The Pieter Levels tech stack

Pieter Levels is one of the best-known indie hackers on X/Twitter, where he posts as @levelsio. He is associated with products such as Nomad List, Remote OK, PhotoAI, InteriorAI, and newer experiments built in public.

His technical style is famous because it cuts against the modern web development default. Instead of reaching for a large React framework, a complex monorepo, or a heavily abstracted platform stack, he has often described working with raw PHP, MySQL, HTML, CSS, jQuery Ajax, and plain JavaScript.

That stack is not fashionable, but it is legible, fast enough for many products, cheap to host, and extremely familiar to him. That familiarity is the point.

At the backend layer, the stack is PHP. PHP is an open-source server-side language that can be embedded into HTML and used to build dynamic web applications. For a solo founder, that means one file can often contain the request handling, database call, and rendered page output without a lot of ceremony.

The database layer is usually described as MySQL, the widely used open-source relational database. MySQL fits the pattern because it is mature, fast, boring in the best sense, and supported by almost every hosting environment.

On the frontend, the connector is not really “VanillaJS” as a formal bridge. The pattern is usually simpler: HTML and CSS render the page, JavaScript adds interactivity, and jQuery Ajax sends requests from the browser to PHP endpoints without reloading the whole page.

Around that core, the working environment appears to be command-line heavy: VPS servers, tmux sessions, and coding assistants such as Claude Code running close to the server workflow.

A simple PHP and MySQL product can be very performant because there are fewer layers between request, database, and response. Server-rendered HTML is cheap, cacheable, and easy for browsers to consume.

jQuery Ajax is old, but it solved a real problem: send a browser request, receive HTML or JSON, update part of the page, and keep going. For many SaaS workflows, that is enough.

The other speed advantage is human speed. If the founder knows every part of the stack, there is less translation work. You do not need to decide between five state-management libraries before shipping a pricing page.

The downside is visible too. Some Levels-style products can feel rough by modern UI standards. The interfaces may be fast and functional, but not always as polished as a well-designed React, Next.js, Tailwind, or component-system application.

There is also a maintainability tradeoff. Raw PHP mixed with HTML, inline CSS, and scripts can be productive for one person who knows the codebase deeply, but it can become harder for a team to onboard, test, refactor, and safely extend.

That is why this stack is better understood as a solo founder strategy than a universal engineering model. It works best when the same person owns product, code, infrastructure, and customer feedback.

The strongest lesson from Pieter Levels is not PHP versus React. It is repetition. He appears to use a similar technical shape across projects, which means each new product starts with less uncertainty.

When the stack stays constant, the founder can focus on the product itself: what to build, how to position it, how to get traffic, how to charge, and how to iterate from real usage.

That is a serious advantage for indie hackers. Learning new technology can feel productive, but it often delays the actual product test. Levels-style consistency forces the question: can this idea get users and revenue?

The newer version of this workflow brings AI into the same simple infrastructure model. Levels’ public archive includes posts about running Claude Code on a server and getting a VPS at Hetzner, while other developers have written about similar Claude Code, tmux, Tailscale, and Hetzner workflows.

tmux matters because it lets long-running terminal sessions survive disconnects. You can SSH into a server, attach to a tmux session, keep logs, run commands, and let work continue even if your laptop sleeps or your connection drops.

Coding assistants change the economics of this setup. A solo founder can keep a very simple production environment, then use an agentic tool to inspect files, make edits, run commands, and handle routine maintenance directly inside that environment.

Copy the principle before copying the tools. If you are already strong with PHP and MySQL, a Levels-style stack may be a good way to move quickly. If you are already strong with React and Next.js, switching to raw PHP just because someone famous uses it may slow you down.

The stack works because it matches the operator. Pieter Levels has years of accumulated habits, snippets, server knowledge, product instincts, and distribution. The technology is only one part of that system.

For a beginner, the safer lesson is to pick a stack, keep it small, and reuse it. That might be PHP and MySQL. It might be Next.js, Supabase, Vercel, and Resend. The repeatability is what compounds.

Trackk is built around exactly this kind of repeatability. Whether your stack is PHP and MySQL on a VPS or Next.js and Supabase on Vercel, Trackk helps you turn the stack into a launch framework.

You can create a reusable formula for your preferred setup: domain, DNS, hosting, database, auth, email, billing, secrets, analytics, backups, monitoring, and cost tracking. Then you can apply that formula to each new project instead of reinventing the checklist.

That is how the Levels lesson connects back to Trackk. The value is not choosing trendy tools. The value is making your tools predictable enough that you can ship more products, compare progress, and move each project toward users.

If you want a Levels-inspired approach, choose one boring stack and use it repeatedly. Keep the number of moving parts low. Prefer tools you understand. Deploy early. Charge early. Watch what users do.

For PHP builders, that could mean PHP, MySQL, jQuery Ajax or vanilla JavaScript, tmux, a VPS, backups, and a disciplined deployment habit. For Trackk-style React builders, it may mean Next.js, Vercel, Supabase, Resend, Cloudflare, Stripe, and Doppler.

The specific stack matters less than the operating system around it. The best solo founder stack is the one you can use again and again without losing momentum.