the design”
“basically encouraging people to "let go" of understanding what exactly your code is doing”
“in my own experience, whiteboard is still quite helpful when it's important to understand the change going in”
“It’s like CS101 and drawing UML diagrams.”
“So it's an electron app but you don't support editing or even viewing on the web? And no windows client?”
“This is a good development in terms of processing information for people.”
“some of the presented ideas are pretty cool, but am thinking that you'll get slown down by the IDE approach”
“It's always good to have such a visual method to check briefly what's there on architecture and design level”
“Seems like a big limitation for an "IDE"”
“this is exactly what I was looking for!”
“90% of the software engineers I know are on Windows”
“Awesome, keen to see where this goes.”
“You cannot currently edit files in Whiteboard.”
“not no-code at all (a big part of this project has been our semantic diffing engine)”
“whiteboard has been a powerful tool for us”
“I guess it's interesting and useful for now, but I don't think people are going to work at the code level much longer.”
“One concern about accuracy of the diagrams.”
“even though this tool addresses a few, use case for reducing cognitive load”
“It's helpful when it's critical for me as a developer to understand the implementation”
“it's not entirely clear what would make me jump to a new IDE”
“this will get out of date as a project progresses”
“what you wrote here does not sound like an IDE”
“got it straight away from the animation”
“Anything that helps with the "wtf did you just do?"”
“we've put in a lot of time and attention into the app especially and hope it shows in the details”
“Very happy to see a product like this.”
“a dedicated product that was just focused on these problems exclusively makes sense”
“our diff viewer can definitely be optimized - it's 138Mb, yikes”
“seems like 1 feature (a MCP with a GUI attached to it) rather than an entire product”
“The choice of the word "IDE" seems like it might get you in trouble”
“Cool idea will give this a try!”
“Loved that zed-inspired landing pages.”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.