We'll show you our hand.

Why we chose it

Runes-based reactivity. Zero virtual DOM. Ships less JS than React. Admin and public site in one repo.

Honest tradeoff

Smaller ecosystem than React, but the DX is meaningfully better.

Why we chose it

Native TypeScript, 10–25× faster installs than npm. Built-in test runner. Same runtime in dev and prod.

Honest tradeoff

Not Node. Most packages work. A handful don't — we've hit zero blockers so far.

Why we chose it

Serverless, HTTP protocol (no long-lived connections), branching for dev. Edge-compatible. $0 to start.

Honest tradeoff

Latency is slightly higher than a co-located Postgres. Acceptable for web; not for sub-ms trading.

Why we chose it

Schema-as-code. Full type inference. Migrations you can read. No magic, no hidden queries.

Honest tradeoff

Less mature than Prisma. The tradeoff is worth it: Drizzle is faster and more predictable.

Why we chose it

In-process Postgres in dev — no Docker, no cloud DB needed. Just clone and run.

Honest tradeoff

No Row-Level Security in dev. We're explicit about tenant IDs in every query instead.

Why we chose it

Plugin-based: 2FA, magic link, social login, admin roles — all type-safe. No vendor lock-in.

Honest tradeoff

Newer than Auth.js / Lucia. Active maintenance, stable API.

Why we chose it

Our own agent engine: hexagonal architecture, LangChain tools, NATS messaging, skill packs, RAG.

Honest tradeoff

Not off-the-shelf. We built it because nothing else gave us the control we needed.

Why we chose it

Tool calling, RAG pipelines, model resilience. Abstracts provider differences cleanly.

Honest tradeoff

Can be over-engineered for simple use cases. We only use what we need.

Why we chose it

Deploy globally in 30 seconds. Sub-50ms page loads worldwide. Free tier is genuinely generous.

Honest tradeoff

Worker limits (CPU time, memory). Fine for our workloads. Very different from a traditional server.

Why we chose it

Real-time everywhere: admin dashboard, agent events, order feeds. No polling. No Firebase.

Honest tradeoff

Requires a NATS server. We run it alongside the app. Self-hosted or managed (Synadia).

Why we chose it

The obvious choice. Checkout Sessions, webhooks, subscriptions. Nothing else comes close.

Honest tradeoff

Fees. 2.9% + 30¢. Worth it for the DX and global coverage.

Why we chose it

Type-safe email with React/Svelte templates. Developer-first. 100 emails/day free.

Honest tradeoff

Newer than SendGrid / Mailgun. We've found it more reliable.

Why we chose it

CSS-first config. Faster builds. The new @theme syntax is elegant. Same utilities, less config overhead.

Honest tradeoff

v4 is recent. A few plugins haven't caught up. Core utilities are stable.