Vibe Coding Benchmark: Building a Notion Clone

Vibe coding promises the world, but almost always under-delivers. Even the top platforms have major issues.

We recently ran the same kind of test for a Slack clone. If you missed it, you can read the results here: Vibe-coding Slack Clone Comparison.

Since people seemed to like that one, we ran it again. This time we tested the vibe coders on a Notion clone.

For those that prefer video, you can watch here.

Tools tested

Same prompt, run across every tool, all judged on the same rubric.

We tested:

• Converge
• Lovable
• Bolt
• Replit

The prompt

Make a collaborative text editor like Notion with these features:

• Real-time collaboration where multiple users can edit the same document
• Presence functionality for each document with a facepile
• Document organization:
• Private documents (only visible to the creator)
• Public documents (visible to all users)
• Simple sidebar navigation between documents
• Full text search over document titles
• Interface:
• Clean, minimal design with lots of white space and a neutral color palette (soft grays and whites)
• Focus on readable text and minimal distractions

Scoring checklist (10 points total)

• Auth (can you sign in)
• Backend (database and backend functions)
• Notion slash command functionality
• Real-time collaboration
• Active users in facepile
• Facepile update
• Create public and private docs
• Real-time sync (docs)
• Search (docs)
• Text formatting

Test setup

• Start a fresh project
• Use the exact same prompt
• Evaluate on the first generation only (no fixing)
• One point per working checklist item

Platform-by-platform breakdown

Score summary: Converge 10/10, Lovable 4/10, Bolt 4/10, Replit 3/10.

1) Bolt

First up was Bolt. The UI it generated looked fine, auth worked, and the backend tables existed, but the core of what the app was supposed to be was missing or buggy.

Docs would not sync across users or browsers unless you refreshed, which defeats the whole point of real-time collaboration and leads to accidental overwrites.

Presence indicators and the facepile were missing entirely.

Even simple editing caused UI jumps and state glitches. No Notion-style slash commands, no formatting, just a plain textarea.

Results

• Auth — ✅
• Backend — ✅ (documents are created, but syncing fails)
• Notion slash command menu — ❌
• Real-time collaboration — ❌
• Active users in facepile — ❌
• Facepile update — ❌
• Create public and private docs — ✅
• Real-time sync (docs) — ❌
• Search (docs) — ✅
• Text formatting — ❌

Score: 4/10

Bolt had some of the basics working (auth, backend, search) but completely missed the core functionality we were looking for. The lack of real-time anything is disappointing.

2) Lovable

Lovable was slightly better, but overall pretty similar to Bolt. It implemented auth and database tables, but there was no real-time collaboration of any kind.

Even worse than Bolt, one user could overwrite the text content in a doc from another without knowing it since nothing was in sync.

The facepile and presence indicators were missing entirely.

The editor itself was just a bare textarea with no formatting, no slash commands, and no structure.

Results

• Auth — ✅
• Backend — ✅ (tables exist, but syncing fails)
• Notion slash command menu — ❌
• Real-time collaboration — ❌
• Active users in facepile — ❌
• Facepile update — ❌
• Create public and private docs — ✅
• Real-time sync (docs) — ❌
• Search (docs) — ✅
• Text formatting — ❌

Score: 4/10

3) Converge

Converge handled the task extremely well. The app just worked and the backend functionality was solid.

Auth worked, the backend was fully wired up, and the generated UI looked the best. Real-time collaboration worked immediately across multiple browsers and users with no refreshes, no glitches, and no state jumps.

The presence system worked exactly as expected. The facepile updated in real time as users opened or closed a document.

The slash command functionality was the most impressive part. The depth of functionality was Notion-like with images, files, headers, dividers, and more.

Results

• Auth — ✅
• Backend — ✅
• Notion slash command menu — ✅
• Real-time collaboration — ✅
• Active users in facepile — ✅
• Facepile update — ✅
• Create public and private docs — ✅
• Real-time sync (docs) — ✅
• Search (docs) — ✅
• Text formatting — ✅

Score: 10/10

Converge was the only platform that built something genuinely usable on the first try. Not just a UI, but a real collaborative editor with all the Notion-style features working out of the box.

4) Replit

Replit was a mixed bag. It took about 30 minutes and cost $5 across two prompts, whereas every other tool finished in a few minutes.

It did not add auth or a backend by default. It did manage some basic real-time collaboration, two users could edit a document simultaneously, but other parts of the app did not sync at all, including document names.

There were no Notion-style slash commands, and the few text formatting options it generated (bold, italic) did not work.

The worst part came when I revisited the project a day later. Everything was completely broken, and given how expensive Replit is, fixing it would have cost even more.

Results

• Auth — ❌
• Backend — ❌
• Notion slash command menu — ❌
• Real-time collaboration — ✅ (worked in the doc editor)
• Active users in facepile — ❌
• Facepile update — ❌
• Create public and private docs — ✅
• Real-time sync (docs) — ❌
• Search (docs) — ✅
• Text formatting — ❌

Score: 3/10

Replit was not close. It managed some real-time editing, but everything else was buggy, slow, and far more expensive than the other tools. The project even broke overnight with no changes.

Final scores (highest → lowest)

• Converge — 10/10
• Lovable — 4/10
• Bolt — 4/10
• Replit — 3/10

Wrapping up

This test was similar to the Slack clone test. Converge did the best, and every other tool only checked a few boxes.

In short:

• Converge was the only tool that built a real collaborative Notion-style editor in one shot.
• Bolt and Lovable generated some UI but failed every real-time or collaborative feature.
• Replit was slow, expensive, and broke overnight, despite partially working real-time editing.

This is pretty representative of vibe coding today. Most AI app builders still struggle with anything real (backend logic, databases, functions, production behavior). They can generate prototypes, not usable apps.

If you try Converge, feel free to send any feedback, feature requests, or complaints in our Discord or directly to me. We want to build something people truly love.