Here are some of my recommendations for the best tech stack to build a project with. While the best tech stack is the one you know best, this should be a good list of technologies to consider.

Guiding Principles

Isomorphic Typescript

• Encourages code re-use
• Developers can move between FE and BE easily
• Easy to hire React + Node devs or to get someone up to speed
• Large amount of high quality libraries, code samples, online resources
• LLMs perform well writing Typescript

Optimize for launching quickly by writing less code

• Buy instead of build for things outside of core product
• Lean on services like Retool to do things that don't scale
• Use libraries that allow you to ship fast
• Use popular libraries with large communities in order to leverage LLMs being able to write code for you

Prefer code over config and DevOps

• Use auto-scaling serverless infrastructure wherever possible
• Infrastructure as code (IaC)

Tech Stack

Language
Typescript

Package manager
Bun: npm compatible replacement that is much faster

Build Tool / Monorepo
Turborepo: Simple to set up and integrates well with Vercel

Code Quality
Biome

Infra
Vercel: Amazing DX and wide range of features

Frontend

Framework
Next.js: Extremely fast to build an MVP and great DX

Design System
shadcn/ui for Tailwind using CVA

Forms
React Hook Form: Performant, less code needed to get up and running, and great Zod integration

Validation
Zod: Ergonomic API and large ecosystem of integrations

Data Fetching
tRPC: Fastest way to build and consume a type-safe API

Backend

DB
Vercel Postgres is Neon under the hood

ORM
Drizzle: Relative new ORM, schema built in Typescript with Zod integration

Jobs
Vercel Crons against http endpoints

Queues & Pub/Sub
Inngest: Typescript IaC for queues, pub/sub, and webhooks

Embedding/Vector DB
Pgvector: Store and search vectors in Postgres

Services

LLM
OpenAI

Payments
Lemon Squeezy

Messaging
Twilio

Auth
Clerk: A more feature complete managed auth experience with pre-built UI components

Feature Flags
StatSig

Ops
Retool: The fastest way to build internal tools, workflows, and even quick MVPs to test features

Logging
Sentry