Part 3/9:
Replit began with a simple premise: allowing users to write and run code in the browser without extensive setup. This vision stemmed from personal experiences of frustration with coding setups in resource-limited environments. Over several years of hard work, the platform evolved, and by 2011, it gained traction on Hacker News, sprouting from a rough prototype to a widely-used application.
Innovatively, the team developed compilers to run multiple programming languages in the browser—a feat that propelled them into the limelight. As the platform matured, it became increasingly user-friendly, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic when demand for collaborative tools spiked.