How I Built an App in 5 Minutes Using ChatGPT and AirTable

How I Built an App in 5 Minutes Using ChatGPT and AirTable

As someone who has spent years working in technology and studied computer programming, I’ll admit that coding was never my strong suit. Early in my career, I dabbled in programming, reviewing C code and experimenting with proprietary languages for the print publishing industry. However, I never had the patience for writing lines of tedious code, a task that, thankfully, is becoming increasingly avoidable thanks to low-code and no-code platforms.

What truly amazed and inspired me to write this text, was how effortlessly I solved a real world problem in just 5 minutes using only two tools: ChatGPT and AirTable.

Here’s a bit of context: I’m a partner in an AirBnb local accommodation management company in Lisbon, and I’ve always struggled to find a solution that meets the specific day-to-day management needs of our business. Traditional CRMs are designed for other industries and come with a hefty price tag.

For a while, I managed everything through Excel spreadsheets. But as the business grew and my time became more limited, I started exploring other options. I considered developing a custom solution in Bubble, but then I remembered AirTable — a tool I had discovered two years ago, so I decided to migrate my spreadsheets there to bring some order to the chaos. But I knew building the table relations and dependencies would take a lot of time.

One of the cool things about Airtable is that it comes with a mobile app that works really well.

 

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To my surprise, AirTable had recently introduced a new feature: the possibility to create an interface that functions like any software, best of all, it allows you to build structures through a simple prompt, much like in ChatGPT.

I compiled all my requirements, asked ChatGPT to generate a comprehensive prompt for the software I needed, and then pasted it into AirTable. In just a few minutes, and Voilà the software was up and running. Ten years ago, this would have required countless lines of code and weeks of development time!

Next task is to connect to AirBnB’s calendar so reservations will quickly be imported. The experience underscored the incredible potential of today’s low-code and no-code platforms. They’re not just making coding more accessible — they’re transforming how we solve problems, empowering even non-developers to create powerful solutions in record time.