Automattic Launches Spacefast, a Deployment Platform for Vibe-Coded Apps
WordPress has long served as a foundational technology and content management system for websites—including TechCrunch itself. Now, Automattic, the company behind WordPress.com, is responding to the shifting state of the web with a new service called Spacefast, which lets users deploy vibe-coded websites and apps.
What Spacefast Does
Spacefast is designed to provide the underlying infrastructure that turns vibe-coded prototypes into functional websites, apps, or services. That includes databases, authentication, file uploads, email, and analytics. The product competes with platforms like Lovable and Emergent—both of which offer an interface plus deployment rails for vibe-coded apps—but positions itself as a more open alternative.
Users can connect Spacefast with a range of external agents and chatbots, including ChatGPT, Claude, Hermes, OpenClaw, Grokbot, Muse, Pi, Cursor, Opencode, and Amp. Alternatively, they can connect a Git repository to get started.
Origins in an Internal Hackathon
The product is led by Batuhan Icoz, who began working on it during one of Automattic's hackathon sprints earlier in the year. At the time, he was working on Beeper, the company's cross-platform messaging app, and noticed that his non-technical friends kept sending him Vercel links while exploring vibe coding.
"I thought there had to be a better way for everyone to set up and deploy their projects," Icoz told TechCrunch in a call. "Automattic already has good infrastructure, but we have been traditionally associated with just WordPress. I thought, why do I have to use Cloudflare when we have a CDN just as good? So I started working on what was called Stattic and now Spacefast."
Icoz eventually shared the solution with friends and continued adding features to make the product more dynamic. Automattic soft-launched Spacefast in September to gather feedback ahead of today's official launch.
Early Use Cases and Competitive Landscape
The company has seen a wide range of use cases, with individuals and organizations using Spacefast for internal mockups, slideshows, and offer-related websites. But Spacefast faces competition beyond dedicated vibe-coding platforms: productivity and design tools like Figma, Canva, and Notion have launched products that sit at the intersection of vibe coding, mockups, and presentations.
Icoz argues that, compared with something like Lovable, Spacefast's advantage is giving users a choice of agent and the freedom to use the solution their own way. The counter-argument is that some users may prefer not to choose at all—and would rather have everything figured out for them.
An Office-themed game built on Spacefast. Image Credits: Spacefast
via TechCrunch AI