TL;DR: Three days to ship a dashboard. The designer was unavailable, the Figma file had maybe 40% of the screens done, and the PM wanted something demo-ready for a client call.

📖 Reading time: ~29 min

What's in this article

The Situation That Made Me Actually Compare These

What I Mean by 'AI-Generated UI' (and What I Don't)

Setting Up the AI UI Side: v0.dev in Practice

The Traditional Design Path: Figma to Code

The Exact Moment v0 Won (and the Exact Moment It Lost)

Honest Pros and Cons Breakdown

Head-to-Head Comparison Table

When to Pick What — Actual Decision Rules I Use

The Situation That Made Me Actually Compare These

Three days to ship a dashboard. The designer was unavailable, the Figma file had maybe 40% of the screens done, and the PM wanted something demo-ready for a client call.…